With the summer almost at an end (certainly the weather has been telling me this), I’ve thought a lot about how I felt this summer. This summer has been really hard for me, not only did I suffer some extreme burn out and mild depression, I felt like parts of myself and my identity were dissolving. Things I thought were essential to who I was were gone, or radically changed. It felt the same to me this summer. It took me a while to get back on my feet and find the things I thought were gone. But it felt like I didn’t know who I was, like I had to motivate myself to get up in the morning, and want things. It was so easy for me to just not want, to not change, and to just sit here. I was in a rut majorly. I thought I should snap out of this, if I can, which I couldn’t, and move forward. But I couldn’t and the more I tried to, the more I couldn’t and the deeper I sunk. So I thought, I’m just going to ride this out, let myself feel this for as long as I do. I won’t rush myself, I’ll just let it happen. And so I did. It was incredibly hard to withstand, but worthwhile. I allowed myself to process to digest on my own time schedule. I didn’t push myself to heal or change or bounce back faster and I can say I am feeling a lot better now. I was so used to pushing to keep going on despite anything, that not pushing almost brought me to a stand still. It was incredibly hard to voice and talk about and even make sense of myself, so it was really hard. There are still numerous things I get upset about that aren’t right and billions of things I still have to work out, but it’s getting better. I felt as if when I looked in the mirror it was really fuzzy and fading, almost like I was a blurred image, but slowly it’s coming into focus again. It was a period of immense emotional learning, and it’s certainly not over yet, but it’s starting to work itself out now.