Severe Anxiety

BASICALLY (hopefully this is the short version) I think it's easy to spend a few years looking for like the perfect opportunity, that one strike that will make everything great -- in actuality most people only appear to have a strike, and in fact the "strike" was preceded by years of just trying to do something, not necessarily succeeding, and just generally being out doing the thing they care about in a way that put them in position to find and jump on the strike opportunity when it came along

for the record I am horrible at taking this advice, but I know it to be true

w/r/t that article:

I almost feel weirdly thankful to be aimless at this age, at this point in time in history because *nobody* expects early-20 year olds to be able to find a good job. I have a sorta aimless personality to begin with and even if the economy was great I'm not sure if my situation would be significantly different. At the very least there's a very acceptable excuse right now.

thanks for the advice nabisco, seriously, it makes sense, and frankly you seem like a dude who has it figured out in a lot of ways, which i mean as a compliment

and i know it to be true because its been true for me w/r/t to a bunch of opportunities in the past

writing for shitty arts mags for free seems stupid and lame but hey u turn around and youve actually become an ok writer and you have a solid body of clips and next thing you know youre the ceo of vanity fair

lol or so we all hope

xpost - hahaha, Lamp, the way that particular advice occurred to me was when a friend got a novel reviewed in the New Yorker, and I was like "geez, I wish I could get a novel reviewed in the New Yorker," and the blindingly obvious solution was: well you'd better pick up the pace finishing one, then, cause writing it is kind of a key step here

^^ sadly, Max, that "you have to do stuff before people can shower you with praise and riches for it" is all I have figured out thus far

the "strike" was preceded by years of just trying to do something, not necessarily succeeding, and just generally being out doing the thing they care about

word

but hey nabisco its a pretty good thing to have figured out!

wolcott @ vanity fair went to the mediocre state university in the region where i grew up, the place i despised the prospect of attending & basically having four more years of high school w/people i never wanted to see again. (i didn't go there.) also he dropped out. then he became kind of an ok writer..

oh xpost makes it pointless but: yah, nabs that is still really good advice

one thing that did really help me and its def a f(n) of my personality but getting a chance to work on creative projects *with* other ppl really helped - ive been 10x more productive w/r/t to my work since i started making games w/other ppl and that feeling of accomplishment really bled into more solitary things

dont know if that really works for writing novels but for scrnwriting it could

I think the thing I find in my 20s is the sense that you've sort of missed chances or wasted opportunities gets very strong, even when there are good things ahead. It's like for the first time in your life there is enough past to weigh on the present and the future, and trying to cope with this is sort of hard. I also find personally that the relative humility that comes with being in my 20s, while possibly making me a more considerate person, also fills me with doubt and a lack of confidence, or makes me more inclined to blame myself if something goes wrong.

Then I think "I shouldn't blame myself though should I? Maybe it's not my fault." Then I think "but sometimes it is my fault". I never know when to blame myself or not, and sometimes I feel I know I let myself off the hook too easily...

20s are so weird, that bulletproof teenage feeling is amazing, I wish I didn't use it to go and get fucked on drugs every week!

x-post it is so true that opportunities come along randomly tho. but also you know, you can never be sure what you want will be as good as you think either. this time last year I thought I had it completely fucking made, I was in a five star hotel for a month, being trained by a world renowned company. I thought "every mistake I made until now doesn't fucking matter cos here I am". Turns out the actual job was shit....so I guess the point I'm making is that it's hard to predict what "making it" is for you...

this year is going well too tho. I'm on the couch and there is a punnet of strawberries in the fridge.

a lot of the musicians i went to college with have been good at that stubborn persistence thing. some are really, really successful and some are less so (or at least less obviously successful), but everyone who stuck with it has come a long, long way since 10 years ago. and obviously the people who gave it up, uh, didn't.

i def regret not taking the opportunity to be involved in creative projects back in college, now i'm just not in an environment where that is easy even though i certainly know a few creative people - but feel like i wasted the time when i ought to have developed skills at something instead of just.. worrying all the damn time & spending ages on critical essays for class. seemed like a good path at the time but years later, wow, maybe i've returned to having some kind of romantic/purist bias against doing criticism & wish i had been writing short stories.

this year is going well too tho. I'm on the couch and there is a punnet of strawberries in the fridge.

