Anne Helen Petersen wrote a newsletter this week about “a blob of amorphous unease” that had been growing all month, and the feeling of no progress:
The calendar moves forward but we’re stuck. In old patterns, in old understandings of how work and our families and the world should be. That’s the feeling of regression, I think. It’s not that we’re losing ground. It’s that we were too hopeful about having gained it.
I’ve felt the same way, steadily growing for a month. I chalked it up to the change of season, but then I started thinking about refinancing the mortgage and it all kind of fell apart: Where do we want to be? How do we get there? What do I want to do? If it’s not what I’m doing, how do I do something else? What about money? What about the future? Why is it all so difficult?
Petersen talks a lot about community in general, and ends the newsletter with saying her October regression feels “so much less swallowing when shared.” I guess if nobody know what they’re doing, then not knowing what you’re doing yourself isn’t as big of a deal. We’re all just figuring out what to do with our boulders together.