Being Me in 2017

I have a goal for 2017 that will define all of my smaller goals.

In short, my goal is to BE ME.

It’s not as vague or as self-centered as it sounds!

Me in 2016

2016. It was… a year.

So much I’d hoped to accomplish was left undone.

As the year wound down, I didn’t much care. At least when I wasn’t beating myself up about it. Do you know that ugly wrestling match between the worthlessness and apathy of chronic depression?

I ended the year in months-long, let’s call it mid-level depression.

I have not ended 2016 well.

And I must accept that my lackluster finish is more my fault than I’d like to admit.

Three years ago, suicidal depression ripped the rug out from under my feet and left me broken and unsure. I doubted everything about myself, my purpose, my abilities, and my future.

Before I understood and accepted that I needed medication, there were times all I could do was take the next shallow breath to get through the heartbeats that carried my body through moments I thought I could not endure. And I didn’t want to take that breath.

It’s impossible to sufficiently explain major depression to people who have not been in the pit. It doesn’t make sense. Even to those of us who have survived.

So, 2016… I haven’t felt the hopelessness that made me believe that everyone would be better off without me. One large trauma in my children’s lives when I took my life, instead of a lifetime with a mother so damaged and toxic they couldn’t come out of childhood whole.

Another year survived.

But I’m capable of doing more than just surviving now.

I don’t want to get to the end of 2017 with the same lack of progress.

The helplessness of my worst days oozed out and clung to me as I crawled, then stumbled away. At times, I let it engulf me instead of doing the work necessary to be as healthy as possible. It drags me in circles when I half-heartedly step forward.

I can’t fail if I don’t try, right?

Wrong.

Wrong.

Wrong.

I fail because I refuse to try.

Manageable and Measurable

Just getting by isn’t enough after crises pass. Just because my medication keeps the worst of the darkness at bay, it doesn’t mean I can afford to be lazy and choose to just drift instead of consistently making healthy choices. And pushing myself to set, and attain, goals

So, how can 2017 be more than just another year survived?

In 2017, I won’t pursue something as small and fleeting as happiness… Click here to read the rest over at Defying Shadows to find out what it means to live more fully me, more fully YOU.