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I’m Trying to Not Be an Out of Control Mess This Year—and It’s Working
I’ve decided to stop living intoxicated, sleep-deprived, and spaced out, and start being the person I want to be
For years and years and for better or for worse, I have maintained what I would describe as manic energy. Many other people would too. And it’s come to an end.
Or at least it’s come to some version of an end. I’m not going to suddenly be a sharply dressed mute expressionist whose only contribution to a conversation is the obnoxiously loud sipping of expensive tea. I’m just going to be a different, better version of me.
See, in January of this year, I basically took on the “Summer-Winter of Jake Kilroy.” (It’s like Seinfeld’s “Summer of George” episode, except it’s more lateral than opposite, and I take my New Year’s resolutions very seriously.)
As of last month, here’s what I’m doing with my life:
- I go to weekly therapy.
- I don’t drink.
- I’m taking a break from drugs.
- I exercise more than usual.
- I sleep eight hours a night.
- I make thoughtful decisions.
- I practice mindfulness.
These, as you can likely already tell, are not exactly revelations. At best, these are things most of us learned to do as kids. It wouldn’t surprise me if a substantial portion of readers are instantly, “Yeah, dude, fucking duh. Like, forever ago, we learned this.”
Well, yours truly didn’t. In fact, yours truly really dug on a life of delirium and mania. To be honest, there was something exciting about life as a space cadet. Basic existence was dimensional voyaging. Day-to-day activity was visiting an alien world. I was between realities. All of it was thrilling and weird.
Wild-eyed hyperbole aside, I really wasn’t “here” as much as I could’ve been, and when I was, I wasn’t exactly centered. I became untethered sometime ago, and I never did anything about it.
