Damned If I Never Learn

So I am at that time of year again, when I feel downright crazy. I’ve spent the last week or two trying to figure out why I feel alternately excited and passionate or obsessive and anxious. My summer plans are starting to fall into place, I’m making great progress at both of my jobs, people at my college are actually taking initiative on a campaign without me having to be the leader, I’m working on community projects that are interesting and fun as well as useful, and post-graduation is beginning to seem more exciting than daunting. When so much is going right, why have the things that bother me been getting at me?

In an odd way, I don’t really know how to deal with having energy. After prolonged periods of being depressed and discourage, I’ve grown unused to feeling as if I am ready and able to take on whatever challenges I my face. When I begin to feel this overwhelming energy, my heart starts to race. I can feel the adrenaline building, and I can only assume I am heading for a panic attack. Sometimes I actually stop myself mid-process, realizing that it is literally the expectation of anxiety that is bringing it to fruition. How much does interpretation justify what we are already feeling and how much does it shift the very nature of those sensations?

I’ve recognized for a long time that that crazy energy makes me more effective at almost everything I am trying to do. I depend on waves of it to sustain my all-too-ambitious lifestyle. It makes me a more dedicated activist, a livelier teacher, a more focused student. Lately, I’ve started seeing a downside to the mania (little “m,” not big). For some reason, it rarely registers to me that I can’t just take up my personal relationships with the same urgency as the rest of my life. A flurry of IM’s inspired by a sudden burst of energy isn’t going to make me closer to the people I care about. I can’t stack people like library books barricading me into my futon. I can’t chart our progress into spreadsheets, crunch some numbers, and have an output ratio. Not all too surprising granted, but damned if I never learn…