I was out and about at a large party event on my own couple weeks ago. Despite meeting a few friends and the event was amazing with so many wonderful people around, I was feeling so disconnected, completely lack of confident, behaving so introverted and feeling so lonely. Nevertheless, I still made myself stay instead of heading home, simply because I don’t want to feel like a failure for leaving early (such a stupid thought). I got home in the evening and started tearing up, not really sure what’s going on and why I felt that way.
I just felt like a loser.
Until my partner came home late from work, I started telling him about it, he was worried, but also throw me questions like what has happened to me – I’m 40 and why am I feeling so insecure about myself, needing so much validation or acceptance like I was a teenager?
It was a great nudge.
Scenario like this didn’t happen just recently. To anyone who has followed my social medias, it is not difficult to realize there are a sense of negativity and signs of depression creeping into my words. There were a few times that I walked into photo sessions and not being myself. These loud voices in my brain kept yelling at me and I was having difficulty to calm myself down to do what I usually do.
For the past one year, my emotions have been extremely volatile. Many things have happened in my life and I am having difficulty to find that balance to maneuver around what’s going on. I WANT TO QUIT LIFE. I don’t mean it in a suicidal way of quit living, I simply want to quit adulting, quit being that good husband, quit working, quit taking care of home, quit being a breadwinner, quit being a good son … simply just quit who I am.
Not only this feeling have been weighing on me, it’s slowly affecting the people around me, especially my partner. Though he understands, but I think he is equally helpless in understanding what exactly is happening to me and providing the support that I need. Or maybe I have not articulated it well and don’t want to drop the weight on him to solution it for me. Without having to worry him, I need to continue to be that strong, wise, elder and capable man at home.
One of the many symptoms is decision fatigue, as in I am having anxiety to make any decision on anything – I don’t want to decide what to do, what to eat, where to go. Whenever I start telling anyone about it, somehow it gets normalized to be a non-issue that everyone has or it gets simplified as being indecisive. But what people do not understand is that it is stressing me out, it’s suffocating, palm sweating, it’s really heavy and I really want to run away.
I know I need help, I’ve tried seeking it, but the process of seeking a therapist has been extremely hard for me too because I have been having difficulty to make the decision of who, where and when to go for therapy.
While I am still working towards getting the help needed, photography is probably the only avenue where I can ran away all responsibilities for couple of hours and being completely in my own world, not having to think about life and be in the moment to be present, to connect with another human being, to get myself calmed down and grounded. But when it comes to booking appointments and arranging the logistics … it’s weighing on me again.
Unlike the last few posts which I usually use the space to tell stories of the subject, in this post, I want this space for myself. This collection is a compilation of peoples that I have the privileged to connect with in the recent Do More Camp 2019 in Ontario. These people are all important to me in many ways and they have given so much trust on me to create and capture them in the most authentic way. HOWEVER, at this time, I am incapable to tell theirs stories individually.
This collection is a juxtaposition of how convoluting my mind is right now and the sense of calmness and quietness that I am currently searching for and wish to have in myself.
I do not know what the path is moving forward and when that enlightenment will appear, but I have faith.
(Music credit: Ontario – Novo Amor & Ed Tullett)
If you have any interest to have your very own intimate lifestyle or nude art photography session, feel free to reach me through contact form above or message me through Instagram @bofiguratif . As always, write me a comment too and let me know how you feel about this collection. I would really love to hear from you!