I'm sitting on my bed in my dorm below the Good Folk excerpts on my wall, about complicated relationships to home, about faith, about isolation, as I read this. I've been away at college for exactly two weeks and re-read these words every day: "That is where the loneliness stems from-- the ways in which we feel that no one else has felt like this, that no one else will ever feel like this." I am working through the desire to feel understood, the need to articulate how I feel everything and feel like I may explode at any moment, but most of what we talk about here is what residence hall people live in or how they are liking their classes. I am surrounded by so many people and feel so alone. I've made some really amazing friends this week and am grateful for how hard they make me laugh and make me feel seen. It's also hard being in a place that feels limiting and makes me question whether higher education is for me. I don't have a comfortable association with the words "course," "academics," "scholarship," and I spent so much of high school longing to get out, get to college where I would finally be understood, where I would "break into blossom" in the words of James Wright! And even now, I'm creating new visions, a new "plan," for a future in which I can get out. I have this rigid, vast, wonderful belief in a future where I will then find my place. When I struggle to get up in the morning and hold insurmountable feelings and so much pain for me to make sense of, this clear, bright future feels like the only way for me to cope. But I want to be more open, remember that we are constantly evolving and that I will figure it out along the way. Thank you for this post Spencer. You always make me feel less alone. I am sending you all the love I feel at your writing, your presence, your existence. Ahhhh!
p.s. The absolute feeling of comfort and joy at receiving a Good Folk notification!!
Caitlin! Somehow I just saw this (?)— thank you for this. It's a beautiful reflection on the strange transitional periods of our life, and I can definitely relate. Sometimes the world and our interactions within it feel so superficial that I am left wondering how we can ever truly connect with one another and if the world will always feel so hollow. In those moments, I try to remind myself that these "small talk" questions can be a gateway to greater empathy and understanding, and that it is up to us to choose to follow up with the larger questions. But (as you will see in today's post!) I have also come to believe that everything good takes time, and especially community building. College is such a strange place— it brings together a group of people with common interest (which, for many of us, might be the first time we have that experience), and yet it can also be the loneliest place in the world. There is no isolation like that of feeling you are surrounded by so many people and yet alone within it. If I could go back to college, the number one thing I would tell myself is just to talk to people– to stop being so afraid of being rejected by the world. Walk around campus without headphones on! Let someone know I like their outfit! Strike up conversation when waiting for the professor to walk in instead of everyone sitting around on their phones! Incidentally, even as a graduate student, I am still struggling with these things, despite having a much smaller community surrounding me. But in retrospect I can also see how all the seeds I planted back then for the life I wished to build are now coming to fruition many years later, and in different forms than I thought, but it is that life all the same. And that makes it all worth it. I hold on to that vision of life becoming beautiful and fulfilling, but I am learning to release the exact ideas of what that must look like. Who knows what the world has in store? (a wonderful and terrifying prospect all at once). Sending you so much love!
I'm sitting on my bed in my dorm below the Good Folk excerpts on my wall, about complicated relationships to home, about faith, about isolation, as I read this. I've been away at college for exactly two weeks and re-read these words every day: "That is where the loneliness stems from-- the ways in which we feel that no one else has felt like this, that no one else will ever feel like this." I am working through the desire to feel understood, the need to articulate how I feel everything and feel like I may explode at any moment, but most of what we talk about here is what residence hall people live in or how they are liking their classes. I am surrounded by so many people and feel so alone. I've made some really amazing friends this week and am grateful for how hard they make me laugh and make me feel seen. It's also hard being in a place that feels limiting and makes me question whether higher education is for me. I don't have a comfortable association with the words "course," "academics," "scholarship," and I spent so much of high school longing to get out, get to college where I would finally be understood, where I would "break into blossom" in the words of James Wright! And even now, I'm creating new visions, a new "plan," for a future in which I can get out. I have this rigid, vast, wonderful belief in a future where I will then find my place. When I struggle to get up in the morning and hold insurmountable feelings and so much pain for me to make sense of, this clear, bright future feels like the only way for me to cope. But I want to be more open, remember that we are constantly evolving and that I will figure it out along the way. Thank you for this post Spencer. You always make me feel less alone. I am sending you all the love I feel at your writing, your presence, your existence. Ahhhh!
p.s. The absolute feeling of comfort and joy at receiving a Good Folk notification!!
caitlin
Caitlin! Somehow I just saw this (?)— thank you for this. It's a beautiful reflection on the strange transitional periods of our life, and I can definitely relate. Sometimes the world and our interactions within it feel so superficial that I am left wondering how we can ever truly connect with one another and if the world will always feel so hollow. In those moments, I try to remind myself that these "small talk" questions can be a gateway to greater empathy and understanding, and that it is up to us to choose to follow up with the larger questions. But (as you will see in today's post!) I have also come to believe that everything good takes time, and especially community building. College is such a strange place— it brings together a group of people with common interest (which, for many of us, might be the first time we have that experience), and yet it can also be the loneliest place in the world. There is no isolation like that of feeling you are surrounded by so many people and yet alone within it. If I could go back to college, the number one thing I would tell myself is just to talk to people– to stop being so afraid of being rejected by the world. Walk around campus without headphones on! Let someone know I like their outfit! Strike up conversation when waiting for the professor to walk in instead of everyone sitting around on their phones! Incidentally, even as a graduate student, I am still struggling with these things, despite having a much smaller community surrounding me. But in retrospect I can also see how all the seeds I planted back then for the life I wished to build are now coming to fruition many years later, and in different forms than I thought, but it is that life all the same. And that makes it all worth it. I hold on to that vision of life becoming beautiful and fulfilling, but I am learning to release the exact ideas of what that must look like. Who knows what the world has in store? (a wonderful and terrifying prospect all at once). Sending you so much love!