Play No More

What's wrong? What's amiss?
I'd be engrossed in something – some book, some study goal, some boy – and then I’d always be the one left. It’s like being kicked out of a shared house, and suddenly you’re on the street, your packed bags on either side of you. There are taxis that slow, windows scrolled down, drivers asking you if you need a lift. You shake your head. No, thank you. Because where would you go?

You could try to scale Mount Rushmore. Maybe try out the scene at Hollywood, just for fun, just for a little while, even if everyone thinks it’s superficial. You could aim to be the next best journalist, win the next award, try freelancing for Greenpeace, save a hectare of trees. But by now you know, you should know, that wherever you go, you take your emptiness with you. And it gnaws.

For a while I convinced myself I was burnt out. I fought too hard, I aimed too high; of course I was burnt out. I’d had enough of the chasing and working and one-minded ready-set-goals, and now my candle was out.

In hindsight, burning out was just another label for what I think really happened as I found myself in my mid-teens, and later in my late teens. Two things happened. Firstly, I’d reached a crisis that I didn’t understand and didn’t want to admit, because the chances of resolving it were zero. It was a spiritual crisis that still plagues me today. I was constantly on the hunt for something, any obsession, that could give me purpose and vision, but I was beginning to see how fruitless and temporary they were, and how I would have to start another cycle when the last one ended. Secondly, I’d realized, however unconsciously, that I had no sense of self. I based who I was entirely on my surroundings, on my personal achievements, on the people I hung out with, on what I could or couldn’t do, what I could or couldn’t appear as.

I don’t like this game so much anymore. I am fully aware that it is artificial, and rather spiritually devastating. But, as you see, I’m stuck.