The Wake

About this time last year, I received some news: Yours Truly has a little sleep disorder called narcolepsy.

It’s not like in the movies. (Or, at least, that’s what my sleep doctor assures me.) I don’t just fall asleep anywhere and everywhere (although presumably I could), and there are a few quirky things that go along with it that up until my doctor explained it, I didn’t even know where connected. I figured I was just fucked-up, crazy and lazy.

Hmm. Oh well.

Let’s get a few things straight, though: I don’t suffer from it. I’ve lived with it since adolescence. I just never knew what it was. I had my suspicions. A doctor even mentioned the n-word to me back when I was battle depression in my mid-twenties. I just never pursued a diagnosis, because I didn’t want it to be a thing the way the depression was a thing. And there was no cure for it—just treatment. I refused to be stuck with that sack of shit.

But I was. In not facing my condition head on, I developed workarounds and coping strategies for even the most mundane things. When reading books, I would balance my mala beads on my pinky finger so that if I nodded off, they would drop and wake me up. I used to pack thumbtacks in with my school supplies and gouge myself when I felt myself dozing off in high school. Other than this cute guy named Brad, the most vivid memories I have high school were fighting against drowsiness and being scared to death that someone would figure I just how different I was from the other kids.

There are a lot of disorders out there than do indeed cause genuine suffering. I am blessed enough to say that this one, for me at least (I don’t have it as bad as some people), isn’t one of them. In some ways, it has been a relief. The spells of sheer sleepiness I would experience, the weird and vivid nightmares, and weirder and more vivid visions and sounds I sometimes witness upon falling asleep and waking up—these are among the features of my shade of this condition. Even the sensation of weakness in my face and knees when I feel certain intense emotions is part of it—a little thing called cataplexy.

It almost sounds like a game where one places cats who hate each other side by side, one after the other, until one of them loses their shit and goes homicidal, don’t it?

It’s strange… I feel as though I’ve been sleepwalking for most of my adult life. Now, it’s like I’m making up for lost time.

And I am grateful.

If it weren’t for feeling so different from everyone else, I would never have stopped trying to be like everyone else. I would still need to avoid losing people at all costs. I would never have found myself.

If it weren’t for the fear that if I felt too intensely, I would keel over, I probably would have never explored meditation in my teens. I’ve been mindful since before it was cool.

If it weren’t for all those weird things I saw on the edge of the Dreaming, I probably would never have begun to tell stories or create art. I wouldn’t know how to capture and contain that which cannot be captured and contained.

If it weren’t for the sleep paralysis that made me think I was going to die someday in my sleep (and that doing so wouldn’t be as painless as people make such things out to be), I wouldn’t have figured some things out as soon as I did. I wouldn’t have known that my purpose is to help others and to create. I wouldn’t have figured out that we live in a Universe of infinite color, size and dimension or that a broken heart is just another kind of window—or, if we allow, a door—into that Universe.

If I weren’t so inexplicably sleepy in my teens, I would have done the same things as everyone else in high school and probably college. I would have a deliberate job with a deliberate career with a deliberate trajectory—all of someone else’s design. I would be like some other people my age… I would go through the motions…sleepwalking. I could do what I’m supposed to do, biding my time until retirement or divorce or crisis or death or whatever. Or I could run away from things—the past, the future, but mostly the self. Distraction could be my anesthetic, too. It comes in many generic forms—sex, drugs, alcohol, Facebook—and most require no insurance.

(Have people always been like this? No one else has changed—just my view of them. And I used to think I felt like Dr. Manhattan before…)

I would be one poor, miserable sap.

Thanks, at least in part, to narcolepsy, I am wide awake.

The purpose of my existence has been clear to me from a very early age. But living with narcolepsy (especially once I confronted it head-on) has allowed me to refine my priorities. I see the people and things around me for what they are: Reflections of my inner world. I used to think I needed to rely on other things—especially people—to validate my existence, to make me relevant; to tell me I am enough. I had it backwards. It’s up to me to determine the validity, the relevance. I recognize that I am enough. I always have been. I am not broken, crazy or lazy. Or I am all those things, when I choose. I am me. And for the first time I can remember, I genuinely and unabashedly love this. I love me. And it is beautiful.

I am awake. And I am dreaming.

So if you haven’t heard from me in a while, it’s because I’ve been busy figuring out how to navigate this new chapter in my adventure, how to manifest dreams into the waking world. I just finished the shitty first draft of a 90,000-word novel and have gotten started on the next one. Next step: Revise and submit for publication. I have zero fear of failure. Success is my only option. The world needs new stories. It’s time to share mine with the world.

I wake up every day at 5:00 AM. I write at least 600 words. I pretend to drink coffee at PT’s Coffee in the Crossroads District while I feverishly type the antics and adventures of the characters who live in my head. Lately, this has boosted the morning word count to 1000 to 1300 words. After that, I pirouette and leap into work at my day job on the weekdays. Or, on weekends, I trot my ass home and create art, spend time with my family, or whatever the hell I want. Some days, I write some more. I punctuate all this wholehearted living with a nap or two. A wise man and one of my favorite storytellers once told me a nap is a real treat. Turns out he was righter than either of us imagined.

Recently, I’ve begun to experiment with nutrition. Next comes fitness. I’m not a hundred-percent compliant with my treatment. (Who is?) I refuse to take anything that’s going to knock me out at night, for instance. (No means no, Xyrem.) And I refuse to take anything that even slightly fucks with the part the gateways in my brain or whatever that let the inspiration get in. (This part, it seems, is linked to the Dreaming.) There is much to figure out still, yes, but even more important things to do—like climb dreams and plant trees. And sometimes, not knowing is quite beautiful.

So in case you were worried: Yes, I am alive. In case you were wondering: No, I haven’t forgotten you. And, in case you are new here: Welcome. I have been expecting you.

I am awake. Come, dream with me.