Decision

I need to decide whether to go back to work on Monday of next week or Monday of the following week. Once I go back, life will be different. There won't be time to watch random YouTube videos about self-compassion or make my dinner in the afternoon so that my dishes are cleaned before 5:00. There won't be luxurious weekday hikes, and sleeping in will be out of the question. Life won't stop.

Life will pick back up at breakneck speed, and getting to work will be the most difficult thing I do all day. When each workday is over, I'll have to force myself to go the gym, even though I'll be tired and hungry. After my workout is done, I'll come home and have to put all my things away. Then I'll make myself some food, scrounge up the energy to make a lunch for the following day, coach myself to take a shower, and talk myself into going to bed, hopefully falling asleep without too much anxiety keeping me from good rest. Then it will be the word I dread most: Repeat.

It's the rat race I exited a few months ago. I had to leave because my depression got too bad, and I couldn't function anymore. How will this time be different? How can it be different? I do have medication on my side, which wasn't the case before. Now, at least, my anxiety is numbed, which allows me to breathe deeply and long. I feel I can face the pressures of work because my feelings are deadened. I have chosen to give myself the gift of truncated emotions because, I reason, my background set me up to languish underneath their heaviness.

So what's it to be, this Monday or next? I can't decide. I want one more week to hike and explore, but do I have the financial luxury of such? Maybe I could ease myself into the work schedule without actually being at work. One more week of leave would allow me that. One more week, and I'll be ready. Maybe Wednesday of next week then? A few days isn't going to make much difference monetarily, but it might emotionally. I want time to go for one or two more hikes before rejoining the rat racers, and I want to try to get to church this weekend.

No matter what day I start working again, I still wonder what I'll do with the rest of my life. I wonder if I'll always be working a desk job, which I'd so hoped to get away from. I suppose I could keep the Alaska Airlines interview in Seattle, but the timing is all wrong. I'm not ready to move to another state, to live on pittance, to work odd hours and feel sleepy all the time.

God of the universe, please show me what I should do - next week or the week after?