Signs Along the Trail

Self-conflict is a way of life. Maybe it isn't for everyone, but if there is someone out there who never experiences conflicted feelings and is always content, I suspect they are probably crazier than I am. Personally, as lazy as I am, I can't even be lazy enough to not feel conflicted. Conflict is one of the parts of the motor that makes us go.

I guess it's only appropriate to use the overplayed analogy of life as a trail. It moves, it winds, it forks, it offers side-trips. The other thing it offers is the chance to grab a machete, turn off, and make a new path to somewhere no one has ever been. It all sounds like fun.

Conflict, though, is funny. All of that stuff sounds fun, but it means you have to get up and move. The conflict comes in and says, "I'm so comfortable, I don't want to go. It sounds like fun, though, maybe I should. It seems like a lot of effort, though, I don't know." In turn we get locked down in complacency while making decision of whether or not it makes sense to be complacent.

We do the same thing when we decide to go. We finally work through the conflict of whether to stay or go and head off down the trail. Along the trail there are signs, this way to here, that way to there. Arrows, warnings, cautions, exhortations, distances. There's also the innate knowledge there may be something exciting just over that way that no trail leads toward. We stop to think, "Hey, maybe we should try it. We have the gear, we don't have anywhere else we have to be, and it would be way cool to be the first to see it."

Then comes the conflict, "But if we go, there won't be any signs. Nothing really points us exactly where we want to go and, when we get to where we think we want to go, it may be way less cool than what was at the end of this trail. Plus, there may be tons of danger. No signs to tell us to look out for ledges or falling rocks. There's no path so there's probably some poison ivy." So, as a result of conflict, we spin back into complacency after earlier deciding not to be complacent.

All of that is exactly what it is like dealing with mood disorders. It's not just deciding whether to go or where to go, but a knotted up mess of anything from putting on a shirt in a very particular way to being so excited you bounce off in any direction without having given any thought to it. Wildly fluctuating from one thing to the next, often you suffer from a paralysis so deep the functions of everyday life become impossible. Everyday is the choice between a clearly marked trail of dread and a making a new path without direction or goal.

Here we stand frozen in conflict, whether literally on a trail or struggling with living our lives. Either way, how do we proceed? The key is knowing there are signs along the trail that is and signs along the trail that isn't.

My post a couple of days ago talked about monuments, or ebenezers. Signs on a trail that exist are easy enough, you've either passed them or see them ahead. They offer guidance along the way to a known destination. Signs on a trail that doesn't exist are different, but that doesn't mean they aren't there. We all carry a lifetime of experience with us. We know what has gone well, we know what has not. Both that which has gone poorly and well brought us to this place, why can't that knowledge carry us forward?

I guess that is a rambling way for me to say there is no excuse for our paralysis. Be it everyday conflict or the conflict that comes with mental disorders, the time comes when you realize you aren't moving. We must begin to recognize more quickly the paralysis of self-conflict, realize any trail we take is well marked, and move forward with confidence in that which has brought us thus far will carry us through to our destination.