On Digging Out of A Funk and Dealing With Distance [Dear DBN]

By Datebynumbers

I miss you, I hate this, I am bored, I am lonely, I am blah blah blah, you get it.  Your emotions are a fire – they need kindling, oxygen, prodding; they need care.  But sometimes the fire is crackling and all you need to do is close your eyes and feel the warmth.  This week, how to fight the emotions when they’re hard and how to appreciate them when they’re special.

What do you do to get yourself out of a “funk?” (mood-related, not necessarily guy/romance wise)

The part that really sucks about the funk is the limited self-awareness.  You’re connected enough to know it’s just a phase, but not enough to figure out what it is.  Thanks, Brain!  Really helpful!  I am an insta-fix junky.  This song will change everything!  This furniture arrangement will realign the stars!  This run will put me back on track!  Okay, no it won’t.  But you know what will?  That continued initiative to fix the rut.

Just the use of the word funk implies that things aren’t that bad.  It’s not your life that’s down and out, it’s just a period of it.  It’s your mood.  It’s, sigh, all in your head, or at least all within your power to change.  Pretend for a moment your funk is a horcrux.  If your first attempt at destruction is thwarted, you keep trying.  You try everything.  You try taking a new class, volunteering on Sundays, keeping a journal, working out, applying for jobs, whatever it takes.

This is your own psyche giving you permission to grow.  It’s asking you to.  This is the calm before your storm.  Take a deep breath and change everything because when else do you feel the need to do so?

When dating someone IS working out, how do you get through missing them in between seeing them?

Missing has come a long way since sending letters in the cargo hull of a ship. It’s likely you still have some access to the person you love, whether that be through calling, texting, emailing.  They can reach through the ether and touch your heart with a simple hello.  What a remarkable shuddering.  Even without sweet notes and drop-by gchats, you have old sweatshirts, the lingering of their cologne, the song they love to sing, the stretch of road where he told you he loved you.  You have long afternoons curled up by the window with a cup of tea etching out your future in dreams.  In the stillness, you have fullness and movement and wishing and fire and heart.  You have more than deadlines and chores.  You have the mind’s favorite poetry, the soul’s favorite warmth.  You have someone.  You don’t get through missing them, you revel in it because oh, what sweet injustice it is to the rest of the world that you get to miss something you will embrace again.

But if the hours are longer than days, then I’d suggest you write.  Because other than depression, love is the only time words demand to be released.  Give them a home and read them again and again, because as luck would have it, you’re feeling something pretty inspiring.

CollegeCandy is excited to announce that we’ve partnered up with one of our favorite Tumblrs, DateByNumbers, to bring you some of her very best advice. Each week she’ll tackle your questions. Life, love, sex, the real world…nothing will be off limits. To submit a question of your own, visit her “Ask” page and keep an eye on CollegeCandy every Thursday afternoon!