Why Is This So Hard? Edit: It's not.

Every day is a new struggle. Why can't this roller-coaster end? One day, I feel like I'm doing just fine. I feel like I can make it, that time is just that... Time. It's something I can get through, push through and get better. I feel like I can let the pain, the stress, the frustration, the anxiety, let it all go and just be me.

I'm constantly fighting with myself. It's an internal battle that I'm having a lot of trouble winning right now. Part of me wants everything to go back the way it was, back before anything happened. And the other part of me knows that's wrong... That if it were, it would be a lie. It would be a painful lie, to WAY more than just myself. It hurts so badly inside of my heart right now that I wish I could be just a stupid, non-caring individual. Just give up my emotions to drinking and partying, leaving everything behind. I want to escape, in other words.

I want to just... I want to break free, from myself. I feel as if I've imprisoned myself within my own six walls, and won't let myself leave. Every time I scratch at those walls and start to see some kind of light, a fierce darkness wraps so tightly around my throat that I actually feel as if I'm putting those pieces back into the wall, just so I don't have to be choked anymore. I know it doesn't make much sense but... My mind is just... I feel as if I'm fighting a war I can't win. The problem is, to see the light, I know I have to win.

I have to break out of this box, and break out of this pain that I'm putting myself through... I think... This is a good idea for a story.

Hmm...

How do you break out of a box that you've built for yourself? When the only tools you've been given are your bare hands, your mind and a hurting heart that just wants... Just wants a friend.

I feel afraid to have friends. I honestly do. That's one of my walls. I feel worried and concerned to have close relationships with people. I've been "burned" so many times by people, and... I don't think I've ever gotten over it. It's one of those things that you deal with as you get older, and sort of stuff under the couch and try to hide away from everyone else. You put on a smile and sort of... Trudge through things, and it eventually gets easier. You lose the need to talk to people. You even alienate yourself to try and keep them away. You bite and snarl as you feel someone come close and you just... You just want to be alone. It's hard to trust, it's hard to feel.

The people I do consider my friends, I've kept at an arms-length. I let them know just so much about me. It's become so routine that I don't even realize that I'm doing it. I think I'm making connections, making new friends, meeting new people with a smile... But it's really all the same. I'm still the scared, afraid-to-trust teenager I've always been. Something happened to me along the way. And the truth is, I don't know what that something is.

I'm afraid for my friends to have friends. I'm afraid that those other people will take my friends from me. The people that I hold at arms length, afraid to let in close.

I'm afraid that the people who I call my friends are conspiring behind me, talking about me and hating me. This is a quiet thing. A quiet poison that I've fed myself. The thoughts come quickly and unabashed and are pushed aside quickly by the goings on of my day-to-day life. But they're still there. I know they are. They put a special kind of stab straight through my heart every time they happen. I feel slightly sad for a moment, and I don't know why.

Now, I think, I know why. This is my Wall of Trust. I keep myself behind it. I keep everyone else out. Even the person who I've held most dear... I realize all too late that I've kept her on the other side of that wall, reaching around and holding her hand every now and again, letting her know that I'm still here. That I'm still okay...

But I'm not okay. I don't know how long I've not been okay, but... From all that I'm writing from this sudden moment of clarity, it's been a long time. Years...

God, it's been years. I've been clinging to this pain, this quiet seething fear inside of me for so long that it's nearly destroyed the one relationship that I wanted to hold onto the most. And for the life of me, I don't know how to fix it. I want to put this back together to look somewhat like it used to... I want to take some glue and find all those lost pieces. Make my life resemble what it did.

But that's... It's not right. It wouldn't be right to do that. Why would I try and put something back together that was just... Broken... All along? Why would I try and piece it back together? Just to say "I'm okay, really. I'm ready to keep going"? God, what have I done to myself. I've lied to MYSELF more than anyone else has. My life was a lie... it was a lie that I created. I sewed it together from the scattered fragments of my loneliness.

