Rest.

Do we get enough of it?  I'm not talking about physical rest.  I'm talking about mental rest.  Giving your brain a break.  Ask my wife, ask anyone I've ever worked for. Ask anyone I've ever been on a road trip with.  I can't shut up.  I can't stop thinking.  One thought leads to another and another and another.  And there is no end.  I have no finish line.  It exhausts me.  Quite honestly, it may be enough to drive one crazy.  I think that's why I often do small projects just to complete them and feel some sense of finish.  And if I can't finish them, the project will haunt me.

I think that's why I paint.  Painting may have have saved me.  Ritalin sure has helped. Immensely.  I tell people that I feel like the squirrel from Over the Hedge after he drinks the energy drink.  It's like the world slows down.

Maybe others can relate.  I certainly hope not.  For your sake.

Do you know something else thats hard?  Self discovery. I've been seeing a therapist and being counseled over the past half a year or so.  Also reading/listening to several childhood development books.  When you have an addict and a co-dependent for parents, the things you need to learn in your childhood that are crucial for you to learn,  you aren't taught those.  And it effects you big time.

Way to often these words by Mumford and Sons ring true.  Do you think it's a coincidence  this song was on pandora as I'm writing this.  I do.

Weep for yourself, my man,

You'll never be what is in your heart

Weep, little lion man,

You're not as brave as you were at the start

Rate yourself and rake yourself

Take all the courage you have left

And waste it on fixing all the problems that you made in your own head

But it was not your fault but mine

And it was your heart on the line

I really fucked it up this time

Didn't I, my dear?

Didn't I, my...

Do you know how I came across that song? I read a book called "East of Eden".  Or listened to it, while I was painting.  Because I have to have something going on in my head while I paint.  And in that book, the primary premise is the word "timshel".  Here's an exert from the book.  

But ‘Thou mayest’! Why, that makes a man great, that gives him stature with the gods, for in his weakness and his filth and his murder of his brother he has still the great choice. He can choose his course and fight it through and win.” 

Read the rest of the section here. 

Thou mayest.  You can.  You will.  You are enough.  

Timshel.