That one friend.

That one person.

That one movie.

That one book.

That one moment.

Have you ever met the one?

The one that makes you think and then lets you go so suddenly that you question if they were the one?

The one person who was there.

Stood throughout the entire time.

Held your hand and didn’t let go.

Wasn’t put off by attitude or a face of dismay.

That one.

That one that stays on an endless call and even though you both have something to do, stays anyway.

The one who doesn’t care much about where you’ve come from, only that you’re here now.

It’s hurtful to find out that the one was found too late.

But it’s a destroying feeling to know you met them already and it was too late.

The friendship was pure.

The feelings were real.

The joy was palpable.

The essence so tangible.

The relationship so true.

But it was too early. I know it hurts when you find love late.

Imagine a knife in your gut, a situation where you slowly bleed out because you met them too soon.

Years of fantasy and hurt.

The potential was always there but never realized because it was too early.

Too early for me, for them, for us.

Too early for the right time.

Time can be an awful concept wrapped in deceit.

We know time waits for no one but time also doesn’t catch up quickly enough.

The very optimistic people will say it’s never too late.

But what if it was too early? What if time was too slow, too early, too on time?

Because that’s what happens when the right person comes at the wrong time.

It’s not too late. It was just too early.

Early enough to almost ruin what could be.

Early enough to irk me deeply.

Early enough to meet the right person at the wrong time.

This is a testament that sometimes the push we need is often quiet and not directed towards us but when the time comes, there is no doubting that it is time.

It would grieve me greatly, the knowing that I could no longer start over. For as long as I can recollect, with the aid of my rusty memory and trampled feelings, I am reminded that I have always and will always want to start over.

The biggest damning fear I have is failing and making mistakes. It is quaint and quite foolish because this serves to be, paradoxically, the greatest achievement in life — failure. Fail in public, they say. Fail upright and downright. Just fail. Their derisive laughter echoes in a sound chamber in the most seared corners of my heart. Biting. Chafing. Dismantling. Breaking. Hurting.

I see a lot, believe a lot and engage with less.

So, I would begin to spend hours, months, weeks and even years trying and failing, the very thing that holds me captive and keeps me searching for something. Something that isn’t me; for something, a substance, an account that would speak to me but simultaneously serve as an opaque ceiling where everyone could hear, but no one could see.

I began writing, another thing I feared failing at. For this reason, I could not write for years. I was stuck in a predicament — to either continue and keep failing or to stop and claim that writing was not for me. I chose the latter, of course, being the coward I am. I often find myself impressed by my few but strong acts of courage. They remind me of who I am yet to fully become.

I didn’t always remember feeling this innate, sporadic but constant fear. I had many reasons to fear, and this brand of anxiety cannot simply be bought on a shelf or ordered through Aliexpress. It had to be a unique collection crafted and designed for one person who would suffer underneath the brutality of its weight.

Trying and failing.

Failing but failing.

Not too long after, I was trapped in the glass behind staring into the eyes of people filled with wonder, watching them come and go, through the the double doors, breaking barriers and I remained ever so small flattended by the weight of the fear of failure.

To you, this might seem rather extreme, as everyone has this fear of failure. Of course! But I would tell you no, not really. These fears began very early on, accompanied by firm and stern warnings by my mother, reminding me of my persistent fragility, handicapping me from becoming anything. She, in her love, started what I would call the beginning of my suffering. It torpedoed into an incorrigible and unmanageable behavioural change that was out of my hands before I knew it was ever in my hands.

I failed at math. I had chest pains when I read hardcover books, and I really loved books. For the very best of them, I pushed myself and stayed through the pain and discomfort because what must be done, must be done.

I promptly failed at writing. I failed at art. I had no passions except an uncanny resemblance to this dangerous but familiar feeling of fear.

It would interest you to know that I have, in many ways and very often, tried to break free, and at times, it feels as if I have. The truth is startling and sure when I realise I often feel like Paul begging God to remove the thorn in his flesh and him hearing that his (God’s) grace was sufficient for him.

I hated God in my early childhood. I tried convincing myself that he did not exist, even though I heard this “delirious” gospel often. It was mostly because of my first heartbreak. I had what I would call a “wake-up call” far too young. I am sure this greatly impacted my ability to form interpersonal relationships for years to come, as for my entire secondary school experience, I cannot for the life of me recall a single friend.

So, it begins. I am not sure where this is going. If I will write it under an alias because I am afraid or because I so badly want to separate the substance of who I am from the reality of who I want to be perceived as. It seems rather tedious, all this running around, creating new accounts to hide my face, a feature I am not even sure is beautiful, just to hide my words.

