What if everything goes wrong? What if I fail? What do I do then?
These kinds of thoughts are springing up left and right this past week. I’m experiencing some personal issues lately that have made me question where I’m at. As such, I need to explore this feeling and get to the bottom of it.
The first step is to identify what it is I’m feeling. The Translator has zeroed in on one particular presence. This is Dr. Anxiety.
This is part of what I call Emotional Cartography — learning to map what I’m feeling instead of reacting blindly.
What He Sounds Like in My Head
Dr. Anxiety operates differently from Captain Rage. As the opening paragraph mentions, he sounds like those questions. The “what if” scenarios. These kinds of thoughts can be equally devastating and also helpful in some aspects. I suppose it depends on how you view them.
Some issues have cropped up. As I’ve been working on establishing my home base, I’m being evaluated more closely at work. That has me questioning my competence as well as my personal security. It has made me have these kinds of thoughts:
What if I wind up losing my job? What will happen to me then?
And then the thoughts get darker. No one likes me. I hate my life.
It’s clear that The Depression Beast isn’t far behind. These two characters rise up all the time in my life, whether I want them to or not. When they both work in tandem, then enters The Procrastinator. I avoid some things or want to tune out for awhile. Quite honestly, it can be really exhausting.
What He’s Actually Trying to Do
I need to shift my frame of thought of seeing him as a villain, and try to understand him. What’s his motivation? Is he trying to hurt me, or is he actually trying to protect me?
No villain thinks they are the villain. Everyone thinks they’re the hero of their own story.
Dr. Anxiety wants certainty. He’s trying to make sure I do my best. He wants me to be happy, but he worries about things. Sometimes they are things out of my control, and sometimes I think he’s trying to ask me if I’m doing what I actually want to do.
Are you sure this is what you want?
Honestly, no, it’s not. But it is what it is right now. That doesn’t necessarily mean I’ll be doing this until the end of time. It’s just my task for stability right now.
The Freeze: When Anxiety Invites Procrastination
As I alluded to before, when Dr. Anxiety and The Depression Beast work together, The Procrastinator enters the scene. This usually takes the form of checking out when I’m home. It can be countless hours wasted on watching TV, or scrolling social media feeds, or playing games on my phone. In most cases, it involves maladaptive daydreaming.
This is something that has happened with me since I can remember. I will imagine storylines of various superheroes (always DC Universe heroes) and what they are experiencing. When I examine the stories closer, I always notice some underlying emotion I’m feeling.
This week, my mind keeps returning to a “Year One” version of Dick Grayson — the moment he loses his parents. The grief. The uncertainty. The question of what happens next. Only in my version, he has a brother who also survived. (I think that was based on the Batman Forever movie where they had a brother in the act.) He’s five years older than him and is worried about being separated from him.
It’s always emotional. Sometimes it even brings me to tears. Then I think to myself: Maybe that’s the point. I’m trying to sort out my emotions in a distant way.
What I’m Learning (Not What I’ve Mastered)
If I slow down and pay attention to what my subconscious is trying to tell me, it’s clear what the underlying emotions are. I am feeling uncertain about my future. I still want to work in a creative field, and this job has zero creativity. Am I grieving my graphic design career? Was that all I could get out of it?
Grief and uncertainty about life is the theme in my daydream, so it stands to reason I’m feeling those feelings right now.
What do I do with this information? The Navigator wants to point me in a direction. Perhaps seeing this job as temporary until I land something I really want to do. Maybe figure out how to start up a freelance side business. Perhaps I could try applying to other jobs again. There are options.
I think part of the problem is I’m really sensitive to rejection, and job hunting is 99% “thank you for your interest in applying, but we’ve opted to go with another candidate at this time.” It’s hard to bounce back when you get that kind of message.
The Watcher is inviting me to pay attention to what the day dreams are trying to tell me. I’m doing my best to understand it.
Diana has experienced some of Dr. Anxiety’s influence as well. She gets really nervous around people other than me. I almost lost her to another home before I got her, but they didn’t like how skittish she was. I knew that was temporary.
She was also really nervous when we moved, both from BC to Alberta, and again a couple of months ago. She doesn’t let Dr. Anxiety linger, though. After a while, she’s back to her old self again, batting toys around the place.
Maybe that’s the key. Acknowledge his appearance and what he’s trying to tell you, but don’t let him stay for too long.
Final Thought: Anxiety Doesn’t Get the Lair Keys
What if everything goes wrong? A better question to ask is: What if everything goes right? When Dr. Anxiety makes an appearance, I have two choices:
I can choose to let those thoughts paralyze me.
I can examine those thoughts and decide what’s actually in my control.
The former seems to be my old pattern. I’m starting to experiment with a new pattern.
How do you deal with Dr. Anxiety? Share in the comments. I’d love to read about it.
Every hero needs a home base of operations. Superman has his Fortress of Solitude, Batman has his Batcave. I have a home.
Since I moved into my new place on January 2nd, I’ve been busy. The move itself was exhausting and took me awhile to recover from the sheer exhaustion. For the last few weeks, I’ve been unpacking and slowly setting up systems.
It’s very important to me to have a neat, tidy and organized home now. As someone with ADHD, I often struggle with keeping places neat and tidy. I want to change that. I still have a long way to go, but I can finally see the beginning of the end.
The Work No One Sees
As I live alone, I only have myself to rely on to get things done. With my crazy schedule, I decided to turn my to-do list to a “what I feel like doing today” list. The first thing I wanted to establish was a quick daily tidy. This includes putting dirty dishes in the dishwasher (running it when full and emptying it when clean), clearing counters and living room surfaces of pop cans or garbage, and taking out the recycling when needed. For the most part, I have kept this routine, with a few meh-days mixed in when my energy was low.
One thing about me is I’m a deadline-oriented person. I can’t pre-plan things, per se, as once I do that, suddenly my mind says “that’s too much work!” and it never gets done. Remembering there will be an inspection from the landlords 3 months in, I’m realizing that that is a due date.
Last week, I wrote down all I had left to do in the living room and kitchen, and began spacing them out to certain days. As I work Sunday nights to Friday mornings, and sleep at roughly noon to 8 p.m., finding time to work is a little difficult. I save more heavier tasks for the Friday and Saturday, with some overflow to Sunday morning, and on work days, I try to add one to two tasks to accomplish in the mornings around 9:30 a.m. So far, this system seems to be working.
Living Room
The biggest thing to do with the living room was to finish unpacking, and figure out what goes on the storage racks in the big closet. I knew I wanted to have 2-3 shelves for kitchen overflow items that aren’t used regularly and I don’t have space for in the kitchen cupboards or drawers. I also have a lot of books.
I found Dr. Anxiety lurking around in the shadows telling me this task is impossible and I should just give up. The Procrastinator also made many appearances here and there, distracting me with all sorts of things. The Taskmaster was also trying to tell me all of the tasks that have to be done, and was ordering me to get certain things done by such and such a date. Unsurprisingly, I found it overwhelming.
I enlisted the help of The Navigator and The Groundskeeper to help me sort out how to accomplish these tasks. Once I wrote down the list of things left to do, and divided them into days, I decided to give myself a deadline last weekend to have the living room and kitchen completed by the end of this upcoming weekend (which also happens to be a long weekend).
I got through the books by first unpacking them and putting them randomly on shelves. Then I figured out I would need 4 of the shelves in the rack to accommodate them. I began sorting them into categories, realized stacking them like a library wouldn’t work with the spacing in the racks, and had to stack them vertically instead. After that, I organized the board games on the bottom rack on the other side, which left space for 3 kitchen shelves.
