It’s time. I’m taking a break from your battles.

I went for a run this morning. It was the first time I had run in two weeks. Every step in the first five hundred meters was exquisite pain.

My mind raced: It hurts, it hurts, it hurts. Why am I still running if it hurts? Why don’t I stop? Why don’t I just walk? My heart raced, not from exertion. Tears welled up in my eyes. I changed my playlist three times: from a mix of old classics, to Bob Dylan, to Matt Maeson. And I kept running; contemplating just about everything. My legs shook. But, oh my god, I couldn’t stop. I had been resting my body for the past two weeks. That is apparently what you do when you are injured. But this morning, despite the awful aching reminder, I was driven to put on my shoes again and return to the only thing I knew. The only time in the day that I was free to be with myself. My only space away from all of you.

The pain slowly eased as I continued to refuse to stop. The words and poetry settled me and brought me back. And then they all just broke free from whatever cage they had been put it. My thoughts. My own thoughts about my own things were allowed to have priority for thirty goddamn minutes. At first an expansive, sparkling cloud, but then a contraction to a crystal clear, star-like, focus. My body kept up and we all moved together and it became so obvious: I can’t keep fighting your battles, I need to fight my own.

For the past two months, 2 years, 35 years, I have been tirelessly trying to fight your battles. I’m am really, really good at this. This is why you always want me on your team. Time after time you ask me to help. You seek me out. You talk among yourselves about how great I would be at it. Then one way or another you involve me. It’s not your fault at all. I enthusiastically rise to the challenge. I love it. It feels so good to be at the top of the list, invited into the ring because someone thinks you are a winner. A gold star is placed. An A+ is given. In an illusory way, doors appear to open. And the best part? Your battles are such a welcome distraction.

I always think your battles will be so great; they will fill the void, provide satisfaction, enlighten, expand, stimulate. They never do. It’s not your fault. On the other side of every battle is never a win, never an exaltation. There is only a piece of me gone, more time lapsed, and boredom and an anguishing frustration. I don’t think even you are ever served either. It is a proverbial lose-lose.

I can’t be in your games anymore. I can’t be held to your rules.

Because as good as I am at fighting your battles, oh man, I am even better at following your rules. Your rules keep me right in line. I know you don’t see the rules you set, but I do now. Your rules make sure that every battle has a consistent pattern: I enter the ring, I get you a little of what you want, the team feels jubilation, victory seems in sight. But it is only at this point that I start to understand the problem more truly. I start to see and feel and hear. My insides start to turn. I yearn. I try. I inevitably start to speak and try my hardest to help you understand and I fail. I always fail here. I am asked to take a seat. I am asked to dim. God, I cannot do this anymore right now.

Your rules kill us both. I have never felt alive following your rules. You can’t be alive following your rules. If I flip through the Polaroids in my mind of times when I’ve felt electric, free, loved, me, every time was when I let my guard down and stepped out of your game and said fuck it to your rules.

Earlier this morning I asked my eldest, my most perfect reflection of my rule-based others-battles-fighting self, to make a little schedule for herself to stay a bit focused now that there is no school. I asked her to consider what she wanted to get better at or do more often and allot some time to it over the course of a week. I told her to just be realistic, set a few goals.

When I returned from my run I asked her how she was doing on it. She said, she couldn’t do it, she wasn’t good at being realistic like me (how interesting, eh?). My husband and I both spat out what we were drinking.

“Honey, your mom is the least realistic person there is.”

“Yes, Isla, there is nothing that I do that is realistic. In fact, being unrealistic is the entire essence of my every problem.” And there it was. Inside my head I started going down the list: myself, my limits, my energy, my work, my time, my peers, the world, ….

Meanwhile, Scott piped in: “This is true. You can imagine how her expectations of me have been dashed” he joked.

“Actually NO.” I said dead serious. “You, you, are the one and only thing in my life that has exceeded my expectations.” And there it was again. Clarity.

And it is all so true. I have needed so much more from everything, from all of you.

Consider my sword laid down. Armour off.

You can’t have my passion, my expertise, my strength, my voice, or my power anymore. I need it. God, I need it. I gave your battles a chance but they have only left me lacking and wanting and searching harder. It’s just not there. I am so tired.

A good friend posted a picture on Instagram the other day. It was a picture of a dog on it’s back, on lush grass with the sun shining on its belly. You could tell it was rubbing its back back and forth and wagging its tail in pure bliss. My friend captioned the picture: find something that makes you feel like this. I don’t have anything like that most of my days. I haven’t allowed myself to find it. I thought you had it to give to me. You clearly don’t. I suspect this is indeed the lesson isn’t it. So, off I go. Under the ropes, down from the ring. Now to open wide and start to swallow the things that arouse my own desires instead of yours. To follow my agenda, not yours. To direct all I have to offer towards myself and, unlike you, worship all of it. You will call me selfish and dramatic. You will wonder if I’m depressed or in crisis. You aren’t used to your leaders bowing out. Only those that really see me will understand that none of this is the case at all. Every day I will try to tell myself the same. I hope to become invisible to you and, as that veil falls, that another curtain rises and reveals the vibrancy and depth and love that I’ve refused to search for until now.