Wednesday, September 03, 2014

A Slight Malaise of the Soul

I have been suffering from a slight malaise of the soul over the last few days.

I cannot truly define it greater than that.  It is not fully a physical sickness - although I have been feeling run down.  It is not fully mental - although I have found myself distracted.  And it is not fully spiritual - although my soul seems leaden down by things I cannot fully explain.

It is a restlessness of sorts, a wandering sense of not being connected to anything or anyone even as I find myself surrounded by people and things to do.  It lowers my energy to the point that I do not feel like doing anything at all,  even as it steals my interest in doing anything at all. I feel trapped yet I do not want to go anywhere, alone in the midst of people, forgotten even though it is quite clear I am not, and fallen even though I am not aware I was taken down.

I do not like feeling this way because I cannot tie it to a particular event or action.  That makes it much easier, of course - after all, if I can find something to tie it to I can easily go back, look at what is going on, and then come to some kind of resolution or at least figure my way out of the situation.  That has been denied me right now as I seem to have nothing to figure out - only this vague sense of something being wrong, something which I am unable to identify to fix.

Every look inside turns awry; every attempt to name the thing falls into silence; every attempt to cheer myself only leads to hollow laughter in my own head.

I do not know this thing, and by thereby not knowing it I cannot understand it.  And by not understanding it, I cannot fix or repair it.  All I can seem to do, like a bull in a snowstorm, is set my face towards the wind and hope that I can outlast it.

2 comments:

  1. Chanced upon this and found kinship in this sentiment , I am turning 40 in the next few hours, feeling small and misplaced.

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    1. I think it is a more common feeling than many people tend to believe. Especially hitting at or around 40, I believe there is a realization that we have invested our lives in certain ways and the question comes up (with not always the happiest answer) of if we invested it correctly.

      Thanks for stopping by! - TB

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