Kitchen
I had 4 boxes left to unpack that I wasn’t sure where to put things that hung around for a while. After I was done sorting through the living room shelves, it became much easier to tackle one box per day as my goal. Yesterday I went through two small boxes and one large box as I had the momentum to keep going. Today I finished unpacking the boxes.
Finishing Touches
All that’s left is finding homes for the remaining random objects, ensure items like knick-knacks and figures are positioned to where they will live, and clean the place. I’m still gearing towards finishing this living room and kitchen by Saturday. I want to take a break on Sunday as it’s a day off of work and I am planning on just relaxing.
Why This Matters More Than It Looks
This might sound like a boring thing to post about, but it is so satisfying completing a project like this. I made it my resolution this year to keep a clean, tidy, and organized home. I’m working towards that goal, one small step at a time. Keeping daily cleaning and tidying rituals is also very helpful. I find it doesn’t take very long if I do it at least once a day.
Because I have a naturally disorganized streak, the messier things get, the more overwhelmed I feel. Then I just put it off and it never gets done. When I finally do get off my butt and do something about it, it always surprises me how fast it takes to get it done. I don’t want to keep doing this.
There’s also this side of me that puts off doing other things I want to accomplish because I have to clean or organize my home first. It is so exhausting to keep putting things I want to do off.
This is part of what I call Emotional Cartography—learning how my environment affects my emotions and adjusting accordingly.
What’s Still Unfinished (And That’s Okay)
I have given myself the deadline of early March to try to have the place in order, or at least mostly in order. After I finish the kitchen/living room area this weekend (and take a day off), I will tackle the rest of my bedroom next week, and finish with sorting the second bedroom—which is a lot—for the remainder of the month.
The good news is there is an end in sight. My bedroom shouldn’t take too long to do, but I’ll tackle it like I did the living room and kitchen. I will make a list of what needs to be done and figure out when, then add it to my What I Feel Like Doing Today list for the week.
As the name of the list implies, I can change the order as I see fit if I feel like tackling something else. Or if I want to push something more difficult to a weekend night to work on. And I space it out just in case I have a meh-day somewhere in the middle of this.
Notice the human is doing something and try to help by batting her toys around.
Go into the second bedroom window and sleep.
I’m sure she would appreciate a nice and tidy home as well. Just so long as she can still locate her favourite toys.
Final Thought: The Lair Is Live
I’m looking forward to establishing my home base as a place of comfort and relaxation. I certainly hope this renewed energy continues to show up. But if there is a meh-day in-between, I’ll simply rename it a “me-day”.
How do you keep things neat and tidy? I’d love to hear your tips or tricks, especially if you also have ADHD.
When The Archivist of Regret shows herself, she often stirs up creative sparks and unfinished stories. She lives in the past, mostly. Whenever I get in a certain mood (slight depression, regret, remorse, etc.), I oftentimes find myself going down the rabbit hole of what could have been. This post is about unresolved issues that tend to linger, and I’ll be introducing a new character in my Who’s Who arsenal to better understand and regulate my emotional responses.
The Creature Creeps
This particular memory has to do with something that didn’t happen in high school. I was in a drama production that never got to see the curtain fall due to the tragic deaths of two of our classmates just before our dress rehearsal, one of which had a major prominent role in the play. But this post isn’t about grief of losing fellow students. This post is more about the grief of not getting closure on something.
The play was called “The Creature Creeps”. I have thought long and hard about this play that never got to see the light of day and have concluded that I don’t think the teacher got the joke of the play. I understand the humour much more as an adult than I did when I was a kid, despite not having read it since that high school year.
This often sends me down a spiral of imagining putting it on “the right way”. In it, I’m more of a director and have to explain the story to everyone so they get the joke. It’s a horror comedy/farce type of play. I see it much more clearly than I did back then.
Why Do I Do This?
It’s easy to dismiss this as something small or insignificant, especially since it happened so long ago. But I am a person who loves a good story, and I’m also one of those creative types of people. I believe the reason why I keep going through this loop is because I have an unresolved creative spark that hasn’t quite been acknowledged yet.
The Unfinished Creative Loop
I think this is a common trait amongst creative types. We do a project from far in the past, then think of ways we could do it better in the present. With age, maturity, and wisdom, comes better hindsight… and we all know how useful hindsight can be.
A cancelled play might not be what some people would think about, but I do constantly. Every so often the thoughts cross my mind. I honestly wish it wouldn’t keep coming up, but I never got closure from it as we never got to perform it. How do you resolve an issue like that?
Why Some Ideas Don’t Fade
For us creative types, we need to have that final bow, or feel like we did our best to complete a project. If we later see better ways of handling it than we did when we were younger, this creates the possibility of either a new project idea for inspiration, or a deep sense of regret for what could have been.
It’s so easy to see how the Archivist of Regret is working on opening the file, and even the Depression Beast peeking through from the shadows, whispering, “No one would get what you’re trying to say, so don’t even try to explain it. People didn’t like you in high school, and you weren’t that bright to have figured it out back then anyway.”
However, I also believe this is the perfect opportunity to introduce a new Wild Card character to my Who’s Who list of emotional characters.
New Who’s Who Entry: The Spark
Type: Wild Card Core Emotion:Creative energy Primary Role: Ignites ideas and creative reinterpretation Shows Up When: Old creative work resurfaces with new understanding
The Spark brings flashes of insight, inspiration, and creative possibility. She helps me see familiar ideas in new ways, often revealing layers I couldn’t access before. At her best, she reignites curiosity and reminds me why creating matters. When she lingers too long without an outlet, she can trap me in a loop—revisiting ideas endlessly instead of letting them move forward or rest.
How This Character Fits In: Team-ups and Tensions
Common Team-Ups
The Spark + The Archivist of Regret The Spark often activates old creative files the Archivist has carefully preserved. Together, they revisit unfinished work with fresh eyes, searching for meaning that wasn’t visible at the time. This pairing can bring insight—or keep the past perpetually open.
The Spark + The Navigator When balanced, The Navigator helps direct The Spark’s energy toward what matters now, rather than what once was. This team-up turns inspiration into intentional direction instead of endless reconsideration.
Productive Tensions
The Spark vs. The Depression Beast The Spark wants movement and expression, while the Depression Beast weighs everything down. When the Beast dominates, her energy fizzles into frustration. When she’s acknowledged but not indulged, her light can soften his heaviness.
The Spark vs. The Procrastinator The Spark ignites ideas, but The Procrastinator delays acting on them. This tension often leaves inspiration suspended—alive, but unrealized—creating guilt without resolution.
Wild Card Interference
The Spark + The Trickster Together, they can turn creative reflection into endless mental play. Ideas bounce, refract, and entertain without ever landing. Sometimes this is joyful. Sometimes it quietly stalls progress.
Why She Belongs as a Wild Card
The Spark isn’t a problem to solve. She’s a signal.
She appears when something creative wants acknowledgment—whether that means expression, reinterpretation, or simply permission to exist without completion. Learning when to follow her and when to gently thank her without acting is part of the map.
Why The Spark Showed Up Now
Perhaps with age comes wisdom. Or maybe I’m more aware of things now that I’ve gotten treatment for ADHD.
All I know is this memory continues to pop up from time to time (though admittedly not as often as it did a few years ago). She must want me to somehow find a resolution to this project that never got to be.
