Resist Persist Resist Persist

“What you resist persists.” - Carl Jung

For many years, I had a colleague—our school psychologist—who had this Jung quote as a part of her professional email signature.

This particular quote always sets off a bad reaction as it ticker-tapes across my brain, ending in an absolute gut-punch.

I’ve been resisting my journal lately, citing lack of time. Ever superstitious, I even abandoned the journal I’d been using and switched to a more substantial, hard-bound book.

As much as I remind myself that writing is a process, that it takes practice and you have to exercise your writing-mind like a muscle, and even five minutes of writing is better than nothing, I’m resisting.

Writing is a task that takes a lonely kind of isolation. Writing is solitary. It is to rise above our environment—our real and present world—and hover. It is a privileged escape. A meditation. And why don’t more people meditate, when we’ve all read the research and understand the substantial health benefits? Meditating takes nothing more than a quiet space.

Writing is similarly bare bones. You need a pen and paper and quiet and that is it. It’s not golf or hockey; it’s no rich kid’s game. There are no fancy, necessary accessories. It should be accessible and simple. So why resist?

The act of journaling is akin to unloading. The act often forces my hand and reveals all. And what happens to be bubbling up for me is yucky and nauseating; what persists is a feeling of failure.

Failing at life is a term I throw around often, usually in a light-hearted, conversational manner, typically accompanied by a sardonic thumbs up and a half-smile. It’s a spread too thin, can’t quite get it done, oops I forgot it’s dress-up like an animal day, when are you gonna grade those papers because my mom really wants to know, we’re out of milk, someone has to spray these jeans with stain remover, why does it smell like puke in this spot, crap I have six missed calls from my husband, you can’t even keep your dog alive kind of feeling.

At first it is tan and tinged, but it starts to burn darker, spreading and turning more severe the longer it is left unattended.

My heavy head is foggy and cluttered with intrusive thoughts. Worry droops off my heart like cheap metal hangers from the dry cleaner, like icicles, the shape of dripping dinosaur teeth.

The sun is out; the sky is that bright blue you can only see on a Chicago February afternoon. The kind of blue so clear that it throbs. I never liked sunglasses; they’re nothing but a world filter.

And all of a sudden, an image appears: I am treading water, barely staying afloat in the center of a lake, algae filled and frigid, the water seeping around me; a speckled loon flies above, and she sees only the perfect circle of my pale moon face. Small currents billow around the soft edges of my outline, the underwater motion of my legs and arms is mostly hidden. The effort diminished from above.

My eyes beg for rest—but I refuse to close them—the urge to sleep just another basic need that persists and is resisted.

My precious time is too often wasted with frivolous attempts to optimize, to make correct use of, the depressing repetition of the same, over-thought refrain: what is my next, best, most strategic move? A chess game, but I’m losing before I start, because I don’t remember how to play, no matter how many times I’ve been shown, reminded, and retaught.

I want to let go of this failure. Correction, this feeling of failure. Because any outsider peeking in wouldn’t look at my life and immediately think: hmm, great effort but failed attempt.

Someone, somewhere would probably tell me not to let go of the feeling, but to lean into it. To uncover and examine. To put my arm around it and ask where it’s from and how long it plans to stay and check to make sure it’s not hungry. But to do that feels like a mountain climb that I’m not ready for, because I simply cannot take care of one more thing.

The failure-feeling persists within me. No matter how many times it is pushed and packed and ignored and smashed and folded and hidden and stomped and minimized.

Because what we resist…