I want to hate myself right now. I want to tear myself to shreds. This one moment of clarity has made me see how... Wrong I've been. The grudges that I've held, that I still hold the strands of to this day... The trust that I don't think I ever let myself give... God, I'm sorry.

I'm so sorry.

How can I say it enough? I feel that... I couldn't be there. I couldn't let myself understand. Distance, time, patience. It's all an illusion to me.

I'm not a patient person.

It's hard for me to trust people.

I want people to like me.

I want to be loved.

But how can I expect anyone to want to talk to me when I keep doing the same thing, over and over again? Why can't I learn from my mistakes? It's this box. This six-sided personal hell that I've devised for myself. Spent countless hours unknowingly building, constructing, fabricating. Painting it to look exactly like the world outside. Shifting colors, brilliant yet shadowed lights. The darkness seeping into my soul from all sides, but I could never let myself see it.

I could never let myself forgive.

I ask for forgiveness, but give none. I feel like a monster.

I feel... Terrible.

I feel burnt alive inside. Why have I done this...? I've already been through this once before... But did I really learn anything? Did I... Just trick myself into believing that I was alright?

I feel as if I'm back in that same position, trying to re-learn myself. If I had been successful in learning myself, learning my flaws, escaping from this box (which I couldn't see then), why would I have to do it again now? If I had been truly successful in trying to fix myself, fix my heart and my soul, to forgive and love and trust... If I had been honest with myself, with my feelings, with others... If I had known then, what I know right this second...

Perhaps things would be different. Perhaps I would feel the love of someone who I want so badly to love and be loved by.

Maybe I would be happy.

And not so afraid.

I wish I didn't feel so broken right now. But now I think it's time that I become serious. I think it's time that I change this. I think it's time that I break out of this box. I think it's time I take hold of my life, of my own happiness, and stop telling myself this self-perpetuated lie. I'm done lying to myself. I'm done. I'm so tired of making up things to keep myself "going". I will break through this box. I will break down these walls.

I will show the world that I am willing to break free. That I am someone worthy to love, and to show love. That I'm someone who can be depended on to be there. Who can be a friend, when it's needed most.

I've just learned the name of a second wall. The Wall of Worry.

That's two walls named. Four to go. This is just the first night, and I feel as if I'm already on a roll.

... Now I know why she said "I know there's a good person inside of you. I know there is."

I didn't know what she meant. God, I wish i had.

I want to write more. There's so much more I want to write. I want to spill my guts, pour my soul out. I want to break out so badly that I can almost taste the freedom of the world outside my own prison. God, it tastes sweet. It tastes like honey and milk, with all the freedom that I could ever wish for. I can see it on the other side of my walls. I have to keep typing right now, because I feel like I am breaking out.

I feel like I'm doing something. Something positive... Something to better myself. I feel like... I feel free.

This is the first time I've been able to cry and release this pain in a long time. Every time I've wanted to cry and let myself have a release, I've been unable to.

My heart feels so... At peace. I feel that in the midst of all of this chaos, in the middle of this torrent of emotional expulsion and freedom, I feel at peace. I want to tell everyone. All of my friends. Everyone I love... The people I've lost.

The person who means the most to me, that I feel that I've hurt the most.

I feel like I've let her down.

And I want to make it up to her. I want to make up all of the lost time. The lost years that I wish I could make better.

But am I scared? I'm scared to death right now. That's the third wall. The Wall of Fear.

The fourth wall is the Wall of Anger. I never did get over my anger. I moved it. Shifted it. I felt like I was making a difference with myself when I was working on it those few years ago. I thought I was getting better. Becoming a more well-rounded person. But all I was doing was changing how it looked, not fixing the underlying problem.

The problem was, that the wall had been there all along. That it was the wall that I had built and the fear of rejection that made me so mad. It was the years of -being- rejected that had made me bitter and angry. And I lashed out on others... And still do.