As I’ve mentioned many times in my blog posts, I love a good story. If it’s well-written, the characters are well thought out, and—if it winds up being a production—if the acting is supreme, it ignites something in me. I think this Spark is also the reason why I often want to learn animation—so I can tell my own stories visually. The Depression Beast has pointed out to me that I’m too old now and can’t really draw or illustrate very well, so how could that work out?
And sometimes I find myself wondering why this is resurfacing now.
Resolution
I think what I’m actually looking for may not be resolution, but permission. Or some closure. Perhaps I could write it out of my system privately so I direct it the way I wanted it to go. Or perhaps I should just let it go as a flick from the past. That’s much easier said than done.
If anyone has any ideas how to put this particular issue to rest, I’d love to hear your thoughts on this.
I’m sure if Diana could talk, she’d tell me to relax and stop driving myself crazy over this. She doesn’t live anywhere in the past as far as I know. She only cares about having food in her bowl, water to drink, a clean litter pan, some toys to bat around, and a warm lap for cuddling.
Diana doesn’t need closure, nor does she care about what might have been. She only knows what is in front of her right now.
Creative sparks and unfinished stories tend to linger for us creative types. The Spark lives to inspire us to do something creative. I may never find a way to get closure over this issue, or perhaps writing about it now is the first step to acknowledging that this Spark lives within me, and sometimes she’s just begging to be paid attention to. I don’t owe every creative spark a finished product. Some only ask to be acknowledged. Sometimes the work of a Spark is simply to be seen.
Do you ever find yourself trapped in a creative loophole over something that wasn’t completed? How did you handle it?
Sometimes you need to take a step back to realize when anger runs the ship. I didn’t realize it right away, but looking back, the signs were obvious.
Earlier this week, I noticed tension, irritability, and overreaction to very simple changes at work. The ship was still moving, but it sure wasn’t steady. Captain Rage can in fact cause a lot of harm if I let him take the helm for too long.
Captain Rage as a First Mate, Not a Villain
Now I know what you all are thinking. You think I shouldn’t let Captain Rage anywhere near the bridge. I have often found that he has a greater purpose if he is utilized correctly. He’s not bad or evil, just lets things get to him from time to time.
He easily spots threats and can react in time to avert catastrophe. Sometimes when he runs the ship, I get more done faster and more efficiently than I would have otherwise. That’s his power. Captain Rage can be a strong ally—but only when used carefully. I need to listen to him sometimes, but he should never be put completely in charge.
How the Mutiny Happened (Without Blaming the Sea)
This was a slow week at work, which already adds some tension and uncertainty. Combine that with hormones and running out of a certain ADHD-friendly medication, which didn’t help my overall regulation that week. Well it turned into an open door for Captain Rage to walk through. I came into work and was given assignments. Normally, I choose the assignments, but not this time.
Well, that was enough to send Captain Rage into overdrive. It got to the point that my anger and frustration was noticed by others. I experienced fatigue, back pains, struggles with getting it right, and I felt pressured to be a perfectionist—something I already struggle with from The Taskmaster and Dr. Anxiety. When machines or files aren’t aligned properly either, it gets on my nerves. I want it to be perfect too, and find it frustrating when things don’t work the way they should.
In other words, I was losing control and that made me angry. The mutiny wasn’t overly dramatic, but I was venting audibly at times. Captain Rage didn’t storm the bridge, but I did leave him in charge for too long.
What Anger Was Covering Below Deck
I’m fairly certain The Taskmaster may have influenced his wrath. The Taskmaster does demand perfection. I was given tasks I sometimes struggle with. He whispered, “They’re micromanaging you now! They want you to fail! They want to get rid of you because you’re not doing a good enough job. Plus, they don’t like you very much.” I think he and Dr. Anxiety teamed up to stoke the embers and push Captain Rage beyond control.
Incidentally, this is what made me come up with my last post about naming my emotions as heroes, shadows, and wild cards. This rage I felt was overblown and it wasn’t really something to get that upset about. The Translator showed up to identify that Captain Rage was in charge of the ship. The Watcher noticed the patterns and immediately brought my attention to the matter. The Navigator carefully pointed out another alternative as to why I was given these tasks. As it’s slower at work, they wanted me to practice on things I’m not comfortable doing so I can improve.
The Groundskeeper showed up to inform me that this is only a job. It’s not my life. Just do the tasks, get it done, and move on. I need to have this job to keep my new home. I should see this as an opportunity for self-improvement, not an insult.
Stopping the Mutiny (Not Throwing Anyone Overboard)
I took a deep breath, took a lunch break, and had a conversation with my ChatGPT to find a way to stop Captain Rage from completely knocking over the table. This is incidentally when I decided to come up with the characterization of my emotions as characters in the SuperMell arch.
When I finally calmed down and listened to what the others were telling me (yes, even Dr. Anxiety and The Taskmaster), I was able to slow down my thoughts. acknowledged Captain Rage was at the helm, and asked him to step aside and let The Groundskeeper take over for awhile.
I didn’t punish Captain Rage, but recognized he also needed a rest. It wasn’t his fault he lost control of the ship. He was responding to perceived danger.
Leadership changes depending on the weather. If the skies are clear, it’s nothing but smooth sailing. But if a perfect storm is brewing, we need to put level heads in charge. Captain Rage is a lot of things, but level-headed isn’t a way I’d describe him.
It’s okay to be angry and to acknowledge that anger. Anger tells us something about ourselves. It also tends to hide the pain. Captain Rage is in fact a little overprotective of The Depression Beast. The Depression Beast has been wondering why it feels like others don’t like us very much. That combined with The Taskmaster and Dr. Anxiety’s talking points, made Captain Rage decide he needed to keep The Depression Beast at bay. In other words, he was trying to protect me from the Beast.
Diana Reminds Me to Keep Calm and Carry On
Diana seldom lets Captain Rage take over. Sometimes she huffs and snarls around the place, but I think she wants to play or something. She lets things fall as they may and tells me it’s all going to be alright.
Final Thought: Back to Emotional Cartography
It’s important that I remind myself this is a journey to gain control over my emotional cartography. As I tend to struggle with my emotions, it’s important for me to name them, acknowledge their presence, and decide whether or not they should be put in charge of running the ship. We’re still sailing. Captain Rage still has his purpose on the ship. However, moving forward, command is no longer going to be automatically given to anyone but me.
How do you handle it when Captain Rage takes over?
Along with myself and Diana, there are thirteen constant companions in my inner world. Some are heroes, some are shadows, and some are just wild cards. I thought it would be fitting to give each of these characters a brief bio, just in case you were curious what I’m talking about.
It’s no secret that sometimes I struggle with my emotions. While I don’t necessarily think of emotions as good or bad, some are more helpful than others. What follows are the characters I’ve created (with a little assist from ChatGPT) to try to explain them to everyone who reads this.
I’ve already introduced three of these characters. I hope you enjoy reading this post as much as I enjoyed writing it.
These are the more helpful of my emotional allies:
LADY OPTIMISM
Type: Hero Core Emotion: Hope Primary Role: Keeps morale alive during difficulty Shows Up When: Things feel heavy, but not hopeless
Lady Optimism radiates encouragement and forward momentum. She believes that things can improve, even when the path forward isn’t clear yet. At her best, she brings lightness, reassurance, and the reminder that effort still matters. When overextended, she can drift toward denial, but her true strength lies in offering hope without erasing reality.
