I was just sitting there, in the middle of everything in Beijing, and I just felt so empty. Empty in my soul. I was pondering: “Why am I even here?” During my whole stay in Beijing I had had a hard time finding happiness, or even feeling somewhat satisfied with being in China again.
I felt exhausted and empty…
Sure, I won’t lie, of course, I was enjoying my unpretentious existence – of course, I did, but I still felt like something was missing. It didn’t matter. Nothing mattered. I might as well lie in my bed in my hotel room, watching a movie, or 20, or why not sleep? Didn’t care.
I did actually rather want to hide in the hotel room and had to force myself to get out every day to discover the Chinese capital. Still, everything was rather unsatisfying… and I was bored… mostly all the time.
So completely indifferent if I spent my entire stay in China in my room sleeping all day every day or out and living my life.
Arriving in Yangshuo, sitting by the river, pondering, I again felt the emptiness growing within me. My soul was hollow, empty, and I was wondering what was going on. What exactly was happening in my head? Or in my soul? Here I was, in another country, I didn’t work, I was on vacation, and I should be happy. At least I should be able to feel something.
But there was nothing inside me, I was completely empty. I had an empty soul…
My thoughts went to a quote from the book ”Eat, pray, love” by Elizabeth Gilbert, one of my favourite books actually, which I read for the first time just after I’d taken my stuff and moved to Thailand with the intention of staying forever. Or at least until I felt better.
I was about to start a new life, find balance, finding my way back to myself again. This was 2012 and the first time I felt completely burned out from work. At the same time, Mr PanicAttack decided to introduce himself. Thus I didn’t manage to do any of the things I had set out to do! I was too broken. Empty soul? Hell yes, even back then… The quote my thoughts were drawn to was::
I used to have this appetite for life. And now it’s just gone. I want to go somewhere where I can just MARVEL at something.
I can relate. SO much. I feel this now again – isn’t that an oxymoron! – and thinking about it how long I’ve actually felt this emptiness I don’t even know? My appetite for life is completely gone, my joy for life nonexistent. What happened to me? I love to travel, there’s no doubt about it, so I should be in heaven. I should feel well, feel happy, joyful, or just for crying out loud feel something!
But no, instead I’m just empty and… no feelings!
Everything around me is perfect. The nature is beautiful, the food delicious, the Tai Chi practice is a great addition to my everyday life – I have everything I can ever want, I couldn’t even be at a better place. Still, it’s like my soul wishes… yes? What does it really want?
The problem might be I don’t really know what my soul wishes for. At this point, it’s just indifferent to everything in life, and I don’t really know how to go about it or what to do to get my mojo back, the joy or the appetite for anything.
The solution to this problem seems to be, according to many people, to do things you enjoy and focus on yourself. It sounds great, had it not been that you feel an immense emptiness deep in your soul. How are you under those conditions supposed to enjoy anything?
What to do if nothing is fun?
I don’t appreciate anything. There is absolutely nothing I enjoy doing anymore. Nothing. I force myself to perform most of my tasks actually, or else nothing would get done. So then what about this “doing only things you enjoy”? If there’s nothing you enjoy?
Sure, I’ve been here, I’ve been there, looking at stuff, sucked in the atmosphere, trying to take in I’m actually here – it is huge! And at times I’ve actually enjoyed it for a minute or two, but it doesn’t really matter. Deep within me – it doesn’t matter! I could have skipped it. All of it.
The futility is paralysing…
I might as well be lying on my couch back home sleeping because this is how uninspiring most of it is… such an empty soul, and I find this troubling. This was supposed to be my salvation! This was supposed to mend my broken body and get me going. Although in a way maybe it has started, maybe I should have more patience.
My blood pressure is much better, and my migraines – almost nonexistent (compared to before). My neck is what it is, but still, there are better periods in that one too…
Hopefully, all these are signs that I’m starting to live again, but it might take some time… I hope so. Because I don’t know how long I can handle walking around with an empty soul, like a hollow shell.
Have you ever felt like you’ve lost your mojo? What did you do to regain it? Please leave a comment, we really need to speak more about these things.
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