That's how I know that I had never actually fixed the problem. I just masked it over. I just put a fresh coat of paint on the wall that made my anger easier to deal with, instead of attacking it's source. I meditated, found my "center" but never really saw past it.

This is the first time that my chest, my heart has felt... Heavy. I regret. That's the fifth wall. The Wall of Regret.

A shiver just shot up my spine. I can now suddenly see all that's been hurting me for so long, standing there in front of me as plain as day. I can see those walls, and understand them. I've never had such insight into myself as I do right now, at this very moment. I feel full. But empty. My heart feels heavy with the knowledge and energy that's suddenly flooding my very existence. I feel such an immense sense of self that I feel almost... Selfless. I feel as if my whole mind and fabric of my being is open to interpretation. As if my own reality is somehow now in a state of flux. As if I could touch it, and make it move.

I feel as if my future is truly right in front of me now. That actual, lasting peace and clarity is just waiting for me to take hold of it.

That I can finally break down these walls, and be me. Break them apart and be free.

I want to keep going... But I think I need to sleep on this. This is a lot to take in suddenly. I can hardly keep myself from just writing more. I feel as if I could write my entire life in this one entry. I feel open. Free. Happy. Sad. Regret. Hope. I feel so many things all at once that...

It's hard to know if this is real. I hope this is real. I want to hold onto this feeling. I want to plant it in the Earth and take care of it. I want to nurture it and watch it grow. I want to let it see the light of day and tell this feeling that is filling my heart that this is who I am. This person who I inhabit, this flesh and bone is me. I am Zachary. I am Zack. I am Z. I am everything I ever wanted to be and more. I do love myself. And that feeling is one that is so inspiring that... I'm crying again. I want to see this seed that I've just found grow and prosper, knowing that it was I who found it. Who planted it. Who sewed that seed and will reap it's benefits for the rest of my life, however short it may be in this world.

We are all stardust. We are all human. We are all the embodiment of a child who had dreams. I am the manifestation of those dreams, becoming flesh. I will not let the child who I once was down.

I will smile.

And I will mean it.

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Edit @ 12:29 AM:

I've never felt so open. I've never felt so free. In the few hours that I've been grappling with myself, I have come to the single most important self-realization that I've ever had. I feel amazing. I feel so inspired by life and my experiences therein that I can't hardly contain it any longer. I want to share. I want to live and to trust. To love, and to feel.

This, as a whole, feels amazing. My world, my existence, my life has purpose. Has meaning. Everything makes so much sense that... It's hard to put my finger on just one part of it and start explaining it.

I don't know why I can't stop writing this. I don't know why I can't stop and just go to bed. I feel, as if, if I don't write everything down and get a copy of it, that none of this will be real. That everything will evaporate from me before I wake up tomorrow. That it will all have been for nothing! This life is not for nothing. My being here right here, right now in my own mind is not for nothing. I am here for a reason. Even if that reason is just to complete my own journey and to write and record it all as it comes.

Even if that is the very meaning, the very essence of life itself is the single journey of every human; the individualistic journey of the soul, of the person. That would be an acceptable meaning to life. We are all here, in one form or another, to give meaning to this world. Our journey leaves it's mark upon this world. Whether we die young, or live to our elderly years, we will leave  some sort of mark upon this world. There will be a record, either in memory or in writing, of each existence. No-one is ever forgotten in this world.

Our journey is one that cannot be defined by another. It can be seen and felt, experienced but not put in order and defined by another. We are the sole writers and purveyors of our existence, our journey. Our lives are given meaning by the very experiences we undergo from day to day.

We love, we live. We smile, we cry. We breathe, we die. We are born, and we are sent away. But each of us has a story to tell.

Each of us has a meaning.

Each of us has a journey.

All we have to do, is look.

I think I've discovered the name of my sixth wall. I need to contemplate on it more before I know for sure. This is all happening so fast! Why am I able to process it all?!

Geeze, life is complex.