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It is my 30th Birthday today, and I think less about what I’ve done all these years and more about what I will do. I have so much art to complete, my will sometimes wavers, and I don’t have enough energy/time to do the things I want to do.
Energy: Based on the anti-psychotic medications I take and other drugs for my mental health the toll is usually a slowed metabolism and gained weight, followed by fatigue.
Thoughts about being thirty though: I don’t feel old in the sense of being thirty years old or anything. I still feel like I am in my early twenties when it comes to age. Like when I was incarcerated I was in my early twenties and I don’t feel much older than that, but I feel like I know way more than when I started my incarceration. I feel like I can handle life more stoutly. for instance, anger, frustration, and sadness I immediately try to break down and process with the tool I’ve obtained during my re-education.
Re-education: I’ve learned so much during my stay at the looney bin. Dialectical Behavior Therapy, Cognitive Behavior Therapy, Cognitive Processing Therapy, Recovery International, and more I’m sure.
Specifically; Dialectical Behavior Therapy: has many tools and such tools I continue to use consistently. Mindfulness, DEARMAN, STOP, Radical Acceptance, etc.
Mindfulness I use to stay connected to people the moment and the environment.
DEARMAN: is used to be able to accurately describe, express, assert, reinforce, stay mindful, appear confident, and negotiate. basically to get my needs met respectfully.
STOP: stop, take a step back, observe, and proceed mindfully. I use this a lot especially when I experience situational anxiety, or when I need time to proceed with something “complicated” in nature.
Radical Acceptance: this is about accepting what life is throwing at you and taking the information in to process without reacting to it negatively.
*The images were taken by mwah 🙂 at a beautiful park here in town*
Dude, I swear turning 30 felt like nothing….. not a change from the way I’ve felt. The only things I’ve discovered that makes me feel an age is when life treats me like an age. I can relate to people who I’ve known at an age that went through the same experiences as I am, kinda makes me feel like their age. It’s wild Levi that in our heads we feel like something with a perspective of our higher selves. Truly the one thing totally humbles me though, my body. Everything’s great up in my headspace until my body does something different and it’s really grounding.