Another year, another month, another day, and more of the same. Please don't ask me how I'm doing.

Technically, I've now been in California for six months, but let me cheat a bit and say I've only been in California for one month.  I'm not counting the five weeks I was in Hong Kong or the 2 months I was laid up due to hip surgery.  On bad days, I won't count the three weeks I stayed with Auntie H in Sacramento either.  Therefore, by my adjusted count (this is the rationale by which economists provide forecasts, which is why they are rarely ever accurate), I've REALLY only been in California for a month.  Even if it feels like it's been forever.

I mean, my job search feels like it's taken forever, even though it hasn't.  PW warned me about this.  She said that if I dragged it out and went on and off in spurts, I would eventually burn out.  As always, she's right.  Even though I haven't been aggressive about looking for work and haven't been proactive about networking or applying for jobs until I moved to the East Bay in March, I feel like I've been looking for work forever.  It causes me a lot of anxiety.

Anxiety which is driven in part by the fact that I lost all my unemployment benefits when I left NYC because I also left behind a part time job that paid approximately $100/wk before taxes.  In the eyes of the Department of Labor, I voluntarily left employment, so I'm now ineligible for unemployment benefits.  In reality, I had been laid off from a six figure job and worked part time so I could continue to feel like a productive member of society.  I made a maximum of $100/wk before taxes, or about $70/wk after taxes, which didn't even cover my weekly groceries much less my monthly rent of $2,600.  When I wrote the Department of Labor explaining that: 1) it was a part time job that paid up to $400/mo, 2) I had moved to California, and 3) I was dedicating my efforts to look for full time employment, I received a ruling that said that my reasons were not valid enough to leave my part time job.  But, I digress.

My anxiety which is also driven by the knowledge that I'm operating without a safety net not only on the monetary front, but also on the social front.  I just don't know that many people here -- I don't have many friends or professional contacts in northern California.  I spend my days asking the few people I do know who they know that I might be able to speak with.  And, when I meet with those people, I ask them to provide names and suggestions on more people to speak with.  I play six degrees of separation, but instead of Kevin Bacon, we're dealing with random people who live in the Bay Area.

My anxiety manifests itself in funny ways.  In the past week and half, every time someone would ask me  how I was doing or what I've been up to, I would burst into tears.  I can't quite explain it.  I can't control it at all.  It's really quite embarrassing and horrible feeling.

Someone called me yesterday to ask me what I planned on doing to celebrate my 32nd birthday.  I said that I had no plans, and he insisted that I do something to celebrate.  When I responded that I didn't want to make a big deal out of anything, that it had been a rough few months so I wasn't in the mood, and that I preferred to just keep it quiet, he kept pushing and raving about how it's important for me to celebrate myself and not the things I did or didn't accomplish.  I really didn't want to talk about it and told him so, but still, he kept pushing until I started to cry.  In hindsight, I should have just hung up the phone instead of politely bearing through a conversation I had already made clear I didn't want to have, but I didn't.  And as a result, we both had to deal with the discomfort of my tears and I felt much worse for it afterwards.  Today, I saw R and her mom. Her mom so innocently asked me how I've been lately, and I started to cry.

Really, it's all just simple small talk.  But, I just don't seem to handle even small talk these days.  I oscillate wildly between hope and despair over whether my life will get better, whether I will find work, whether my move to California was a mistake, and wonder if I will find happiness in my new life.  On the days I have hope, I'm fine.  Almost positively optimistic.  And, on the days where I feel despair, I almost can't do the smallest things.  On those days, be sure not to ask me any questions about me.   I'm not sure I can answer any of them without bursting into tears.

This is my life

I've been unhappy lately.  I've been unable to motivate, I wage a small war with depression and my ability to get out of bed in the morning, and I'm frustrated.  I often ask myself what I did wrong, replaying what-ifs in my head and wondering where things went wrong.  I can't quite put my finger on things, but I think what I suffer from is a lack of fulfillment.

Which surprises me and teaches me things about myself I never knew.

I've always prided myself in taking joy in the simple things in life.  I've never been someone who has let my job, my possessions, my friends, my looks, or my income define me.  Yet, here I am, one year and four months out of work, newly moved to California, financially insecure, unhealthier and fatter than I've been in a while, recovering from hip surgery.  Unhappy.  Unfulfilled.

Why do I feel this way?

Why am I so focused on the negatives when in reality, I am surrounded by family and friends that love me, that care for me, that are there for me?  When I have a safe place to live, and a functional car that takes me where I need to be?  When I have access to running water, heat, and healthy food?

I'm so caught up in acquiring my perception of happiness and success that I've failed to just live.  To truly experience.  Which was the reason I took 12 months from work, the reason I spent most of 2009 traveling, doing odd non-corporate jobs, volunteering, being a part of my community -- I wanted to experience life in a way that I hadn't before.  I want to be able to say that I lived my life.

Was I truly happy as a desk jockey that worked 50-80 hour weeks?  Was I truly happy living a life that started at 6am and didn't end until midnight?  Was I truly happy because I bought a $1,200 handbag?  Was I truly happy making six figures but paying $3,000 a month to live in a mouse-infested apartment building in a desirable neighborhood?

When I try to place myself in that life again, I remember that I wasn't.  That I hated that life too.

So, why is it that I'm trying to find that life again?  That the life I have now isn't ok?

JP, the world's best therapist, says that when we're faced with the unknown, we often revert back to the familiar even if it isn't good for us or hurts us.  That's why children of addicts marry one or become addicts themselves.  Perhaps in the face of the unknown and uncertain future, I wish I had my old life because I know it "works." I don't know whether my current life will succeed.  I don't have a map that tells me that I should do next.  I am just here.

I'm scared.  Which is why I've been wishing for something I walked away from. To truly experience life, I ought to embrace my fear.  Live in the moment.  Fill up on my experiences.  Even the hard ones.  Because struggles, personal frustrations, fear, uncertainty.  That's life too.

I am not my job or my ability to find a job.  I am not my income.  I am not the clothes I wear, the bags I carry or the places I shop.  I am not my busy schedule, my social calendar or the hours spent at the gym.  This is my life, and I'm exactly where I should be right now.