Source: gamerfitnation.com

I’m sitting here in the dark—a gigantic ball of stress and angst, if you ever saw one—contemplating life (as you do at 5:00am). I’m exhausted. My eczema is out in full force. And I’m pretty sure that there is absolutely no way that I can justify drinking this early. I mean, even having a mimosa this early sounds a bit wrong—not entirely wrong, but a bit wrong, surely.

Why the stress? Pick a reason. Career, money, weight gain, money, world events, money—all are perfectly good candidates for an early morning angst session. What is different? I’m not alone. I don’t mean physically. There is no one else in the apartment at the moment. What I mean is that seemingly everyone around me has hit this wall at the same time.

We could blame something being in something else’s orbit, but I think it’s more than that (or less than that depending on how important you might find something being in retrograde to be). Everyone around me is in transition. Everyone is either fearful that their job is ending (not because they like their jobs (God, no!), but because of the financial stress), fearful that new projects won’t get picked up, or fearful that doing something they love won’t actually lead to being able to make a living (despite the greeting card and Facebook placards that claim otherwise).

Yes, we could all look at this time as one of tremendous opportunity. We could decide that rather than being despondent or fearful, that we could be excited about the new possibilities that are about to be open to us. But then we look at the student loan payments, credit card bills, or production budgets and that excitement starts to feel a lot like panic.

Obviously, we all keep moving forward. The other option—rocking back and forth in a corner until someone institutionalizes us—has its appeal, of course, but also comes with its share of problems. So, friends and I share conversations over text about creating new plans, trying new things and trying to keep hope alive after a string of roadblocks.

Clearly, no one has a definitive answer about what to do in these situations. If they did, we’d all be doing it. We’ve all heard the talk—negative thinking attracts negative responses from the universe. We must be positive! But there is a different between positive thinking and delusional thinking, right? How do I know when I’ve hit it? And if I do hit it, can I then write a book about it and sell it on Amazon? I mean, how do I learn from it? Yep, that’s what I meant.