Life, By Definition, Is Conflict, or I Guess I'm Perfectly Normal

For the past two weeks or so, I've been stressed. I'm being pushed and pulled by a variety of pressures and deadlines (can you say Finals Week?) and I'm tense. Yesterday I woke early because of a stress dream and couldn't get back to sleep. All things considered, I've been thinking of one of the most apt descriptions of life I've ever been exposed to: life as a series of crises.

When I was an undergrad, I had to take some psychology classes. Overall, I really hated them. One of the three I took wasn't too bad. That class had the best teacher (the other two sucked). Still, psych classes = not my thing. It's not that I dislike the material or that I dislike the study of the human mind. More, I disliked the specific approach two of the three instructors took.

But, the part that stuck with me the most was Erikson's developmental theory. You can google it for more info, but the jist is that we, as people, are formed and become who we are, through a series of conflicts. Each age has its own special conflict, from infancy all the way until death. The important thing, is that, according to Erikson, our whole lives are defined by conflict.

Erikson fits perfectly from one of the basic ideas I learned in biology - life is a product of unbalance. All of our biological processes, like breathing, are constant while we're alive. Yet, the processes of breathing are not constant. There is a struggle behind each inhalation, then an exchange of gases because there's too much carbon dioxide in the blood, and then the oxygen is whisked off to the rest of the body. For a moment in between, when the gases are trading places, there is an instant where there is balance between them. But, that balance can't last. Your cells need that oxygen and your body needs to expel the carbon dioxide, and the balance is ruined. It is a necessary lack of balance, but one that cannot be held, so the teeter-totter swings back and forth, back and forth. When the teeter-totter stops, you're dead.

Right now, I'm in the midst of complications. Every good thing comes with its trade-off.

• In May, my MA will be official vs. I feel burned out and cynical about the experience.
• I finished all my coursework for getting said MA vs. that made me ineligible for the work study I was doing for two years and I had to start paying back student loans at about the same time I lost my work study job.
  
• I got the second part-time teaching job vs. now I have another teaching commitment with a different curriculum, different assignments, different supervisor, different campus, and different student body demographic to juggle.
• I'm happy for the extra income of the second job vs. even with it, I still lack basics like health insurance, and even with the second source of income, the combined total is still going to be pretty underwhelming, especially relative to the combined work load.
  
• I'm in a new relationship with a guy who treats me well vs. I'm intimidated by being in a serious relationship with anyone, much less a guy who's got such a complicated past.
• I'm soon to be doing some traveling to visit my brother and go to a wedding and I'm really excited about it vs. the travel comes with expenses, and I'm in a place where I'm stressed about how quickly the number on my bank account is shrinking, even though I know I've been planning for these travel expenses for months.
• I paid off one of my student loans in its entirety this week vs. that's nearly $2,000 all gone at once.

The teeter-totter goes back and forth and the crux of the stress is knowing that the path of my life has to change due to necessity. My biggest overall concern right now is money. I live frugally, but the money I make is even less. When I was getting student loans, I socked any leftovers away in a savings account so I could have a financial buffer. Over the past year or so, I've had to lean on that buffer and it's slowly, but steadily, getting smaller. Even living frugally, my monthly expenses average just a little bit more than my monthly income. My job is not sustainable, but so far picking up another part-time teaching job is the best I've been able to do.

What I need is a real, grown-up job where I can work full time, have an income that can actually support me, and have some benefits like medical insurance. The only problem is I haven't been able to find one yet. My job hunting so far has turned up a couple of possibilities, but one already turned me down, and the other is beginning to look like it'll follow suit. All of this pain and effort to get the damn MA and I'm starting to think my best career option is to get one of those jobs I could have gotten right out of high school - at least, those seem to be the only places hiring (or, I can redo college and go for nursing, 'cause they're hiring right and left right now). Kind of makes me wonder what the point of going to college was. What the point of getting the damn MA was.

So, yeah. Every resolution ultimately leads to new conflict. Life is crisis. I guess it's good to know I'm living, at least.