burnt.out

My mama used to tell me that I overbooked myself to the point that I was burning both ends of the candle. Which sounds like it could almost be cool, except that it means the candle burns up twice as fast—and then the show’s over, because nothing’s left. Well, she was right. I’ve been burning both ends for so long that I feel as though there’s almost nothing left of me.

It’s pointless and I’m tired of outlining the ways in which I overextend myself. Suffice it to say that I’ve never had a true vacation and I’m in my fourth year of part time graduate school and full time work and my immune system is so compromised I’ve been sick six or seven times in the past nine months. It’s unhealthy.

I’ve completely lost my desire to attend to the regular responsibilities of my daily life. I no longer care about being a student, no longer care about learning, and am tied only to completion and grade-reporting. In my work, I operate on autopilot.

And when I’m home, I wander back and forth between the two rooms of my home and feel untethered and idle. Clearly there are tasks on my task list. But I ignore them and search for something else I can’t name, bypassing the extracurricular activities that once brought me joy, finally settling on the numbing and un-interactive experience of watching. I watch television online, I watch movies. I watch other people live through their blogging. All the while I envy their ability to engage, to create, to interact. I watch and feel I cannot act, cannot do, myself. So I stay up late doing nothing. I am withdrawn. I am constantly exhausted. I am too frequently alone. And I am too tired to set my own agenda—or else I can’t see the point in doing more than lying there, when there is no one here to witness.

I know that there are seasons and that this season of life will pass. I know that this season will be short, and that the next season is already hot on the heels of my season of darkness. But I feel, in this season, that I am shut down to really living. It’s the winter in so many ways. Cold and somewhat dead.

I live in the presence of others. I live on the weekends. I live at dinner with friends. I even live on the road to Mark. But during my week, I am a zombie, moving between obligations and doing what must be done, pushing through to the weekend, to the next opportunity to live.

Part of this experience is tied to a sense of loss of community. I am as responsible for this loss as are the members of my community who have left it. I withdrew as they excused themselves, I let go as they left. And what I am left with is a shell of my experience of what robust community feels like. This is why I live on the weekends, with Mark, this is why I panic when he goes home. In many ways he is my most real tie to life.

I don’t know what the point was in writing this. I don’t want sympathy. I don’t want to be encouraged. I don’t believe that this season can be prematurely brought to light. I know that I have to continue, and yes, to try, but more than anything merely to persevere until the season of darkness yields to the season of light and life. I guess I just wanted to exercise my frustrations, articulate my angst over what might otherwise just appear to be laziness and lack of motivation. Those are present, but it’s deeper than that. It’s tied to the wellness of my soul. It’s being alone in Indonesia again. It’s the feeling you get toward the end of a journey, when you know it’s time to move on to some other challenge, some other place, some other part of life; but you can’t get the pieces to work out right when you feel yourself ready. You have to wait, and be patient. Kind of like being ready before your time. Kind of like the surge of the flame before the candle is blown out—you’re ready to keep burning, but you’re at the end of your wick. The light’s burnt out and there’s darkness now, but I’m holding fast until the next candle of my life is lit.