As The Hours Bleed.

as the hours bleed.

gestalt

Here’s the thing… I don’t claim to know, nor did I ever truly feel I understood myself by any standard. But maybe one day I can decipher my own emotional nature….

My life has been notably the exact flip side of a simple story line and looking back, I often can’t discern the difference between events that were in my control (due to choice and relative action) and events that weren’t. I think subconsciously, all along, I’ve had far more of a hand to play in the cards I was dealt than I led myself on to believe, and that fact alone tends to replicate the worst parts of me. It’s a frightening thing, really.

I don’t think there has really been a moment in my life that I didn’t think things would lead to this point. Pick apart pieces of my past if you will, but I highly doubt you’d ever find the answers you were looking for. My world seems to be that of a folding picture book, only if the pictures were broken, and only ever perceivable as distorted and 2-dimensional. The uneasy feeling of knowing something should be a certain way but it’s not. That if you could see it from the right angle, perhaps reality could shape things back into a comfortable feeling of normality. But it never works that way does it. Sledged in a mindset revolving around making the best out of the worst case scenario, and re-training your neural networks to constantly prepare for the worst things that could possibly happen. I won’t ever claim to comprehend the point of view of another looking in on my life. I tend to do a fair amount of guessing, however and it can be as equally introspectively rewarding as it is existentially destructive. And it’s something I’ve had to come to terms with.

I think a lot about things I could never change. It’s a harmful aspect of my emotional nature that puts me into a frenzy between my heart and my mind, caught in between the crossfire 24 hours a day 7 days a week. It’s possible that I punish myself beyond necessary ends and the act of bettering yourself can find its way passed the threshold of a healthy form of self-awareness, to never being able to forgive yourself. In some aspects, I find it’s easier to address problems of those closest to me rather than my own. Maybe it makes me feel like I’m working on something constructive, all the while avoiding the truth of the real harms at bay.

It seems to be irrational really. It’s almost as if anxiety and existential doom have teamed up to dissipate any remaining emotional stamina you may still possess, and the feeling is relentless. A feeling that in most cases, has to be repressed so you don’t drop to your knees balling in public, and the pressure surrounding such reaction only makes the possibility of that outcome much more frightening. It’s hard to wrap my mind around if I think too deeply on it. I don’t know why I find myself chasing “feeling” so often. It’s a piece of myself that no matter how cautious I am when approaching the feeling, I can never stop myself from feeling the feeling. It takes a toll, because I find I can never seem to be satisfied in anyones company. And maybe wanting what we don’t have is a hardwired feature in the “humans monthly” magazine, but it’s far more than just that. It has to be. Why does my constant chase for love trump any and all other rational motive? Why is it that even friends I hold so dearly, consistently fail to replicate the atmosphere I need to feel like I’m worthy of love? Or that it’s possible for me to ever be loved? I have yet to find out who I know myself to be without it, and that’s possibly flawed, yes. But the pursuit is all I’ve really known, regardless of the anxiety that comes along with it. It’s like returning to the dark when you’re low to heal. A comfort blanket, if you will. And I think that up to this point, I held out for any extended version of love so that I could believe I was capable of feeling any part of it. Anything to reinforce my belief that I truly do live in an early 2000’s rom-com. Only, one or both of us die in the end.

I can’t change myself. I accepted that a long time ago and I could spend 4 more years “buckling down” attempting to be something I’m not, or i could just embrace the things that make me, me. The things that set me apart. But perhaps my cripplingly hopeless romanticism isn’t the worst thing about me. Until recently, I never questioned that in my movie, it made me unique. The longing for a love story isn’t THAT wrong, is it? Is it so criminal to want to spend the key plot points in your screen play with that special person? Or to have the lights fade down on the goodbye kiss at the end of a marvelous act II? To spend every minute of your screen time making those moments perfect? perhaps it isn’t THAT flawed, but maybe the problem lies in the motivation behind it. There’s a fine line between hope and obsession, and I may have crossed that line the second I was conceived, but it doesn’t make a difference. There’s a danger in loving love a little bit too much. There’s a fear that comes with romance, and as much as I hate to admit it, It’s ruined me. I’ve never been more happy and full of light than when the cameras are rolling, but on the same parallel, I’ve never been nearly quite as low and lifeless as I am when the cameras run out of film. And though the experience can inspire great stories, it also alternates a result of horrific, indescribably intensified, depressive emotion.