― Local Garda, Friday, March 27, 2009 8:32 AM (3 minutes ago) Bookmark Suggest Ban Permalink

<3 that's the secret, i think, try to stay in the moment and have a bit of gratitude. and happy birthday for the other day, i meant to post on your thread but i forgot.

me too! my creative writing at the time would have been terrible (probably still would be, but at least now i have a much more developed sense of the parts of my writing that i hate), but still.

xp

xpthanks a lot! was a nice day. yep I think you're right. I constantly fret over the future but the present is mostly pretty good.

Creative projects, non-creative projects -- I dunno, Daria, so long as you were doing something, right?

xpost

yes, happy belated birthday, ronan! i'm glad it was nice.

i read the other day that if you ask someone right after they've done something, they'll say they regret not being conservative and cautious enough in how they spent money or time, but if you ask years later, they'll regret not having more fun. we may be feeling some of both of those effects now.

This whole line of advice may be particular to my experience, because I'm definitely the kind of person who'd normally be in danger of just coasting along doing whatever's in front of me forever -- but I'd guess that's not super-rare among ILX0rs.

or most people, i think.

weird for this thread to bump today...today of all days i'm feeling more optimistic and happy about my life than i have done in a VERY long time...employed, about to join a band (fingers crossed) and on the cusp of, yes, embarking on BIG SERIOUS writing endeavours

tell you what, max, we'll make an ILX novelists' club...we have to have written a certain number of words by a certain time to remain in the club, it will be a massively groovy challenge

something i said on ronan's b-day thread is that this year has had SUCH a wretched start that we are able to attack the rest of it as ppl with something to prove, something to gain, and i personally believe 2009 will respond positively to this

i.e. it's gonna be a GREAT YEAR

also srsly let's all get on board for this novelists' club thing for real i'm psyched

the worst is coasting along but also giving yourself shit about it! xp

xp - nabisco - sure,i was doing something. i got to be pretty adept at taking apart literature & finding interesting things to say about it, probably i am not too shabby at film criticism either (though would have to refresh my vocab, it's been a few years). and yet philosophically i feel like it's not what i would like to be doing. perhaps should reconsider that. and by 'criticism' at this point i certainly mean finding ways to explain why a particular work is interesting, not passing judgment - either it's interesting or not, and if not, don't bother.

or most people, i think.

yeah but most people are probably less (formally) educated than the average ilxor, which adds another level of obligation to your life. my roommates are in their late 20s and have no education or real future, but they never seem particularly stressed about it. whereas my college friends, even the ones who are objectively in much better situations, are very stressed.

at 29, i am finally coming to terms with career anxiety. seeing a lot of my friends doing really well, doing amazing things, was really bumming me out cuz i felt like i had zero skills/knowledge/talent. stuck in retail/hospitality, i was freaking out that this was the rest of my life and it was just a miserable thought, but recently i've accepted that yes, i probably will spend my working life in retail, but hey i can actually manage a store and earn some not-awful money, and it's something i'm pretty decent at doing. it sucks, indeed, but the fact is that someone has to do it - not everyone gets to be the talented painter or the original and striking novelist. part of what helped me in accepting this as my 'fate' was finding an artsy thing i love doing and am a little bit good at; it's not something i could go into full time in the foreseeable future, but it's satisfying and i can make a little money at it eventually.

also ronan completely otm

ok i am having a status anxiety moment over a guy i am "friends" with on facebook (dc networky type who happened to be watching monday night football at the same bar, thus is now "friends" with everyone there who were all druuuunk). so i am like, jealous of a republican and a cowboys fan! also v debonair, polite, good looking, and knows barack obama, and throwing a party at his v swank and spacious apartment to which i could theoretically RSVP being a "friend" on facebook, but, surely wouldn't know anyone & would feel totally out of place. sure, that stuff isn't really what matters in life and blah blah blah but it's like daaaaaaaaaaaaaaamn.

if you were to go and be observant and then write a full report for us i am pretty sure i would rather read that than most new novels reviewed by the new yorker.

