sunny = happy, rainy = sad
Most days, I let the weather decide how I'm feeling. Probably too much. Sunny is happy, rainy is sad, etc. You can imagine how hurricane seasons usually are for me. But something happened recently that made me think a lot more about what I thought was just a sentimental attachment to the sun. My house (meaning: everyone who lived there except for me) went into a kind of crisis mode. Each of my roommates were dealing with their own personal problems which cast a metaphorical cloud over the apartment. And I nearly lost my mind.
It turns out that I'm the kind of person with a mental checklist of things that need to be okay in a given moment in order for me to feel okay. If all the boxes aren't checked, I freak out. If the sun isn't out, I freak out. If my planner has too many pending to-dos, I freak out. If someone around me is freaking out, I freak out harder.
Obviously, this isn't a very productive way to manage my own emotions. After all, the emotions of others are hardly mine to manage, so why worry what my roommate is dealing with? Shouldn't I just feel content enough within myself to not have a panic attack at the slightest hint of emotional discomfort? Apparently not.
But this isn't anything new. I was the kind of kid who would take a headphone off to listen to my mom's steps down the hall and know by the rhythm whether it was a bad day at work or not. I've always been this kind of person, the kind who relies on everything around them to be alright before they can be alright. The kind who needs even the sun to confirm that today will, in fact, be a good day. That it is allowed to be a good day.
I'm not sure what to do about that.