153. The Other Side

I’ve been working all day, but it feels like I’ve achieved nothing. Despite my best efforts, I’ve failed to produce anything of note. I feel miserable because of this. When tangible results are lacking, the effort itself feels like a failure.

I’m stewing in my discontent when I receive a message from a friend. They want me to come to dinner this evening so that they can introduce me to someone — a person my friend claims I’ll find interesting.

I should be intrigued but all I feel is an intense revulsion towards the idea of going out. I’m hungry but I’m not at all interested in meeting someone new. I haven’t been out in weeks, but it doesn’t matter. I want to shut down. I’ve wasted the entire day, and I feel completely drained. I want to be separate from this infuriating world that is the source of my anguish.

Meeting a new person is especially daunting. I need only imagine what they might do to me in my present state. They might judge me as I am in this moment, pathetically weak and diminished. I can’t possibly offer my best self right now. And first impressions matter, regardless of what anyone might say.

I’m tired but I’m not unconscious, and I can sense my own pessimism. Why do I think the new person will be so judgmental? They could just as easily be kind and generous. And it’s not very often I get to meet someone interesting. But my misery has made me averse to even the possibility of harm. In my current state, I might collapse under the weight of the other’s presence. And then what?

My worries are dominant. To release myself from them feels impossible. It would require a kind of energy and attention I do not have. To simply go there and try my best feels like a step too far. I tell my friend I won’t be able to make it.

I stay home, I hide, and I lose. What I lose is the possibility of something good. It’s this possibility that lies on the other side of my worries — a possibility I’m currently unable to appreciate. It is this same possible goodness that is lost every time I stop myself from reaching for the other. As I extend my isolation, I drift farther and farther from that good.