I'm not sure whether it's not healthier having that status anxiety in your 20s than in your 30s, because it might motivate you. I pretty much coasted through my 20s - not that I accomplished nothing, but I was and am nowhere near being on the cover of college alumni magazine status, or even a sidebar article. The wtf have I been doing with my life, look at all these people who were my peers in school being successful thing just hit me a couple years ago when my next door neighbor in the dorms freshman year of college got a MacArthur Genius award. Part of it was doing work and being discliplined creatively, but a significant part of it, which is the case for a lot of the famous novelists, musicians, and so forth is being in the right place at the right time. In other words, luck and careerist strategy play a major role.

Oh hey, Max, here's another calming thought, kinda related to something I was saying above. I don't know what you were like growing up, obviously, but I'd be willing to bet that at some point in the past 10 years, you were a person who'd have thought that living in Brooklyn, writing for arts magazines, having a great girlfriend, etc. were great things that you'd be 100% psyched to be doing. But of course it's totally natural and healthy that we keep revising our goals upward, so you get to that point and you're more anxious about living in a better place, or writing for better things, or relationships being complicated, or whatever else.

Two things. One: part of what I meant about accomplishing things without noticing is that as you get older your life changes less rapidly and strikingly and you feel less completely disconnected from who you used to be -- so you start to notice and take some joy in the things you do accomplish just by going around on your everyday grind. Two: this is maybe an argument for taking a while now and then and thinking about old goals and being satisfied about them, right? A few months ago, I found an album I thought I'd lost years back, something I used to listen to all the time in college, and I was walking around the city listening to it and thinking ... you know, if college-me were observing current-me right now, he'd probably be pretty amazed and really looking forward to this. Even just for the shoes and jacket and owning a decent guitar. Which is kind of a relaxing thought to keep in mind, you know?

there's always the not-very relaxing thought that it'll probably be at least 40 years before you're at risk for alzheimer's and regress to an infantile stage.

I have weird lapses of worrying intensely about a problem so that I am unable to concentrate. It goes away and then comes back again.

hey u know what is just great for alleviating anxiety, besides internet people giving u good life advice, is 60-degree fridays in march

it doesn't make you anxious about global warming?

so i've been thinking quite a bit about this, and i think what nabisco said upthread is otm - about how sometimes you don't realise that you actually *have* accomplished stuff. it got me thinking about what my 21-22yr old self would think of what i'm doing now, and i suddenly realised that i would have actually been pretty impressed, and quite surprised. at that age i was a college dropout, working as a waitress, absolutely no plans for the future and nothing going on outside of working/sleeping/drinking. in the last 12 months i finished my degree, moved countries, started a small press - 3 things that i would NEVER have believed myself capable of just a few years ago.

career/status anxiety is horrible and crippling, and i don't actually think there is much that can ease it; the only thing is to hang onto the cliched-but-true saying about how the only certainty we have in life is that things never stay the same.

I went to law school partly out of this sort of anxiety, and haha, jokes on me, law school is a whole NEW world of anxiety. The school itself is, by nature, a kind of beehive of anxious buzzing, and further, the LEGAL job market sucks right now so sometimes it feels like it's for nothing. I did really well so far but I feel a little like I'm jumping from disintegrating piece of ground to disintegrating piece of ground. Am I any better off than my friends who decided to become librarians, financially and/or spiritually? I guess time will tell.

in no uncertain terms, i'm falling apart at the moment. usually i am a bastion of health despite my not so good eating habits, but i got mono a few months ago, and as usual, i became a hypochondriac. kept fearing rupturing my spleen, thinking i have disorders since then.

i've been overanxious my entire life, which has caused me to ruin so many things and hampered most of my relationships. but its at its all time worst now.

i started having hand tremors one day and it caused me to freak out as i felt circulation in my leg as well. then i got a massive headache, which an MRI revealed was just chronic sinusitis. but at this point i was already convinced i was dying and one night when i was winded, started taking over my breathing, and then had a major panic attack at a restaurant in front of my g/f and friend. the next day i went to the hospital and of course everything was fine.

i'm fine when i keep busy but now my sleep has been disrupted since, i have occasional tremors...and i can't function without xanax now. which ive never had to take before. i'm always miserable now and spend my entire days fearing my g/f is going to leave me again and that i'm going to spend most of my days alone...despite the fact that i have more friends than i can count.

i just fucking hate feeling like a different human being. has anybody done group therapy for this before? what can i do...i'm fucking losing myself slowly

Sounds like panic attacks, but I am not a professional! I have found it is difficult to get treatment and a proper diagnosis for real panic attacks - I had to check myself into a hospital before I could get the right medication.

