Staff Writer: Savannah Phillips
Have you ever felt crushed? Absolutely devoured by the world? The day comes to a close and you feel like you’ve been defeated?
Yeah. Me too.
As I made myself walk up the stairs to the library of my university, I truly questioned if I would be able to put one foot in front of the other. Each step felt steep. My ankles throbbed and my legs burned. It took every bit of strength I had not to cry as I sat down on the leather couch. In an open space, oh how I wished my little corner of the world I had found was invisible. My head so desperately wanted to fall over onto my bookbag, allowing me to drift off in a peaceful sleep. I feel so tired. Near exhaustion- that point where nausea lives inside of you. See, I had just figured everything out. Who I was. My relationship. My ties to family whilst I grow up. My workload. My feelings and emotions. Everything.
And then, as it always does, everything exploded. My world flipped upside down, leaving me disoriented and lost once again. It’s frustrating, because as soon as I get comfortable, I find myself not anymore.
It hurts. Growing up. It’s a hurt unlike any other hurt. As my maw maw calls them, they are “growing pains.” They feel like those awful leg cramps that occur when you accidentally stretch your leg out too far. They’re so sharp that they often take my breath away for the first few seconds. That same sharp stab is what I feel in my chest right now. It hurts as equally as bad, if not worse. At least, my leg, I can clinch- holding firmly on the muscle until it relaxes. But with ribs in the way, it’s hard to clinch a throbbing heart.
It’s also lonely, being trapped in your own mind with only yourself. These types of journeys are taken alone because only you know what is going on inside of you. You describe what you feel to the most intelligent people in the world, and they would still not satisfy you with their response. It’s a knot that we must unravel. I feel, in a way, it’s a way for us to cling to ourselves to have a new respect for ourselves. It’s a way of falling in love with who we are. It’s in time of deep self-reflection that we often discover who we are.
-Savannah Phillips
Wingate Triangle 