Fight vs Flight

I'm exhausted. Seriously, it's 7pm, I took a nap today and I’m still tired.

Since the day I got here I’ve debated whether to stay or leave. I fought with myself for 10 days. During these 10 days I have thought heavily about my fight/flight instincts. I’ve beaten myself up, unnecessarily. I’m too hard on myself, I know Mom, but I really wanted to identify why I wanted to just run away. Is it fear? Is it intuition? How do you recognize fear versus intuition? How do you gauge the appropriate response? I feel like I should run more from intuition but I don’t. I run from fear, letting fear dictate how I live my life. But when things scare you generally it’s because it’s new, foreign and uncomfortable. Instead of staying and overcoming fear, I run. I run because I want to get back to what doesn’t scare me. Fear is “I don’t like this because I don’t know how I should feel right now”

Intuition on the other hand, that nagging feeling in the pit of your stomach. Deep inside your core. The “something isn’t right” feeling. Intuition is when you know something doesn’t feel right but you can’t explain it. You can’t label it, but you can feel it. And what do I do with intuition when it tells me to run? I stay. I stay when I should run and run when I should stay. I’ve got it all wrong. I stay because I think I feel like I have something to prove. All I end up proving is to myself is that yet again I have failed to listen to my gut. I end up fighting a battle that I should have run from. Like running into a burning building without a hose. For whatever reason I want to fight a fight not worth fighting. And fleeing from something that could help me grow.

I started trying to label what I was feeling and connect it to something I’ve felt in the past just for comparison purposes. It wasn’t in the pit of my stomach, it wasn’t intuition. I know intuition, and this wasn’t it!

I dated a guy for a month after my intuition sounded the alarm. An entire month. Why? Intuition(and Iris) told me to run but I ignored it and fought. I fought a fight I had no chance of winning. The ex girlfriend won, the ex always wins, whether she knows it or not. I should have run, but I stayed. Hoping that either I was wrong or that the feeling would go away. Did it go away? Nope. It got worse. And it kept getting worse and I kept ignoring it. That something isn’t right feeling never went away. Intuition is always familiar and recognizable. A lot of times coded wrong and categorized with subsequent feelings…like insecurity. Did I feel insecure in that relationship? Absolutely. Why? Because my intuition was right and he pulled farther and farther away, pushing me farther and farther away making me feel like something was wrong with me. But it wasn’t me, I was feeling the insecurity becomes the comfort wasn’t there.

Staying here created a feeling of insecurity. Me feeling insecure because everything was unfamiliar . Me afraid of the unknown. I didn’t know how I fit in here, I didn’t have a voice, I wasn’t sure this was the right choice for me. I wasn’t sure I was doing the right thing. Did I feel insecure when I woke up in this strange place amongst a dozen intelligent, grounded, creative people? Absolutely. Why? Because I was afraid I didn’t fit in. Did it get worse? No. I stayed, found my place and overcame what it was that made me feel insecure.

Being able to relate what I am feeling now, to something else I’ve felt in the past helps tremendously. I feel like insecurity is present in both fear and intuition, and as long as you are able to identify the feeling, you can then employ the appropriate response. Run when intuition floods your gut, don’t fight...you won’t win, you’ll end up continually unhappy there is nothing to gain and your body is sending warning signals before the shit hits the fan. Avoid falling on your face, pay attention to the “slippery when wet” signs.

Today I decided that I just don’t want to be here anymore. Not fear, not intuition, just conscious choice. I am on a very regimented schedule and I just don’t want to exude the energy to keep up. Screw schedules. I want to be on my own non-schedule. Let things flow as the day allows them. I’m headed to Oahu, to stay with the girl I was originally going to rent a room from. I’ll stay there three weeks. Recruiting in the morning and lounging on the beach in the afternoon. Here I’m lucky to get to the water once a week. I need more sun, more color, more time to by myself.