Dear A,
If you decide or mold into staying in the city of your college, you will eventually run out of tears, go off to work, or continue in the graduate program. You would finish the study – in a different discipline even. A mere flow of things to come.
Anxiety and stress, however, will follow you everywhere like a shadow – even in the dark, outside the vast campus. You would be at the dinner table with some friends but would, in your mind, be present in the cloud of a faraway place. You would repeatedly question: Do I belong? Do I belong here? How long until they find out I’m an imposter? All sorts of questions would paralyze you. You would be terrified to make mistakes and be desperate for others’ validation, constantly feeling nauseous. You would still be sinking like a stone.
The most important question is: Are you going to live today? You are welcome to cry without an answer – it is part of being alive. Also, being a human is to feel sadness and disappointment. Because only some of your plans, risks, and efforts would work out as you plan. If you hope to fully recover from your despair, you don’t just need to learn to walk and run again. It would be best if you also had something to run towards, something to live for.
Please be more proud of what and how you got where you are today. Not the physical journey but the mental one. So much of the anxiety that holds us back is self-inflicted. We make it worse on ourselves. We are afraid to see your fears for what they are. Own them. They will terrify you but not forever. Your scars are not just a reminder of everything you have been through, but more so, everything in front of you.
Roll up your sleeve, and get busy planning how you want to live today. Tomorrow is only for those who live today. Start with how you want to take care of your roommates if you were to leave. After all, they made a plan to be your mates! What would you do with your possessions? How would you protect your heart from being broken by the callous remarks that invariably would come to you if you were to leave? Are you going to think less of yourself? Would you blame yourself because the risk you took did not work? If you do, you will end up more distressed than you are now.
You can make a plan to live for today. Be creative in solving your problems. You have all the tools and charisma, I bet again. No one wants what you want preciously the same way, sees what you see, and gets things done the way you do.
Yet, something always breaks. Something always needs to be fixed or worked out. Now what? Cry momentarily and wipe your tears. Stand up tall and go plan another party. Baba will wait to join the foofaraw.