I Feel Empty

Time to refuel.

I’m interspersing installments of my Social Media History Series with my regular content. This week’s newsletter is on one of my regular content topics and my Social Media Series will resume soon.

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Photo by Cottonbro Studio on Pexels

How is it possible to go from feeling on top of the world to at the bottom of the barrel in seconds?! Because it happens to me, and it happened this week.

I was going along feeling good — hopeful even. I’ve been focusing on going to the gym and exercising more consistently. I don’t have a lot of work right now, but the handful of projects I do have are fulfilling and meaningful.

And then BAM! I got knocked off my feel-good cloud and back to Earth for the seemingly smallest reason.

It started off at the beginning of this week when a neighbor shirked on a basic responsibility. Right away, I felt this weight on me, like I had to be the one to take care of this problem and literally clean up for a grown-a*s adult who should be able to clean up after themself.

This impulse immediately squelched my energy and depressed me. Because that is my pattern, whether it’s a result of being the oldest daughter or a people-pleaser or for some other reason: When other people do less, I pick up the slack and do more than my fair share.

This pattern has transpired in dating and relationships, from being the one moving a conversation forward on a dating app when all I receive is one-word responses on the other end, to putting in more emotional effort with avoidant men. It’s snuck into friendships, when I’m the one consistently initiating calls, text exchanges, or plans. It happens in my family in myriad ways. And of course, doing more to compensate for others doing not enough has been present in work situations since the days of group projects in college. It even happens with acquaintances and strangers, who email or DM me for information they could have easily Googled. In fact, I was still getting random requests like this in the days leading up to my ovarian cancer surgery, and I fantasized about setting up an out-of-office responder on my email that said, “I’m busy, Google it!”

I notice everything, so I always see what needs to be done, handled, or fixed. And then I feel like I need to be the one to do, handle, or fix it. This crushing sense of over-responsibility that I put on myself — and, to be honest, that others seem all too happy to assign me — is d e p l e t i n g. I’m really sick of it, but it’s so deeply embedded that my “Do-Handle-Fix” response is pretty compulsive and difficult to intercept.

The situation with my neighbor was the first reason I started to feel empty this week — empty as in depleted. But a few days later I began to feel empty for another reason. This time, the emptiness was a feeling of life being devoid of meaning, of feeling joyless, disconnected, and dead inside. This version of emptiness was prompted by a frustrating and disappointing work situation that made me question… not to be melodramatic, but, well, everything. It made me feel like, Why do I put so much care and effort and passion into my work if it’s not appreciated?

These difficulties that I was confronted with this week sent me lower and lower, and by Friday I found myself empty on multiple fronts: energetically, emotionally, and spiritually.

After the first hit (neighbor slacking), I started taking action to replenish myself. As the week progressed (or rather, devolved), I realized I needed to kick it up a notch. Here’s what I’ve been doing this week to fill back up.