mile-an-hour mind

You know how driving long distances can make you exhausted?  You're not physically doing much, just working your hands and a leg, but you are so aware of your surroundings, concentrating on road signs and landmarks, that by the end of your trip you can feel mentally mowed down.  I know when I drove the eight hours to and from college, it took me nearly three days to recover.

Well, this is how my mind feels all the time, with or without a speedometer.

I'm always focusing on something, always wrangling my thoughts, fighting the urge to be pulled in one thousand different locations, unfolding my brain like a map to cover so much ground, making notes and scribbling directions so fast and furious that I write holes into the paper as I burn rubber with my regrets, constantly creasing until the paper crumbles.

My job isn't physically demanding but the stress is emotionally overwhelming.  My living conditions are not detrimental to my body but my spirituality is stressing my heart.  I never do anything yet I'm always tired.  I know my parents think I'm lazy, and maybe they are right because I will admit there's a slice of sloth in me, but mostly I'm just exhausted.  That's why I think I'm not artistic anymore.  It seems the older I get, the more disturbed I become.  And the more disturbed I become, the less creative I am.  I'm too preoccupied to push myself as an artist and a writer, preoccupied with everything ranging from garbage that doesn't matter to larger than life issues I cannot control, things that should not take so much of me away from myself, things that I should have let go a long time ago but can't for whatever reason.

My mind is racing at one hundred miles an hour but my life feels stuck in first gear.  And I have to wonder, when will my mind stop wandering?  When will I find a rest stop for my cerebrum?  I need a place where I can relax and release the tension, a space where I can be still and take in the scenery.  When will it end?  Where will it end?  Will I reach my destination?  Will my head eventually just run out of gas as I run myself into the ground or will I crash and burn and finally shift into shambles?