Depression

This isn't really a blog post that I ever really wanted to write, or ever planned on writing, but with the way that things have been going lately, I feel like it's important for me to write. Not so much because I want people to be able to read about it, because I'd really rather they didn't, but because the words need to be said, and putting them out there where they can be seen gives me a sense of having actually said them.

I'm not an ok person. I have a lot of problems, and most of them I have avoided and ignored for far too long, because I didn't want to face the reality of them. I've been working on facing them, but have been forced into a position where I really don't have much of a choice but to face them anymore. And in facing those problems, I have to face myself, which is something that I really haven't done before. Which is really weird to say - how can you not face yourself? How can you look in a mirror and not know who you're looking at? I don't know - but that's what I do.

I always thought that I could get by anyway. Despite my problems, I'm a weirdly selfless person - I'm far more concerned with trying to help others get the most out of their lives than I am with getting the most out of mine. It makes me happy to be able to help others - genuinely happy. Working in retail, days when I feel like I was able to actually connect with people and help them do what they needed to do, and walk away a little better off, has made me happier than anything I ever did for myself in school.

So somehow I have to learn how to turn that want to help inwards. And part of how I plan to do that is through use of the other thing that consistently makes me happy - making things. There's something satisfying about crafting something with your own two hands - part of why I enjoy making my knife so much. And I've made many things throughout my life, many of which I've given away as gifts, because it makes others happy, which makes me happy.

So I want to make things for myself. Things that I would have made for others, perhaps. I want to make things that have meaning and stories behind them, even if they only mean anything to me. I want to find ways to feel purpose and meaning, and I want to create things that I can carry with me to remind me of those things. I suppose other people use tattoos for that kind of thing - I'm not big on tattoos. I'd rather have something I can physically hold that I myself made. And maybe it'll take me a while to figure out what those things are, and even longer to actually make them. But I'm gonna work on it. Or else I'm going to fucking lose it.