I suppose it tends to be about the chase. A first-time feeling is a fleeting one, that of which resides in a flame of infatuated desire that never truly dies out. Not completely. But it seems like over and over again the process finds its way back to the same scenario. Me, attempting to prove to myself that it is indeed possible for me to find love. And more importantly, that I can love someone else as intensely as I love that idea. Avoiding an obvious suspicion of previous trauma, I tend to only recreate the worst aspects of love. An intent in which all the highs will inevitably reach a tipping point and I can never seem to stop waiting for the other shoe to drop. Almost as if waiting for something good to end is part of what makes the story so special. A special kind of tragedy. A tragedy in the fact that there may not be anyone who could fully understand the methods of my love. That there’s a possibility there’s not a single one who could love me as intensely as I could love them. I liked to believe that someone could know me so well without realizing any of this, but that begs the question if there’s anyone that really knows the first thing about me. And that’s not unreasonable. But it feels selfish. It has potential to invent a toxic environment full of helpless wonder and worry for the turn the next chapter may take, because not even I can seem to predict where I’ll take it. But that’s part of it, isn’t it? Tragedy is what makes the happy ending so sweet. It’s what makes the pay-off that much more satisfying. Whether that’s right or wrong I could never know, but it’s not a habit I’m not exactly fond of having.

I don’t exactly know what I make of the concept of time. Some things could feel like a week ago but pass by your radar at a flying speed as minutes turn to days, days into months, months into years and eventually being able to fathom the timeline of your progress seems ungraspable. You could feel so content in a given moment, when so easily the loss of parts of your existence can sweep you off your feet, and be nothing but out of your control. Never living in that moment and always awaiting the next, or living in the last. And there only lies one inevitable conclusion. Love, life, contentment; all things you believed so heavily in that cease to ever yield the same meaning. In an honest way, as beautiful and comforting as retrospect can be, it rears its head at seemingly the worst of times. Typically, when things couldn’t seem to be going better. I can far too easily be re-immersed into a feeling even years after it’s passing. But I think the hardest part about accepting the past is facing the fact that the future didn’t end up to be anywhere close to what you imagined. That this new reality you’ve created veers so far off from your original path that it’s not even funny. The contrast of the two is by far the most depressing part, and thoughts of an alternate universe inspire a sort of mindset to constantly assess the differences of where you were then vs now. An almost angry feeling. A passive thought that makes you question the validity of the feelings you ever really thought you had. “Look how far we’ve come since then. Look at the hole we’ve burrowed into. Look at what we’ve become.” Day after day, moment after moment. Not fully realizing the speed at which the concept of time can dissipate so quickly at. But at the same time, learning to have compassion for a past version of yourself is vital, and you may not ever see yourself the same way. But that’s not always such a bad thing.

It’s honestly really funny how ironic things can turn out to be. At times, even the act of “getting to know” yourself can contradict its own purpose and leave you more confused than ever. Questions you never really had answered; feelings you never quite settled; emotions you never truly came to terms with. I suppose part of the exposition of a great redemption story is learning how to live with all of those things, regardless of ever finding what you think you needed. But for someone like me, that fact can sink your ship far faster than you could have ever anticipated. A black hole that takes pieces of your mind little by little till very little of anything much else remains. But I think I missed the point the first few times around. I always search for that thing that may bring me back to you. That somewhat bitter history I need to be fully prepared for you. And it’s not on this one occasion I’ve attempted to bring it out of myself. It’s just the first time I was really dependent on something other than you. The difference is, I never could find a way to love it quite like I loved you. I blame myself for that. Because I believed that each piece of my story since we parted, has been a way for me to prepare myself for us again. Making myself believe I was truly trying to love someone else but making excuses as to why it could never work. A conflicting mindset that scatters all parts of my mind in the most damaging ways possible. A love for something you can never truly be in love with. Maybe it’s evidence of an internal argument involving the parts of my brain at war over what the motivation should be. Answers separated from my executive I’ll never be made aware of. Do I want love? Do I want security? Validation? Do I find psychological satisfaction in recreating the loss of past traumatic events? Do I know how to process those emotions or live any other way? Maybe love is more complicated than it seemed at face value, and you can try to create it out of the understanding you think you already have of it. But maybe you can’t create that feeling. Maybe it has to walk through the door on is own terms. Because even now it always seems to revolve around you. Love. Because no matter what I do, I always find my way back to needing- you. There wasn’t ever a doubt in my mind till now that that had to mean something. But there’s only so much you can really do when self-crafting your own tragedy. And saying nothing while expecting it may work out in the ways you’d hoped can only lead to the sure end of a two way fantasy. And you’ll be left alone, to feel it all by yourself.