I am terrified of getting dragged, as we call it. I am dissatisfied with my crushing, gimp ability to rise above even perceived hate, for this is the bane of my very existence. It is fascinating, this fear that translates to anxiety. I have, in most recent times, experienced hate and I have consciously not batted an eyelid. I have not cared or given thought, but as Joyce Meyer’s book suggests, this is the battlefield of the mind. A book I have not read by the way.

I want to help myself. Believe in who I should be. I had a dream years ago, as I am a dreamer often receiving messages from the most high, that an old woman in an old parking lot held my waist where, might I add, I often experience debilitating pain from time to time, and refused to let me go. She had an iron grip and when I woke up, sweating and not because of paralysing fear, but because of the darkness blinding me and bolstering heat, I could still feel her hands.

It is another thing that amazes me about my contradictory nature. I call this revelatory but terrifying dreams, “night terrors.” I have had them long before this day, and when I can feel the worlds collapse into one and a woman supposedly in my head hold me in “real,” life, I must concede that there must be some extraterrestrial force beyond this world and cannot for any reason take anybody seriously trying to convince there is no God.

This may be an introduction to something new or perhaps a continuation of something old. As I write, I am itching to create a Substack and put this there or use one of my newly created anonymous accounts and paste my story.

It is unfortunate because I want my story to be heard but not at the cost of being truly vulnerable. How exactly, does this makes sense? I do not know.

What I do know is fear has held me and anxiety has assaulted me brutally so much so I am ever so tempted to say NO MORE and curse them by fire as many of my brethren do. My only issue with this approach is that it hasn’t worked yet.

So it seems I must write under my name and not an alias and do this often and against my will, because this is the only way I step into the destiny I truly want.

The Bible says, “O deaths where is thy sting, O grave, where is thy victory?”

To you, I say, “O fear where are thy fraudulent hands? O anxiety, where are thy lies?”

I am not scared much of anyone as evidenced by many of the things I have accomplished so far. I do, laughably, seem afraid of myself. Isn’t this the perfect mockery of my entire existence? That the “devil or evil” could effortlessly convince me through no real effort of their own, exclusive of generational ideals and characteristics that may prevail over me, make me the very enemy I seek to destroy, myself?

I truly wonder if this is how Eve felt after eating the fruit — betrayed by her own selfishness, or rather, more accurately, her want to know. For it is this want of knowing. The knowing of the past, present and future that has kept me in captivity because I do not know, I cannot plan, so I cannot fully give myself over and be vulnerable. What if I get a job where it disqualifies me? What if I live too long? I’ve rarely thought of dying. What if I don’t like who I am in a few years?

It speaks of self to self and in fear of self. A bitter irony that has no element of sweetness in it. This journey to chasing the now and pretending to be unbothered with the future has, and I hope will continue to serve me well.

When I look back on the last two decades, I stand filled with fear, very unaccomplished. I wished more for myself, achieved nothing of note and yet I almost carry into a new year, a routine of true depravity that seeks to satisfy this selfish part of me; one that feeds my innermost fears and kills my most intimate dreams.

In 2014, I swam and almost drowned all in one day at a measly age of 9. I felt peace just as I felt the water take me away. I saw darkness and felt no longer beholden to make something of myself. For a few short moments, what I had never felt, I saw and became.

I am not sure the family or friends that will one day read this, and in truth, I couldn't care less. I care more about the future me that will read this, and that is my real trigger. What real way of healing is there if I am my own trigger? If I take the gun and cock it in my direction and at my head, willingly, for fear, fear of what may be! What does that make me?

This answer is one I have not read of yet. This cruel hate is one I have seen often, but mine is only different because when your own faculties are turned against you, the conclusion is that there is little to do.

It reminds me of the insane ones and mad men. They tear their clothes in dissatisfaction, seeking to be understood, trapped in fear and frozen in a glacier of sincere anxiety. There is no talking to them or helping them.

Am I… insane?

I do not think so. I believe all of my faculties remain functional, but these words up above seem insane, and while my mind has never broken down in shambles I could not put back together, I am back to this same dilemma.

In my head and in my dreams, I imagine a wondrous future filled with all the characters I will one day play. It is this fear of who they respect that grates on my nerves. It has been a long time since I sat in the dark at 2 am to write down my thoughts before they run away. It has been a while since I have basked in the beauty of the insanity that is my mind.

People understanding me does little to soothe me. I do not really ache or ask for stories that resemble mine. I am not asking anything of anyone. I am only trapped by the constraints I inflict on myself and my willful ability to be a useful idiot in my own story.

It would be a thing of joy to break free, but when I leave this page and read through this again, go through the reins and edit, I will still be at a desk, stuck staring at my laptop screen, confused on whether this should ever see the light of day.

I sincerely hope I choose that it does.

I hope I write it under my real name and real account, because how else does one break free from the imprisonment that is them?

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