The Rat Race

I mean this legitimately—the rat race in my head and my thoughts. They're always racing, so much so that I cannot sleep. It feels like my mind and my thoughts are going 100 miles a minute. Sometimes I can control it, especially when I go for my morning run, but most of the time, I cannot. Unfortunately, it prevents me from sleeping, and this isn't good for my disease, my bipolar disorder. My therapist and my "drug dealer" (as I like to call my psychiatric nurse who prescribes my medication), always tell me that I need my sleep; it's imperative I get a good night's sleep. But how can I control it? How can I control my racing thoughts?

Most of the time, I'm always thinking of ways to improve my solitude and give me projects to work on, especially for my art. But there are so many ideas that I honestly don't know where to start, or worse, how to execute them. I know I have discussed this through one of my prior posts, Therapy Through Art, but it's something that continues to affect me even today, several weeks later.

I sometimes feel like my mind is in the middle of New York City running through rush hour as though I was part of the "rat race." It gets beyond frustrating because I just can't seem to concentrate on anything—not even my art, which means the world to me right now. Again.

Yesterday I had my daughter's friend come over for a sleepover, and since I had never met her mother, she eagerly came upstairs to introduce herself. Nice enough lady, just couldn't seem to stop talking. Well, for most people that may be OK, but for me, someone who suffers from bipolar disorder, my mind wanders if you've lost me; lost my interest—which unfortunately happens a little too often these days, and with her, it was just too much; too in depth.

As I'm standing there trying my hardest to listen, my mind continued to wander—round and round about everything and anything to zone her out. I couldn't help it, but I lost interest not far into the conversation.

How do I overcome this? The past several days, I have been shaky in the mornings, and now exhausted. I credit the exhaustion to my lack of sleep these days, but the shakiness, I just don't know what to do. Thankfully I have my appointment tomorrow with my "drug dealer" so hopefully he can recommend something. It's tough, kind of like this dichomoty in my brain telling me that although my depression and mood swings have diminished exponentially, I'm shaky and exhausted regardless.

The polarity is frustrating for me. No pun intended.

This tells me one thing—I'm still not 100% like I had hoped. The last few weeks have been such a huge transformation, as we had immediately thought, finally she's back.

Not yet.

After starting this painting a few weeks ago, I finally completed it this morning. Although I haven't done the finishing touches to date—a shiny gloss coat—but I can still display it proudly to share with you for this post.

I hope you like it. If not, that's OK too, I realize my art is not for everyone. That's what makes it art. More abstract in nature which demonstrates my current state of mind; my racing thoughts.

Skyscraper of a Scattered Mind – Artist, me – 2012

Thank you for reading, and thank you for allowing me to share my recent painting with you.

P.S. Please understand that my paintings are amateur as I have had no professional training in fine art painting with acrylic. But it's something I do for myself. I typically don't sell my paintings, would consider it.

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