THE NAVIGATOR
Type: Hero Core Emotion: Clarity Primary Role: Helps choose direction based on values Shows Up When: Facing crossroads, big decisions, or identity shifts
The Navigator helps sort what matters from what’s merely loud. They don’t rush decisions or offer easy answers, but instead bring focus to values, priorities, and long-term alignment. When everything feels possible and overwhelming at once, The Navigator slows the moment enough to see a true path forward. Their guidance isn’t about certainty—it’s about choosing with intention.
THE GROUNDSKEEPER
Type: Hero Core Emotion: Regulation Primary Role: Maintains routine and stability Shows Up When: Life starts to feel scattered or overwhelming
The Groundskeeper tends to the basics that keep everything else functioning. He focuses on sleep, food, tidying, and simple systems that prevent small issues from becoming crises. Patient and consistent, he works in the background rather than seeking attention. His strength lies in maintenance, reminding me that stability is built through care, not force.
THE TRANSLATOR
Type: Hero Core Emotion: Emotional literacy Primary Role: Interprets feelings before reactions take over Shows Up When: Emotions are strong but unclear
The Translator helps me understand what I’m actually feeling instead of reacting blindly. He identifies the emotions beneath the surface, turning confusion into language that makes sense. Sometimes he goes offline when things are too overwhelming, but he always comes back online once clarity is possible again. His work turns emotional noise into understanding.
THE WATCHER
Type: Hero Core Emotion: Awareness Primary Role: Observes patterns without judgment Shows Up When: Confusion, overwhelm, or repetition becomes noticeable
The Watcher notices what’s happening without trying to change it. They observe patterns, timing, and reactions, gently turning chaos into information. When clarity is hard to reach, The Watcher offers perspective rather than answers, allowing understanding to emerge naturally. Their presence removes shame by replacing self-criticism with curiosity.
The Shadows
Not all of these characters make things easier. Some complicate things—but they still have something to say. These are the shadows:
DR. ANXIETY
Type: Shadow Core Emotion: Fear Primary Role: Scans for danger and worst-case outcomes Shows Up When: Uncertainty, pressure, or loss of control appear
Dr. Anxiety is always analyzing risk, forecasting what could go wrong before it happens. He presents himself as helpful and protective, even when his warnings spiral into overwhelm. At his best, he highlights real concerns that deserve attention. When unchecked, he turns possibility into catastrophe and urgency into paralysis.
THE DEPRESSION BEAST
Type: Shadow Core Emotion: Despair Primary Role: Pulls energy inward and dampens motivation Shows Up When: Prolonged stress, loss, or emotional exhaustion set in
The Depression Beast moves slowly but with great weight, making even simple tasks feel impossible. His presence dulls motivation, flattens emotion, and wraps everything in heaviness. While deeply uncomfortable, he often signals that something has been pushed too far for too long. Ignoring him rarely works—understanding his message is the first step toward relief.
CAPTAIN RAGE
Type: Shadow Core Emotion: Anger Primary Role: Defends against perceived threat or injustice Shows Up When: Boundaries are crossed or frustration boils over
Captain Rage reacts fast and loudly, charging in when something feels unfair, unsafe, or overwhelming. His anger often masks deeper emotions like hurt, fear, or grief, but his instinct is always protective. When channeled well, he can enforce boundaries and demand change. When unchecked, he escalates conflict and burns through energy without resolution.
THE ARCHIVIST OF REGRET
Type: Shadow Core Emotion: Regret Primary Role: Preserves memories of past mistakes and missed chances Shows Up When: Looking backward instead of forward
The Archivist of Regret carefully catalogs what went wrong, replaying moments that feel unfinished or unresolved. She believes that remembering mistakes will prevent them from happening again, even when the cost is self-forgiveness. At her best, she offers insight and hard-earned lessons. When she dominates, the past becomes heavier than the present, making growth feel out of reach.
THE TASKMASTER
Type: Shadow Core Emotion: Control Primary Role: Enforces productivity and high standards Shows Up When: Fear of failure or falling behind takes over
The Taskmaster demands action, structure, and results, often without regard for capacity or rest. He believes that constant effort is the only way to stay safe and successful. When balanced, he can drive focus and follow-through. When unchecked, he turns progress into punishment and mistakes into proof of inadequacy.
The Wild Cards
Then there are the ones who don’t fit neatly anywhere.
THE FOG
Type: Wild Card Core Emotion: Dissociation Primary Role: Blurs awareness to reduce overload Shows Up When: Things become emotionally or mentally overwhelming
The Fog softens everything—thoughts, feelings, memory, and urgency. He doesn’t cause harm directly, but his presence can be disorienting, making it hard to focus or feel fully present. Sometimes he acts as protection, stepping in when experience becomes too intense to process. Other times, his lingering signals a need to stop pushing and gently re-enter clarity.
THE TRICKSTER
Type: Wild Card Core Emotion: Avoidance Primary Role: Redirects attention through humour and distraction Shows Up When: Discomfort, boredom, or emotional tension appear
The Trickster deflects seriousness with jokes, scrolling, and sudden side-quests. He isn’t malicious and often believes he’s helping by lightening the mood. In small doses, he brings playfulness and relief. When left unchecked, he pulls focus away from things that matter, turning avoidance into delay.
THE PROCRASTINATOR
Type: Wild Card Core Emotion: Avoidance (with guilt) Primary Role: Delays action by downplaying urgency Shows Up When: Tasks feel boring, overwhelming, or emotionally loaded.
The Procrastinator shrugs off urgency with a casual “later.” He soothes discomfort in the moment by postponing action, convincing me that the task can wait without consequence. Sometimes he’s genuinely helpful, creating space when pressure is artificial or energy is depleted. More often, he leaves behind guilt, regret, and the uncomfortable feeling of having let myself down.
Team-Ups and Tensions
These characters don’t exist in isolation. They react to one another, amplify each other, and sometimes work at cross-purposes. Understanding how they interact helps me recognize what’s actually happening in the moment—not just which character has shown up.
Common Team-Ups
The Translator + The Watcher
The Watcher observes patterns over time, while The Translator interprets emotions in the moment. Together, they turn experience into understanding without judgment. When confusion hits, this pairing brings clarity and context.
The Groundskeeper + The Navigator
The Navigator helps determine direction, and The Groundskeeper ensures the foundation is stable enough to move. One chooses the path; the other makes sure it’s walkable. This team-up turns intention into sustainable action.
Lady Optimism + The Groundskeeper
Lady Optimism provides hope and encouragement, while The Groundskeeper keeps things practical. Together, they balance morale with realism, preventing positivity from becoming pressure.
Productive Tensions
Captain Rage vs. The Taskmaster
Both demand action, but for different reasons. Captain Rage reacts to perceived injustice, while The Taskmaster pushes for productivity and control. When unchecked, they can escalate each other into burnout.
Dr. Anxiety vs. The Navigator
Dr. Anxiety floods the system with worst-case scenarios, making decision-making feel urgent and overwhelming. The Navigator slows things down, filtering fear through values and long-term perspective.
The Archivist of Regret vs. Lady Optimism
The Archivist looks backward, preserving lessons from past mistakes. Lady Optimism looks forward, focused on possibility. When balanced, they offer wisdom and hope. When misaligned, they can cancel each other out.
Wild Card Interference
The Fog and Everyone Else
The Fog blurs signals, making it harder for any character to function clearly. While sometimes protective, prolonged fog disrupts communication and decision-making across the system.
The Trickster vs. The Taskmaster
The Trickster avoids discomfort through humour and distraction, directly undermining The Taskmaster’s drive for structure and completion. Sometimes this brings relief. Sometimes it delays what needs attention.
