The place where my head goes when I’m trying to fall asleep is not pretty. In the dark, before I’ve slipped into sleep I still have those thoughts where I remember embarrassing moments and cringe. I still catalogue regrets, going back as far as college. I find myself angry at myself. I am mad at me for not being able to “snap out of it,” for wasting those years, for missing the quintessential college experience. For not studying hard enough. For not taking advantage of every opportunity. For not even knowing I wasn’t taking advantage of every opportunity.

Even when I’m having these thoughts, I know that by the light of day I can attack them on several fronts. But that doesn’t stop the feelings of regret that bubble up at 1 AM. And then it’s 9:30 in the morning and I’m sitting at work texting with Michael, thinking that maybe I should go get another Master’s degree, to make up for the way I screwed myself out of opportunities with the first one. But as my aforementioned thinking of the college experience shows, in order to feel that I was truly rectifying past mistakes, I’d have to do college over.

See what I mean about this type of thinking being entirely unhelpful?

I know this, and yet sometimes it is still there, and denying that it’s still there dosen’t seem to be particularly helpful either.

I have always been the type to want to take back the past. Even when I was young, as far back as 4th or 5th grade, the things I wished for most vehemently were do-overs.  I used to be far more myopic, part of me convinced that the only way to avenge the old me would be to invent a time machine. Now there’s a part of me which manages to see that the best “revenge” is to live a good life.

But it’s still possible to get tangled up in the possibilites for a good life, or a better life that could have been, had I not done X, or if I had only chosen Y.

It’s too early in the week to be this much of a downer. I have no energy or motivation on the job application front. The enthusiasm with which I attacked Federal Job applications last month seems to have waned. Perhaps it’s another sign that I should not be frentically applying for jobs that I’m not thrilled with the prospect of, but for some of them, all I see is dollar signs, and really, there are worse reasons to do things. But I’m staring at pages of “multiple choice and explain your answer” questions on my experience communicating and scheduling and administrating and while I do have all the requisite experience and can give the clear examples they’re looking for, my motivation to write those perfectly worded explanations of my ability to be a glorified secretary is just not there.

I’d say the only thing I need is a break from the job applications, but I barely did anything last week and this week is going to be equally busy and I can’t get a job if I don’t apply and it’s already a week into March and I’m not closer than I was at the beginning of January.

And then I get this notice about bills that are overdue (at work. Not my own personal bills) from this vendor that keeps screwing up and it just sets off the annoyance.

I know I need patience and gratitude, among other things, but it’s 9:45 on a Monday morning and it’s not happening right now.