The Slow and Constant Burn

The Slow and Constant Burn
Do you have any idea how uncomfortable it is to feel like you are constantly on fire?
I do.
Not physically of course. But it is a visceral feeling, real and tangible to me. Deep in my soul, I am constantly burning and I can’t quite put my finger on the reason why. It’s exhausting, both physically and mentally. Sometimes it’s overwhelming to me, to the point where I just want to do something about it. I run myself ragged trying to constantly achieve, but the burn never stops, it just burns hotter. Sometimes it overwhelms me in a way that makes me want to run away and rest. I have the urge to lie down under my desk, under a blanket, I want to be under something where no one can find me. Unfortunately, that is very rarely an option. It wouldn’t help anything anyway.
Is this normal?
Do other people feel like this?
Am I the only one?
I don’t know the answers to those questions for certain, but I don’t think I am the only one. It certainly feels very lonely though. The only logical reason that I have been able to come up with for this constant all-consuming slow burn, is that I haven’t quite found out what I’m supposed to do with my life. I feel like I am on an arduous quest for personal meaning, a way to make a difference; the way I am supposed to change the world. 
Simply writing that out makes me feel insane.
I have a very fulfilling life. I have everything I have ever wanted. But I still feel like I am missing something. I have this vision of time ticking away faster and faster while I hold on by a thread just hoping it doesn’t get away from me.
I feel like every day I am not fulfilling my purpose is a waste. Wasting time seems like the ultimate insult to God. I’m halfway through this life and I still haven’t done anything with it. I go to an office every day. I sit in a room with no windows trying to achieve a number that doesn’t matter to anyone else in the world, all for a few dollars more on a paycheck. Every day I pull into the parking lot of my office and think to myself, “I don’t know what I want to do with my life, but this is not it.”
I go home every night and I cook and clean and try to be an attentive mother and wife. I am responsible. I am caring. I am loving. I am loved. I go to the events my kids are participating in. I volunteer for booster clubs. I take care of the people who matter most to me. I offer guidance when I can. I love my family with ferocity.
These things soothe a certain part of my soul, but there is still that ache for more meaning, for more purpose, a longing that I can’t describe even to those closest to me.
People have said, you need another job, or you should go back to school, or you should find out what your passionate about and do that. I am receptive to those ideas, and actively pursue them. All the while I know in my heart that another job won’t make this burning stop. I’ll simply be in a different version of the corporate disease. Going back to school is fruitless if there is not a plan for what to study. Finding out my passion; well, that is certainly number 1 on my priority list, but I have yet to pin that down.
Recently, someone shared an article with me about how to find your passion. I read it earnestly and intently, more than once. One of the author’s recommendations was to look at the books you read and find a theme. I did that. Most of the books I read are about murder and crime. So that wasn’t exactly helpful. One of the other recommendations was to ask those closest to you about what you talk about the most. So, I asked my husband. His response, unflinching and without hesitation, was “Violence. Also reading, writing and anything fitness related”.  Two of my other friends said basically the same thing.  I must have really missed my calling when I didn’t become an assassin. I could satisfy my violent tendencies, make my own hours, make a ton of money and work out whenever I wanted. Sure, there is the downside to that life, mainly prison, but there are downsides to everything right? (All of that was sarcasm, just in case someone wasn’t aware).
After all those conversations I marveled at the fact that I have any friends at all and that anyone ever agreed to marry me.
The violence in my heart is not a frightening type of violence, although it can be frightening to those who do not understand it. It should be frightening to someone who is on the wrong side of it. It is a controlled ball of fire that lives inside of me. It is a righteous violence. Righteous because it was earned through battles fought alone and lonely through many years of struggle. Battles fought against men who tried to take what wasn’t theirs time and time again. Battles fought in the work place. Battles fought at home. Battles fought in my heart and mind. Battles fought against my body. Battles that made me a warrior. Battles that made me strong. Battles that prove that warriors aren’t born, courage is not bestowed upon a few lucky individuals through the luck of the genetic lottery. These traits are not gifts. Courage and bravery and the right to be called a warrior is earned through walking through fire and knowing what you are made of. 
Another thing comes out of that fire, grace. Grace for yourself and more importantly, grace for others because you recognize that everyone is fighting an invisible battle and we all need a bit more grace.
Sometimes I think to myself about the men and women who built this country, the farmers, the ranchers, the ditch diggers and the railroad workers. The men who forged the steel that built the buildings that dot our skylines to this day. The people whose names we won’t ever remember and the ones whose names grace colleges and libraries and monuments. I wonder if they got up every morning to till their land and drive their cattle and move their families from the known into the great unknown and understood that they were a part of building something amazing? I wonder if they thought about how their seemingly small insignificant lives were actually the building blocks upon which the families of our nation grew? Probably not. I bet that there were a great many of them that got up every morning to do what they had to do to feed their families and maybe they thought they were meant for something greater, they might have longed for a bigger life or a defined purpose. They had no idea that their small lives were so important to the big picture. They had no idea the impact they had on the future. 
So maybe I don’t know what my great purpose is in life yet? Maybe I won’t ever know? However, when I look back on the life I’ve lived so far, I know that I’ve been through everything for a reason. Maybe it’s to write? Maybe it’s to do yoga? Maybe it’s to be a mom and let my children be my legacy? Maybe my purpose is to be my husband’s wife, or my friend’s friend or my brother’s sister or my mother’s daughter? Maybe it’s to get up every day and chase the sales quota that’s always on my head to provide for my family? Maybe it is all of these things? Maybe the violent fire that resides inside of my heart is the spark that will start a revolution someday? Maybe it’s the force that will drive me every day to be better, to live better, to be more kind, to always be searching, to never be satisfied with mediocrity? Maybe it will inspire someone who speaks to me about my story to not give up? Maybe they will decide to see what they are made of? Maybe they will be the one who changes the world? In a small way, that will be part of my purpose and my legacy.
Until I know what is next, I won’t stop searching. The fire just gets hotter and it won’t let me rest.
Peace and Love,
Chace