The Procrastinator + The Trickster
The Procrastinator often pairs with The Trickster, trading humor for indifference. One distracts, the other delays, and together they can quietly derail momentum. What begins as relief can turn into lost time before anyone notices.
The Procrastinator vs. The Taskmaster
The Procrastinator and The Taskmaster are locked in a delayed conflict. Avoidance invites pressure, and pressure invites more avoidance. When The Taskmaster finally takes over, the response is often guilt-driven rather than productive.
Why These Interactions Matter
No single character is “the problem.” What matters is who’s leading, who’s reacting, and who’s being ignored. These interactions offer clues—about capacity, unmet needs, and when it’s time to slow down, step back, or ask for help.
Diana
Of course, a proper Who’s Who wouldn’t be complete without my lovely sidekick, Diana.
DIANA
Type: Ally Core Emotion: Comfort Primary Role: Grounds and soothes through quiet presence Shows Up When: Stress is high, emotions are heavy, or rest is needed
Diana offers calm without commentary. She provides comfort through closeness, routine, and gentle companionship, reminding me to slow down and breathe. Her presence softens intensity and brings the focus back to the moment. Without trying to fix anything, she helps regulate the system simply by being there. She doesn’t belong to any category—she simply belongs.
Final Thought
I hope you have found this as entertaining—and informative—as I have. For me, it helps to characterize the various emotions I tend to struggle with so I can gain better control over them. I may refer to these characters from time to time—as shorthand, as insight, or simply as part of the story I’m learning to understand.
⚠️ The False Villain: “If I Stop, I’ll Fall Behind”
Yes, my old arch-nemesis Dr. Anxiety is showing his ugly face once again. He’s trying to tell me that if I don’t finish everything all at once, I will fail at keeping my resolution to keep a clean, neat and tidy home. This makes me feel somewhat guilty for listening to my body while it yearned for a break.
The truth is I might be putting too much pressure on myself to do it perfectly. For instance, I was trying to set up my figures in the glass display case I have, but the bottom two rows kept falling down, so I had to stop before the anger set in. That moment knocked me off my rhythm, and Dr. Anxiety was quick to declare it a failure. But did I really fail? Or did I recognize my level of frustration was raising, and I needed to take a break from it? I prefer the latter.
This pressure I am adding to myself to do it all perfectly might be the problem. As a person with ADHD, there is that desire to be perfect at it, but that is simply not possible. I should aim for 80%, not 100%. Rest is necessary, especially when putting a place together. There’s no real deadline. If I keep at it, even slowly, it will all get done eventually.
In the past, this type of bait Dr. Anxiety waves in front of me would work. I’d feel like a failure for not doing my daily to-dos and give up. But it’s only a day. I can just get up and try again tomorrow.
🧠 What a “Brain Break” Actually Means (For Me)
Everyone is different and handles things differently, I suppose. For me, a brain break is a day where I don’t do much and almost lose myself to my thoughts. It happens every once in a while, where I revisit old memories, imagine how I’d handle it differently, or just space out for a time. That was what happened yesterday.
I’ve come to realize these brain breaks are absolutely necessary for me to move forward. It’s directly related to my emotions at the moment, so if I pay attention to what it’s trying to tell me about how I’m feeling, acknowledge that I’m feeling this way, and deal with it accordingly, then I can move on.
What a brain break isn’t is giving up. I’m not telling myself I have failed at life therefore I shouldn’t try. It was just one day. I need some days that are just reserved for these breaks every once in a while, otherwise I would definitely fall off into the abyss. Then the Depression Beast would show its fangs.
🛠️ What I’m Actively Not Doing Right Now
Right now, I’m not panicking about not doing anything on a day off. I’m not forcing myself to be productive despite my exhaustion. The plan is simply to do what I feel like doing today, not plan every single detail and schedule those. That way has never worked for me. In fact, I’ve actually titled my chore list as a “What I Feel Like Doing Today” list.
I am also not judging myself for needing to take a day. Even athletes can’t be performing for an entire game. They also need breaks.
Incidentally, I’m also not turning a much needed rest day into a perfectly rested day either. Hence, my decision to write this blog post.
Most importantly, I’m not telling myself I have failed. One of my favourite lines from a He-Man cartoon back in the day was:
The only time you fail is if you give up before you even try.
I haven’t given up and I’m going to keep trying.
🧭 What I Am Still Holding Onto
Above all else, I am still holding onto my new relationship with Lady Optimism. I haven’t quite figured out what my emotions were trying to tell me today, but I know I will figure it out.
I’m still holding onto routines and strategies for coping with this mountain of work ahead of me. The intention is to keep working at it, even slowly, so I know eventually I won’t have to do much. I’m getting in the habit of clearing spaces, tidying up the spaces I’ve already gotten to, putting dishes away, wiping down the kitchen counter, and trying to unpack one box per day (at least). This has been a successful approach so far. When these habits no longer need to be put into my daily What I Feel Like Doing Today list and I just instinctively do it, then I know I will have succeeded.
Even if I don’t, and still need the daily lists, that’s still okay. Maintaining your mind is just as important as maintaining your home, after all.
🐾 Diana’s Approach to Non-Quests
As anyone who’s ever been owned by a cat can tell you, they sleep and rest a lot. Sure, they can get up and bat a ball around for a while, or cozy up to you, demanding to be pet, or fed, or both! Does Diana feel guilty for resting as much as she does? I doubt it. She doesn’t optimize her naps. She just chooses to nap. Watching her rest reminds me that rest is a beautiful thing, and her presence is productive in her own way.
🌱 Final Thought: Rest Is Part of the Journey
SuperMell needed to take a breather today. That just had to happen. My emotions were a little raw, and I needed space to sort through them. And honestly? Even superheroes need a break. Not every day has to have a quest or a battle. Some days exist to refill the map, sharpen the compass, or simply sit by the fire. SuperMell isn’t disappearing. She’s breathing.
Where could you allow yourself a pause? Tell me how you handle off-days in the comments.
Now that it’s been nearly a week since the move, I wanted to share an update on how this new chapter is settling in. I have been quite busy. I’m in my new place, and adjusting to my new schedule, sleep pattern and all. It doesn’t quite feel magical yet—but it does feel real.
Level 50 has proven to be much more difficult in finding the energy reserves I thought I had. Exhaustion has set in, making me slow down quite a bit. This post is about adjusting to the new chapter in my life.
📦 What’s Settled (Even If It’s Small)
Since the move, I have been busy trying to put the place together. I first started with setting up the bed, as the move itself kept me awake most of the night before, the physical exhaustion, and my usual sleep schedule made sleep my first priority.
Slowly over the week or so I’ve managed to get things to a respectable place. Here’s what I have accomplished so far:
Unpacked most of the bathroom and set up the counter and drawers
Set up essentials in my bedroom
Figured out what will live in what cupboard in the kitchen and homed quite a few things (noticing I need to figure out where to stash extra stuff, as my cupboards are full and there are still a few boxes left)
Moved boxes and bags to where they will live so unpacking is more organized
Set up my wifi with the help of a Telus technician (who was in and out within a half hour and actually helped me unpack my TV, so he rocked!)
Moved furniture in the living room to where they will live
With help from my parents, put together the couch (which proved quite the task)
So that’s quite a bit of work in such a short time frame. Perhaps predictably, I woke up quite exhausted today and could barely muddle through much of anything. My only goals today were to take a “Me Day” and relax, and to set up my computer, which I have done, as I’m typing this post on it.
