Black or White.

I've always been a black or white, all or nothing kind of person. The reactions I grew up with were BIG. It was either the best day of your life or the world was ending. And community is powerful. The sheer fact that I was sharing these big reactions as a family emphasized the reactions themselves.

So there's the nurture part, right? And now here's the nature part - my best friend and very irritating roommate, Bipolar II. Bipolar is hard to explain. It's confusing and makes absolutely no sense sometimes. One of the best representations of Bipolar I've seen is Modern Love, Season 1, Episode 3: Take Me As I Am, Whoever I Am.

Being Bipolar, I exist in the clouds with highest of highs and in my spare time, teleport to the deepest depths of hell (or whatever) - for straight up funnsies. And when I say teleport, I mean tel👏e👏port👏. I'm talking walk through a door into another dimension teleport. No in between. No warning. Just whiplash. Biploar is not always a good time, but don't worry y'all, there's meds for that. Being diagnosed with Bipolar might have been the best thing that has ever happened to me. Your girl is maxed out on a mood stabilizer and I will take it until the day I die. It saved my life.

So yeah, regulating emotions growing up? HA - never heard of her.

Between the big familial reactions and my Bipolar diagnosis, the black and white was all I knew. I thought that's all that existed.

The gray area.

Ahhh, the gray area. What's in the gray area? Mmmmm, apparently everything. Did you know two feelings can exist at once? This sentiment will forever blow my mind. When I think about the gray area, I think about the fact that I can and most of the time am feeling several emotions at once. When I process my emotions - I'm observing them, accepting them - ya know, all the things you do when you process. I often think of it as the neutral zone - Switzerland, if you will.

The acceptance part can be tricksy for me. I find myself struggling with the neutrality of it all. I know that approaching conversations and relationships with curiosity and compassion is helpful and I am so proud at how successful I've become at pulling myself out of the middle of the storm with a simple ✨reframing of the mindset✨ via curiosity and compassion.

But sometimes it feels like I am forcing myself to neutralize and there are moments where that's difficult for me to sit with - the idea that I'm forcing it. It doesn't always feel authentic. And I mean, I hate to say it, but sometimes neutralizing just isn't as satisfying as yelling at someone. I know I can't be the only person who feels this way...

Is it good or right to go against what you're feeling? I can appreciate regulating my emotions before reacting, but sometimes I want that person to know how I am feeling in that exact moment. I think where I get caught up in this is the repeating offenders, which I am surrounded by.

This brings me back to curiosity and compassion - the two pillars I lean on in order to neutralize. When I think about this, I'm always left with more questions. What do you do when a loved one commits the same crime over and over again? How much curiosity and compassion are you supposed to have? How neutral can one be when you're being hurt over and over?

xoxo your favorite exhausted girlyyyyy