My Essay for Pop Sugar

How often am I escaping?

This is a question I asked myself at around 3am last Tuesday when I just could not sleep.

I was having some kind of epiphany. My existential dread was weaving hundreds of muddy-coloured threads into a web of guilt across my mind.

I was asking myself questions like:

Are you doing what you actually want to do each day?
Do you spend most of your time distracting yourself?

What is your soul purpose in this life?
Is everyone else doing life better than you?
Do you realise you’re nearly halfway to sixty?

In some ways, I am thankful for having had this ‘dark night of the soul’. My mum has taught me about nights like these and how they serve as stepping-stones on everybody’s ‘Hero’s Journey’. Taking perspective in the early hours has got me thinking outside of my usual patterns, as uncomfortable as it is.

I have realised that I go on my devices as if seeking an instant ‘answer’. Although, that need for gratification seldom gives me the satisfaction I am looking for. The impulse that leads me to go online is really just an emotion coming up that I need to sit with or explore. Patiently exploring the emotion rather than cutting it short allows these feelings to become the source of my creativity, where the ‘answer’ arises rather than is ‘found’: Far more fulfilling.

Since then, I have been trying to reach for a book more than my phone. I have been staring at the turquoise sea more than the rich kids on ‘Gossip Girl’. I have been out in the garden more and I have been cutting down on ‘treat yourself’ moments.

It’s only been a few days and I am already feeling my addiction to escapism calling me back.

Read the full essay here.