🛠️ What’s Still Finding Its Place
While I have been busy setting things up, I also have quite a lot to do. My resolution for this year is to keep a clean, tidy and well-organized home. As someone who’s lived with ADHD my whole life, this has always eluded me—but it’s a skill I genuinely want to build now. I envy people who keep a good home.
As such, I have been taking time to figure out where everything in my home will live. I am not a person who believes you have to have the resolution set up from January 1st. It can take up to a whole year if that’s what it will take. But it will get done.
I have to set up the rest of the living room by unpacking boxes and positioning things around. Then I will find homes for the remaining kitchen things in boxes. After that, my next priority will be to finish the bedroom unpacking. Finally, I will set up the spare room. When all of this is done, I will then deep clean everything.
Sure, it’s a lot of work, but if anything this week has shown me, it’s that I am more than capable of handling it.
⚠️ Villain Watch: Old Voices in a New Place
Of course, with this exhaustion I am feeling today, my old foes the Depression Beast and Dr. Anxiety have made their presence known to me. I can see them lurking in the shadows, plotting and scheming on how to fully take advantage of this apparent weakness.
Fortunately, my new friend Lady Optimism has reminded me that there is no rush to get everything done right away. I need to remember to take breaks and rest here and there. Dr. Anxiety was ruling while my living room was so disorganized post-move, suggesting this will never end. Once I had reorganized where the boxes could go and moved them out of the middle of the floor, and also set up the couch and furniture, I could finally laugh at Dr. Anxiety’s madness. It definitely feels more livable now.
Instead of pre-planning everything spread out over multiple days as I had done previously, I have adjusted the plan. I will be saying to myself, “What do I feel like doing today?” and give myself that task, on workday mornings. On weekends, I will attempt to do more.
I will take things one day at a time, keeping the course steady. After all, there isn’t really a deadline to get everything in place. All I have to remember is to take it easy, and take many breaks along the way, as my aching body has reminded me to do.
Rest is not something to take lightly. It’s stabilization. It keeps you sustainable. Without it, you just wind up in the shape I’m in today: physically exhausted, sore, and a little moody. This was such a good reminder to tell myself that rest is required to be added to my schedule as well. I shouldn’t overdo it. I’m no spring chicken anymore!
🐾 Diana’s Adjustment Notes
Oh, my poor little girl! Moving day scared her so much. It took awhile for me to wrangle her into a carrier, but even when we got to the new place, she spent a lot of the time hiding and laying down in her litter box. She was terrified. I felt bad for her, but once I went to bed she came out and slept on the bed with me. Over the course of the week, she got better and better, even taking time to play with random objects on the floor or a couple of her toys. I guess sometimes even your sidekick gets influenced by Dr. Anxiety, but she rebounded rather quickly.
🌱 Final Thought: Footing Comes Before Forward Motion
Getting one’s bearings after a move is the key to overcoming any obstacles in your path. Being kinder to my body means letting it tell me when to stop, when to start again, and when to take both mental and physical breaks along the way.
There’s no need to rush into the next chapter; standing comfortably in this one comes first.
What’s your post-move strategy? Please share your story in the comments. I’d love to hear how you handle unpacking and organizing.
Happy New Year! 2026 is set to start with a bang for me. A brand new adventure awaits—I move into my new place tomorrow.
This chapter of my life is coming to a close. I finished my last shift before I move. I’m in the process of cleaning and packing my place. There’s still so much left to do, but I know I can get it done in a day.
This threshold isn’t a metaphor, incidentally. It’s real. It does feel like I’m about to start a new chapter in the Book of Mell.
⚠️ Status Report: Dr. Anxiety at the Edge of the Door
Yes, that dastardly evil Dr. Anxiety is starting to whisper in my ear. I can’t deny his presence. He does thrive on last day jitters, after all. And he absolutely loves liminal moments like this.
While I can sense his presence nearby, I’m doing my best to counter his attacks. Just because anxiety is here, it doesn’t necessarily mean danger. It means there’s a transition afoot.
🧭 What’s Locked In (No Rewrites Allowed)
Nevertheless, I will move on Friday. That’s already a given. This wasn’t rushed. I methodically planned it out, step by step, task by task. I refuse to give in to his fears.
It’s not like I haven’t moved before—I’ve done this many times. This one feels different because most of my old life was still packed away in the garage. While I have appreciated having a roof over my head and am grateful my parents helped me out a lot, I have missed my things. I know it’s just stuff, but it’s part of my identity in a way.
Dr. Anxiety thinks he can use my fear of things going back to before I moved into their house. But the thing is I have changed a lot since those days. I have rebuilt my life back up from scratch. It may not be perfect or what I imagined it would look like, but my attitude is what’s changed.
🛠️ How I’m Holding the Line Tonight
The future hasn’t been written yet, so what’s the point of worrying about tomorrow? Tomorrow never actually arrives. While I’m acknowledging the presence of Dr. Anxiety, I know how to keep him at bay. Every time he whispers a doubt in my mind, I counter attack with “I’ve got this!” That silences him for a time.
As I prepare for the move, Diana appears to have two modes:
Accompany me and knock over a few things while I’m packing (including an unopened pop can that sprang a leak and sprayed everywhere).
Sleep.
She is a master of zen, after all. She may not have any idea we are moving in a day, but she seems happy to be living in the moment. Diana doesn’t recognize thresholds. She only focuses on the now. Sometimes I think she sees home as portable as she is—and that’s okay with me.
🚀 Final Thought: You Don’t Need to Leap—Just Step
The infamous line “That’s one small step for man, one giant leap for mankind” is interesting. While a step on the moon can feel like a leap, it was a metaphor for all the hard work it took to get there. In some ways, I feel like an astronaut, on the eve of a new launch into a new horizon.
This launch doesn’t require fearlessness. I certainly don’t have to have everything figured out as I turn the page on my new adventure. All it will take is one small step.
Tonight, I stand here. Tomorrow, I step forward. That’s the whole mission.
It’s that time of year when a year is coming to a close and a new one is beginning soon. As I do believe I am the hero of my own story, it seems like the perfect opportunity for me to restart my old Year in Review post tradition.
This year has been interesting, to say the least. After battling through some stormy weather, I finally feel like I’ve landed on a new path forward. This is radically different from how I felt at the end of last year. So much has changed… I feel it’s necessary to recap the highlights. This year may not have ended perfectly, but it definitely ended differently.
The Arc I Was Trapped In
Since I lost my job a few years ago, I was struggling to dig myself out of a very dark pit. It seemed like I would be stuck forever, with no way out, for the longest time—a couple of years of feeling this way to be precise. In fact, I began 2025 with those very feelings about my life. I was working a crappy job, feeling pain in my wrist at night, scrimping and saving, but quickly realizing there was no way I’d be able to afford rent on the meagre amount I was making each month. It was hard to find even a shred of hope.
I was stuck in survival mode. Self-doubt was running the show, and I was living small. In fact, you could say I was reacting instead of choosing my path. I was miserable.
Something did start to happen though. A change was in the air, whether or not I was able to see it. I could definitely feel it. As luck would have it, it all started with the pain in my wrist.
When My Body Drew the Line
The pain in my wrist turned out to be carpal tunnel syndrome, which I got from using vacuum cleaners that barely worked to clean a huge office building, and carrying heavy loads of garbage as well. The job was destroying my health and making me wake up in the middle of the night with excruciating pain shooting up and down my right arm. I got evaluated for carpal tunnel, which wound up being diagnosed as “pretty severe,” and surgery was scheduled. They sliced open my hand, released a compressed nerve, and then resealed the incision. The recovery process took almost two months, during which I had to take time off work. This marked the beginning of the change.