I couldn’t say I definitively believe in a greater power of the universe. Fate, destiny, “meant to be’s” they’re all part of a hopeful persons quandaries that if you simply go with the flow, things will work themselves out in the end - perhaps that was just me.- And it’s true. Life tends to find a way to teach us lessons we never really thought we had to be taught in the first place. Always finding a way to fit heartbreak into our life plans, whilst we indulge in our own insignificant feelings toward it, as if there were ever really a way to avoid it in the first place. I used to believe in it all. That perhaps there was a greater power dictating the things I may or may not be and truthfully, as relieving as it should feel, I ended up far more lost than ever when entertaining those ideas. Because it means that in that moment, you could never love me based on a story I never set for myself. Or that the extent of my wildest dreams could never come true due to the light touch of a greater force. That separation from us and the responsibility of what we are is far passed dangerous. It implies that truly, nothing is in our control. We can live and die never knowing who we were meant to be because we believed it was never our decision to make. And maybe there is a god. But perhaps the “universe” we put faith into is a lot closer to home than we like to believe. Waking up from that headspace is never the easy part, is it? Admitting to yourself that maybe - just maybe - you’ve been the problem. Our minds are far more powerful than many give it credit for, and rewrite your history in your memories however you like. At the end of the day, no one can prove your reality to be false, right? That is, unless you truly do understand yourself. And accept that knowing yourself possibly has a lot less to do with understanding who you are, and a lot more to do with accepting that you may never know yourself in the ways you hoped you would. I never can seem to see the full picture the first time around, and you could never truly know how long it may take before you’re finally able to open your mind. Or how long it may take before you can meet the real you. But time is pointless to measure. The self-doubt may never end but at the very least you can rely on this: “I may never know the full truth, or ever get the closure I really think I needed. And I’m okay with that.”

If we were all given a total of 3 major “enlightenment events” throughout our lives, I guarantee I surpassed that threshold 30 revelations ago. I always seem to think I finally understand the punchline, until I realize I never actually have any clue what’s going on. It doesn’t seem too destructive at face value, but the routine of digging my hole deeper and deeper is something I never seem to outgrow. It’s like hitting bedrock in Minecraft. Only in creative mode. And I have to fall off the ends of the earth to learn that there is such a thing as taking it one step too far. But I think the worst part about it is not having to admit to yourself that you were wrong - that’s the easy part. - What’s hard is finding a way to climb out of the mountains of rock and dirt, imbedded with the anxiety and depression you’ve laid for yourself over the years. An endlessly deep volcano that affects not just you, but also everyone else that you claim to love so deeply. The guilt that feeling carries is unmatched and is something you can never truly be sure you’ll outlive. And the thought of never coming back from that can eat your heart away piece by piece until there’s little left to classify it as a functioning organ. The things you always wanted; the plans you always wanted to make; they mean nothing if you sacrifice what you truly love in sake of an unrealistic ideal that ends up turning bad anyway. A feeling that was never yours to begin with. You play with the balance of someone else’s heart to make yourself feel like the bigger picture will be worth the pain you caused, just to paint your picture in the blood of the past. And though it can be very deeply poetic, it can haunt you for the rest of your life. And that. That is something you may never come back from.

