Tonight is one of those nights that you try to sleep, but you hardly can. I can feel that hot and steamy summer is already here with us—more sleepless nights to come. I change my ceiling light setting to warm white from daylight white. My stereo is gently playing piano concerti by Mozart.
Nights like tonight, I am easily sucked into a vortex of thoughts. On a lucky night, I am inspired to write. Some nights, I doodle meaningless cartoons. But mostly I get myself vacuumed into a thought vortex. A few years ago, I could not fall asleep for several hours. After countless trials, I finally gave up, and decided to write a letter to my future self. I cannot recall the details of the letter off the top of my head, but I do remember it was about things I wish I had known earlier.
The very first thing I wish I had known earlier was that the house I was living at the moment had neither a functioning roof nor a working heating system. Living in the little brick house, I had a very cold winter. I was always feeling ill. Every time when it snowed, the snow directly above my roof melted and the water dripped into my room. Even though the maintenance checked the roof multiple times, they could not figure out a way to fix it. The house was built in 1861, and a little over a century later it became a city landmark. In a way, I was living in the history. But at that moment, I was writing to ask my future self whether being in the history was worth it. Years later, I sometimes see the little brick house in my dream. Even in my dream, I try to fix up the house. I never saw any positive outcome in my dream though.
The second thing was about anxiety. I am a type who easily gets anxious. I only learned it about myself three to four years ago. At the time of writing, however, I thought I was experiencing a mood-swing or my mood was easily affected by the surroundings. So I wrote in my note to my future self that I wish I had known that my mood swing were based upon the surroundings. I am glad that I eventually came to an awareness of my anxiety, otherwise I would be blaming on myself for having a mood swing. Being aware of my anxiety is actually relieving. Meditation and breathing practices come in very handy. Some say happy and positive thoughts are helpful, but they are not for me. Emptying my head space is more affective on me.
A difficult time like this, we need to focus on the mindfulness. Understanding what we desire and how we can feed our soul and spirit is so important.