The First Step Into a New Arc
During the lead-up to the surgery, I started thinking about where I was in life. Working a crappy and unfulfilling job, living in my parents’ basement, barely making enough to get by. I thought to myself, “This isn’t where I want to be anymore!”
It dawned on me that I needed to take some charge of my career. I decided to seek out a career counsellor for advice and work on looking for options to get back into my old career. While I didn’t find that door, a different one opened up for me—one I didn’t expect to see.
Also during this time, I made a decision to start up this website. I felt I needed to put myself out there in order to find a way back to my chosen career. I deleted my old blog (which I found to be too negative) and started this new one. At first, I used ChatGPT to help me write the blog posts, aiming for one post per day to keep interest in my site. However, when that started to feel like it was more of a ChatGPT blog than my own, I decided to scale it back and write these posts myself. I still use it to help me come up with titles and possible outlines, as well as improving readability and SEO scores, but I wanted—no, needed—to write again.
The Breaking Point
While working with a career counsellor and trying to find a way back to my career, I decided to go back to work once my wrist healed, but I even remember telling my boss I wouldn’t be overdoing it for awhile yet, as I didn’t want to risk re-injury. As it turned out, the people I worked for were being even more neglectful in paying some of their workers on time. This worried me somewhat, but this happened before, so I thought it was just temporary. That is, until it happened to me.
At the end of July, I was supposed to get paid, but they delayed paying me, citing that a Fortune 500 company hadn’t paid them—a small family contracting business. I found that hard to believe, but when this pay wasn’t happening around a long weekend, I got nervous. According to employment standards, workers are to be paid at least on a monthly basis, which the employers did, so seeing as I wouldn’t get paid until August 6th, I finally got upset enough about it and filled out a complaint against the company for failing to pay me on time. I had every right to do that.
Suddenly, the “we really appreciate all your hard work” friendly attitude I was always getting turned into the opposite. Seeing as I had that complaint registered against them, they couldn’t really fire me as that would have been illegal and I’d have every right to sue them. Instead, they found many supposed problems with the way I was doing my job, even threatening to fire me. They decided to give me one more chance to prove myself, cut back my hours even more, still expecting the same amount and quality of work, and wrote up some official report of my supposed offences.
For me, this was the straw that broke the camel’s back. I no longer wanted to wait to find the perfect career anymore. I just needed to get the hell out of there.
Choosing Myself
I began applying more steadily to any job I could find so I could get out of that situation as soon as possible. They made me feel like I was a bug. I hated feeling that way. An opportunity came by for me to work full-time at a local print hub in Calgary—only it would be working the night shift, but they’d pay an extra $3 per hour compared to the day shift. As I was never really a morning person, I took the opportunity.
At this time, it started to dawn on me that perhaps the reason I felt so “stuck” in the first place was because I was always telling myself that. “I don’t think I’ll ever have my own place again!” “My life is over!” “I had a great career and flushed it down the toilet” “This is the life I deserve for being a moron!” Is it really all that surprising that that’s how life was showing up for me?
The minute I decided to stand up for myself and fight for myself, I got a new job. Suddenly, hope began to come back to me. I could see a way out of the dark tunnel.
First I had to take ownership of my thoughts and challenge them. I had to remember that everything that happens to you is by choice. You may not be able to control other people or sometimes situations you fall into, but you can choose how you respond or react to them. Recognizing how long I had endured in survival mode required compassion rather than criticism. Patience kept me going—but surviving was no longer enough. I wanted to live.
Trust became the next lesson. Trust in my own judgment, trust in doing what felt right, and trust in the principle that what I focus on shapes what I experience. From there, healthy boundaries began to form—not only with others, but with my own thoughts as well.
🔹 Naming the Villains Changed the Fight
Over time, depression and anxiety stopped feeling like flaws within me and started to take shape as something external. The Depression Beast was a metaphor I had used before, but naming Dr. Anxiety as a separate presence was new—and surprisingly powerful. Having an affinity for all things superhero in nature, labeling them as a beast and a Dr. Evil type of creature has helped me out enormously in fighting them. But one entity needed to be there that I haven’t seen since I was a small child—Lady Optimism.
I don’t know if I can explain this well enough, but to a person with such admiration of superheroes and villains, and with this blog evolving into the SuperMell persona… for some odd reason, this is working for me. I’m able to hear the crazy thoughts coming from Dr. Anxiety and I start to laugh at the absurdity of it all. While I’m still getting to know Lady Optimism, The Depression Beast and Dr. Anxiety are beginning to fade into the distance.
The Tools That Helped Me Turn the Page
🔹 What Actually Helped Me Change
In order to change my thought patterns, I needed some tools to help me turn the page:
Job Stability – This was a huge thing. I needed not just a way out of the bad situation I was in, but I needed it to be full-time. Landing the new job, and passing probation, getting benefits again, etc., were huge steps forward that I needed.
Routines – Admittedly, I’m still working on establishing some healthy routines, I needed to get used to working full-time, overnight hours, keep my overnight hours on days I don’t work so I don’t throw my sleep schedule out of whack. I still need to work on healthy eating, exercising, and organizing my surroundings, but I’m starting to see how having a stable routine is in fact helping me to see the light.
Systems – Also this year, I started to change the way I was doing things. Before I would make myself a chore list and when I wouldn’t do one task or even one day, it would throw everything else off schedule and I’d feel like a failure. I started to organize my tasks in work blocks instead. That changed how I did things.
Writing – As a creative person, I’ve always enjoyed using my imagination to fuel something. Feeling inspired by Wil Wheaton over the many years as he’s been blogging, I felt the need to go back to it as well. This helps me sort out my thoughts and feelings—which is key to loosening the grip Dr. Anxiety and the Depression Beast have on me.
Trust – Woof. This one is a big one. I have to trust that life will work out for me now. That’s really the only way it can. I must believe that everything will work out fine and I’ll build myself up by thinking it will happen. Whenever the villains decide to make an appearance, I need to find Lady Optimism and ask for her assistance. I don’t want her to take over… I just need her help to defeat them both.
The Constant 🐾
Every hero needs a trusted sidekick to help them in their journey. Diana’s consistency as always being there when I need her is very instrumental in fighting the battle. She represents continuity, presence, quiet companionship, and life that happens alongside the story. Even when I write her sections, she lays down quietly beside me, as if she knows her presence serves as an inspiration to me, which it does. Everyone should have a lovely pet that does this for them.
I have no idea what this next chapter will look like, but I know it’ll be vastly different from how this chapter shaped up. I’m going to strive to continue my partnership with Lady Optimism, battling the villains with much more gusto than I’ve ever had before. I want to work on keeping a clean and orderly home, and improving my health through proper diet and exercise. It’s time I take care of myself.
Final Thought: The Story Continues
As I turn the page to a new chapter, I have no idea what it will shape up to be, but I am looking forward to finding out. With Lady Optimism helping me, and my faithful sidekick at my side, this battle finally feels winnable. This wasn’t the year everything changed. It was the year that I did.
What would your year in review be like? Have you begun to see something positive shaping up in your own storyline? Do tell in the comments below. I love a good story.
Origin stories alone don’t make the hero. Sometimes we evolve and change as life forges on. Something has happened with me as of late. I’m not entirely sure where it will lead. Nevertheless, I’m excited to see where this new path takes me.
