Inside my mind is a place I am all too familiar with.
As a kid, my imagination created my reality. Most of my memories were made up in my own mind based on bits and pieces of the real world harmoniously strung together by my own imagination.
I’m grateful for it- it made my life more exciting, I felt more accepted and less lonely. But as I’ve gotten older, my mind has become more of a scary place than a fun, imaginative one. Quieting my mind and staying present has become something that almost feels impossible.
Upon arriving to Salt Lake City, it was the end of an 8 month period of darkness.
The freedom and light that had been stripped from me in the months prior, was coming back with a vengeance.
Almost like the feeling when you open the blinds in the morning after a deep sleep – that first blinding glimpse of the shining sun in the morning.
So much of what we had dreamed was finally a reality, but I was so trapped in my mind that I really struggled to take it all in. I felt a surge of emotions as we drove into the city. So much doubt, anxiety, fear as well as excitement, peace and joy.
“My mind is so loud right now” I told Camilo as we went to have breakfast one morning.
I felt as though my mind couldn’t catch up with my body.
I had spent the months prior defending myself so much, protecting myself, learning what I needed in my life and making the hardest decisions based on that. So much of my reality had to be in my mind more than ever because if I let myself take in the reality, I would’ve truly hit rock bottom.
With all of the practice from childhood of creating worlds in my mind, I got really good at it and, 8 months in, I was truly living in my mind.
This conflict of reality and of imagination began getting stronger causing a deep loss of a sense of identity.
I didn’t know who I was – I felt like I lost so much of myself, like I shed so many layers that I didn’t even know who I was today.
There I was, at a lovely breakfast with my husband on an amazingly beautiful day, living the life we had only dreamed of prior, yet my mind was thinking about these crazy hypotheticals, absurd outcomes of the future, and the most insane worries about my life and the path I was on.
Camilo has always done such an amazing job of grounding me, of bringing me back to the present when my mind decides to take the wheel. Looking into his eyes immediately helped me shut out the absurd thoughts running in my mind, and slowly began grounding me to the now.
As we walked back from breakfast, laughing at myself for getting to that point of insanity, I looked outside and saw the license plate on a Subaru that said “BE HERE”. I silently smiled and thanked the universe for the sign.
Be Here.
Be Present.
If we’re not present, if we’re not HERE, then our whole life will get ahead of us. Memories can not be created if we aren’t being HERE to make them.
Personally, I have to make a strong, active effort to remind myself and pull myself back into the present, it’s an ongoing effort. But what I do know, is that I refuse to allow the mind to completely hijack the vehicle that is my life.
As always, sending you lots of love <3
Until next time,
Cristina Marie