I think I can affirmatively say what breaks my heart the most is the idea of having to give that up. An unspoken underlying connection, gift wrapped and given, made to look like a form of love that feels like poison. Like it’s there, but at such an obvious level will never be more than the extent of just that. A part of me I think liked that about it. There’s a comfort in never really knowing what will happen. And a “backup plan” mentality is far from what it is. it’s much, much, more than that. It’s hope. Hope that there is a feeling one deserves when being loved and giving love. A standard. And you can never really know what that is until you compare it to a lesser feeling. But I can’t say it was always roses prior to this. Far too many times it became a struggle, wrestling with the pragmatic nature of my mind while also following the true desire of my heart. It’s exhausting and I can’t truly describe such a feeling accurately. I suppose I pour those words into music rather than actually speaking them. In my own world, those words become said that way, and it’s hard to accept that one may have no idea what goes on in the depths of my emotions, because the reflection of truth could easily become clouded using actual words instead. Words that really mean nothing. I’m constantly trying to shape a reality of myself in the eyes of those around me. You were left out of that equation. Perhaps I could’ve said more. Perhaps I could’ve done more. I don’t regret learning the truth about those things and cutting myself some sort of a break is usually impossible in other cases. But I think can truly say I did everything I knew to be best, for everyone the stakes were up for. That my ignorance and negligence was out of love more than it was anything. But an internal, eternal tug-o-war can never be sustainable. Loving is a comfort of mine. Turning to our memory is what keeps my heart full, but is also the very weight that empty’s it in the first place. Every part of my heart was connected to an illusion in hindsight and I resent myself for it. I’m not saying I hate myself, I just hate my capacity for love. As striving for such feeling is all I know how to do and without it, I fear I lack any direction. I have yet to find out who I am without it. And my greatest fear lies in the truth that there’s most likely a reality in which those things never learn to love me back in the ways I’ve grown to be so psychologically devoted to them. Which is a very lonely feeling. And a reality I most likely reside in.

In the end, I like to think there isn’t much of my history that I regret. After all, you can only do what you think is best in each moment. But I think making that decision is the key of “being your best self” and failure to act on any decision at all can be considered a form of cowardice. Nonetheless, it doesn’t change the notion that the past is set in stone. It’s a stone I can’t ever seem to penetrate and I may have to learn to live with that reality. But maybe there’s a chance we don’t have to live with it. We may see ourselves as the same continuing being, writing our own biographies as we go through life. But our lives aren’t measured by paper and words, and the person at the end of the book won’t be anything like they were in the first chapter. It’s scary to consider the ideal that “no one ever changes.” Because I beg to differ. If the way we respond to life is based off of perspective, then that’s living proof that all we do is change. A single perspective switch can make all the difference in how you handle your emotions, how you love your significant other, how you react to the world around you; If those things don’t make up the person we are, I don’t know what does. I suppose the point I’m getting at is I could still punish myself for the past, if I really wanted to. I could spend every last bit of my breath agonizing over the fact that I could ever go against my core beliefs so deeply, but our memories are always clouded. Because even now, I have to believe I’ve been trying my best. That my intentions never were to hurt anyone. That I wasn’t pushing the limit to see how fun it could get, or fucking with someones emotions just to get some sort of feeling out of it. I was just trying to understand myself. And the byproduct of that is the true criminal, but who can blame someone for that? All we ever do is attempt to be good people, and there has to be something redeeming about that, right? That our intentions matter more than the final result? That maybe not everything is in our control, and blaming yourself for eternity doesn’t do anyone any good? Lacking the awareness to take responsibility when your carelessness has caused pain, can be a problem. But if I choose to be different today, how is that different from waiting till the end of the book? I don’t regret the past. Though in the ideal, things may have gone differently, there’s a reason they went the way they did. And it’s not because I lacked the capacity to make the same mistakes otherwise. I am the way I am, and was the way I was. And that’s simply how it is. I think more than anything, I just wish love didn’t have to be so complicated. Love can never be clear can it. There always has to be a catch. I suppose the beauty is in the complication and a life of love that’s easy, is unfulfilling. Part of the agonizing descent into what could be the rest of our insignificant, uninspired lives. I’m not sure that feeling will ever go away. There’s always something worse to worry about eventually and awaiting the consequences of your inevitable doom only brings significance to one thing. “Either get busy living, or get busy dying.”

I can’t spend the rest of my life watching the clock. I can’t sit here waiting for the end, dreading the notion that nothing truly lasts forever. And it’s not the hours bleeding away, filtering my life in the color red, writing my novel with the compilation of every tragic ending, ruining my perfect love story. It’s me. Living with myself may not ever be the easiest thing to do, and I may never come to understand it. I’ve been put in a game I never chose to play, but the odds are slim I’m playing at all. So I may as well see how it actually ends, and stop dreading the possibility of the worst case scenario.

“As The Hours Bleed”

~ Kyle Christian Avery Austin