For many years, I remained stuck to the past. I obsessed about being bullied in a small town to the point that it took over too much of my life. I’m at level 50 now. It’s time to put the past where it belongs, and travel onwards towards a new horizon.
I need to become the hero my younger self needed so desperately. But becoming the hero doesn’t require time travel. It requires awareness—or perhaps self-awareness is more appropriate. This post is all about my continuing evolution into the hero I’m supposed to be, and not what others imposed on me. A hero of my own choosing.
Something has shifted as I prepare to move forward in a very literal way. Stability, clarity, and self-trust are no longer abstract concepts — they’re active choices.
I’m certain I’ve mentioned my past before. When I turned nine years old, I moved to a small town outside of Calgary, where I wasn’t welcomed by the people there. I was different, after all. I was a geek girl, back when that wasn’t really a thing. Then I failed grade four, and that began the many years of being bullied.
As I already alluded to, I spent way too much of my time obsessing over the pain that treatment caused me. Being isolated, ignored, insulted, and being treated like an outcast brought me a lot of emotional turmoil. It introduced me to The Depression Beast, and, not long after, Dr. Anxiety. I allowed the years of cruelty to take over most of my adulthood. I wanted to prove to everyone that I would be a major success and be a big shot. That desire fuelled some really bad decisions.
I was also struggling with this little thing known as ADHD. No one knew how it affected girls when I was a kid (still don’t, really), so it wasn’t diagnosed. I had much difficulty with reading or paying attention to conversations. Many teachers assumed I had reading comprehension issues, but that wasn’t it. It’s hard to comprehend what I’m reading when my mind travels to far and distant lands mid-sentence.
But I wasn’t broken. I was merely under-equipped.
🔹 The Villains Were Never What I Thought
Honestly? The depression beast scared the hell out of me. Dr. Anxiety made me nervous. I thought for the longest time those two would rule over my life with an iron fist forever. Together, they convinced me that I was in fact a loser. If I didn’t get a good career, a good marriage, a good family, a good house, I wouldn’t add up to a big shot, and I wouldn’t be able to prove to everyone that they didn’t break me. But the thing about that is: they did break me.
They convinced me I was broken. In reality, I was reacting exactly as a human does when pushed too far for too long. Obsessing about the past as I did for too long only got in my way. Did I really need to be something huge? Most people on this planet are everyday, normal people, who just try to do the best with what they’ve got. Besides, obsessing over becoming a big shot only leads to egomania. Did I really need a marriage to be happy? Kids? A house? (I’m still not sure about that last one…) If I got those things, would I be happier?
Did I really want any of that? Or was that what I thought society wanted for me?
🔹 The Rewrite: Armour Built Over Time
When I realized that the Depression Beast and Dr. Anxiety were ridiculous creatures to listen to, I decided to put on my superhero mantle with pride. My origin story may have forged me for awhile, but there were some truths about myself Dr. Anxiety failed to realize: I survived. I am the hero of my own story.
The past taught me some things about myself. I like who I am. I’m nice and kind, but don’t take any crap from anyone anymore. Reaching level 50, you realize some battles are worth fighting for, and some aren’t. Knowing what you can change—and just as important what you can’t change—is really the key here. The past isn’t something I can change, and neither are the thoughts, words, or actions of others. What is within my control is what I choose to say, think, and do. Boom! Mic drop.
I have learned some valuable skills over the years. I’m resilient, strong, brave, kindhearted, trustworthy, dependable, reliable, loyal, and I never surrender. There have been many instances when I felt like life might be over for me, but the fact is I’m still here, fighting the good fight.
I also finally convinced a doctor a couple of years ago to get me assessed for ADHD, and from there, got on a medication that I wish I had tried ages ago. I feel stronger and more aware of myself than I’ve ever felt in my life.
I’ve also learned the power in saying no. Being a people pleaser was tiring. Trying to prove myself to everyone was exhausting. Setting up boundaries is the only way to show oneself self-compassion. Instead of acting with urgency, I should act with intention. The armour may not be flashy, but it’s functional.
It’s time to bid Dr. Anxiety and the Depression Beast a final farewell.
Becoming the Hero I Needed
Who is SuperMell? What can I give myself now that I couldn’t do back then? Let me break it down for you:
Protection – I wasn’t able to find a protector as a kid, but I have since realized I am my own protector. There was something inside me that kept me going and protected me from serious harm. I had my armour on without even knowing it was there.
Patience – The last couple of years have taught me a lot about patience. Losing my job, moving into my parents’ basement, working a crappy job — it all taught me this was a temporary setback. Now that I have a better job and will be moving next week, I feel like all that effort has finally paid off.
Validation – It’s important for me to say this as strongly and poignantly as I can. Every emotion I have felt over the years are valid. I am valid. I am a person, and I matter. Whenever the Depression Beast would show up and growl into my ear that I wasn’t important and didn’t matter to anyone, it didn’t erase the fact that I am important and I do matter. (In fact, I just got a gift of a cup from work saying as much…)
Choice – This is the big one! Everything that has happened to me, that is happening to me, and what will happen to me is my choice. I can choose to act, or not act. I can choose nothing and still come out ahead. My own choices are what’s guiding me right now. I’m no longer listening to the Depression Beast, and Dr. Anxiety’s influence is also waning. I won’t say he’s gone for good as of yet. Life will continue to thrown curve balls along the way. But knowing I am in charge of my own decisions sets me free.
I’m not going to erase my origin story. What’ the point of that? It made me the person I am today. I own it, and I honour my past. Even the bad decisions taught me something about myself. Choosing to show up differently changes the path.
The Power Isn’t Perfection
I don’t want to come across as though I’m a completely evolved person who will never listen to the Depression Beast or Dr. Anxiety again. That’s naive. I haven’t arrived. That’s a myth. There is no destination.
Growth doesn’t mean you’re invincible. Things can still hurt me. I have no idea what will happen after I move. There’s a certain Dr. who is whispering in my ear about that. I’m doing my best to laugh it off, but I know with such uncertainty, anxiety will happen. But that doesn’t have to be a bad thing. I just need to remember to slow down, breathe, and think things through thoroughly before I make a decision or act. Is this really me talking, or Dr. Anxiety?
I’m still human. I’m sure I will make mistakes along the way. No one is flawless. What I plan to take with me is the lesson any mistake teaches me. That’s what real growth looks like. I no longer care about proving myself to anyone other than me. I’m still learning.
True power lies in adaptability, not dominance. Even though I’ve proclaimed I’ve changed, it’s what into that I’m not sure about yet. I just feel different now. Maybe it’s a wisdom that comes with hitting level 50. I know as I continue to grow into the hero I know I’m capable of being, life is about progress over performance.
Diana is true purr-fection. All she knows is she is a happy cat, and that’s good enough for her. When she sees me sitting too much, if not joining me, she’ll pick up a random toy and fling it about, signalling to me to not take things so seriously and enjoy myself. Not to mention, it’s time to get off my lazy butt and do something. Sometimes I wonder if cats are the true masters of zen.
Final Thought
The rewrite is ongoing. There is no set time limit, and I no longer care about trying to impress anyone else. I don’t need to go back in time to change its meaning. Becoming the hero I needed back then is a necessary evolutionary change—one that I’m excited to see where it takes me. My origin story didn’t end. It evolved into something better.
Tell me something: how are you the hero of your own story? Has your origin story haunted you? Did you learn something new about yourself in the process? Share them in the comments. I’d love to hear your story.
