medicating and dashes

Why is it that we medicate the uncomfortableness? Why is that we medicate and drown, and drug instead of sitting in the awkward, and often, painful moment where every fiber in your body is telling you that something is not right? Why is it so difficult to face the fact that there is something broken in our lives?

We medicate by flipping the channel until we find a show that makes us laugh or horrified or sentimental. And the second that it is no longer giving us that "high," we flip the channel to the next "drug."

We medicate by going out every single weekend, running ourselves into the ground in order to make sure that we are doing "life" right with money and interesting hobbies and a glamorous career and a confident fashion sense and the perfect partner and the "best" kids and… When does it stop?

What has happened to quietness? To stillness? To not doing anything? To being uncomfortable? To resting?

I don't have the answers. I am caught in this cycle too. But I want out. I want to start caring about the people around me. I want to know and be known. I want to be uncomfortable at times. I want to acknowledge what is broken in my life. I want to admit that I don't have it all together, that I struggle with taking risks.

Maybe that is my whole point. Maybe what I am trying to express is that there has to be more to life than just drowning out the imperfections. 

There is this saying that on your tombstone there will be two dates on it with a dash in the middle and that the dash is our living. So, what will your "dash" look like? If the dash took on the characteristics of your living, what would it look like? Would it be long and thin? Or maybe a fat, squiggly line? Maybe a double line? Would it be a colored dash? Or a sparkly one? What about a simple black line? Whatever your living, your dash, looks like, let's not drug and drown out the entire experience. 

Just one more thought about the whole living without the medicating. I'm learning that in order to make the most of my living without medicating, I have to do less. I have to set aside time to be quiet, and still, and even be uncomfortable.

But it is worth it.

And on that note, I'm going to find some quiet.