I had group therapy, I have found it is MUCH better for panic disorder or depression than one on one, and you make friends, the group leaders are usually terrific! Groups are difficult to come by, both times I went to group therapy, again, it was through a psychiatrist instead of just answering an ad.

My medication isn't helping much, it makes me tired and depressed, only exercise seems to help.

ive never done group therapy but i have family members who do, and who find it incredibly helpful

i did a bit of group therapy but got bored of it as ppl would turn up and basically repeat more or less minor variations on the same problem week after week. im sure they felt it all v genuinely but i didnt really see how it was going to be that productive, apart from giving them an outlet to release that anxiety. going every so often i think - for me at least - is prob better than making it a regular part of your schedule. plus, if you happen to be feeling better one week and less positive, other ppl still feeling nervy and anxious will probably get annoyed by your newfound combative approach to anxiety.

I'm not really sure therapy - group or individual - would benefit me. I pretty much know where my fucking anxiety problems (and to some degree migraines) come from. I've been advised to take some meds (friends, partner,...) but I'm pretty fucking lazy about my own (mental/physical) health. :-(

going to therapy and getting medded up was probably the best thing i could've done for myself. was 15/16, rly socially anxious, depression that spun off from that.

i remember doing group for a few months. kind of a general anxiety and depression group, so some nam vets with ptsd, some garden variety depressos, one girl kind of my age with pretty severe ocd. didn't really get buddy buddy with anyone especially since there were such a variety of age groups represented, but it was helpful to a limit to feel not weird.

still get social anxiety at concerts and parties every now and again, though, i don;t think that will ever go away. but the severity of the incidents has diminished immeasurably.

yeah ime just having one or i guess several people to talk about yr anxiety with who are otherwise totally disconnected from your life can make a big difference in the frequency and severity of those kinds of feelings. even if you know what your anxiety is about, even if you know that it is anxiety.

most of my anxiety now is whether or not i'm "accomplishing enough" even tho i am married, have a hella stable job, and a puppy

Funnily enough I never got social anxiety at gigs. I went alone. Of course I wasn't really plastered with a gigantic smile on my face - oh look at me I am so happy to be alone at this gig - but I didn't really care. (It was also to do with this compulsive need to show that I, a woman, could attend gigs alone.) Parties? That's another story. There was this time a guy literally stood me up at this gigantic party... just fucking LEFT ME and I knew NOONE. I was petrified. I could have crawled in a corner, but I think I was also too mad and shocked really.

M Bison, are you my alter ego? I never feel as though I accomplish enough. I too am married, have a great life, two adorable kids, great husband,... Yet I am never at ease. :-(

not sure what it is exactly, of my friends and peers who have gone onto big thangs poppin, there is zero jealousy and 100% pride that i knew em when. i think it's mostly like the things i am passionaite about and have some leve of acumen i'm not ALREADY THERE which is stupid. i try to think "ok, steve reich didn't really start until he was like in his 30's" but then i'm like "FUCK, STEVE REICH!!!"

like upthread nabsico talkin bout just go things and see if things happen, i feel lke i'm only half-assing it making a bunch of demoes that no one will hear (still have never performed live in a band or otherwise).

music is just one instance, thats more of a hobby at this point. but professionally i'm looking at becoming an educator and later going into education policy and i feel like ive let myself stagnate on that front.

Last couple of weeks I had MAJOR anxiety about my driving exam. How fucking pathetic is that? 36 and being afraid of a fucking driving test? I mean, I was literally freaking out (like in the middle of the night). I feel such a loser for being so afraid about a fucking little exam. But I just felt that I was so horribly moronic that I'd never fucking pass that exam.