There are certain days where the reality of stepping in poop so completely defines the place you are in that all you can do is laugh in a sort of maniacal manner. I did step poop this morning; no way around that fact. I face it, I see it, and I can’t help myself but compare it to all the things in my life that are, in fact, poop. Symbolically, literally, mentally, you name it.

I don’t want to live a life where poop is even symbolically part of my world.  I would like to be one of those people that can take a life that looks like poop and recognize that it isn’t anything other than a moment, a brief second of crazy that doesn’t define the actual world that I live in. A Jessica Rabbit moment in a world of realism.

I do have the ability to step back and acknowledge that my life isn’t poop. It isn’t a disgusting thing that comes from a cat’s stomach and mucks up my rug. There is so much more to my life and my world than this single step. I certainly would never compare my children or my husband to poop; they are so far away from that it almost embarrasses me to even type it.

So, despite it being as common as applies, why are we disposed to look at the world through eyes shut to the reality of the passably pretty? Why is it easier to look at the darkness, the bad, the negative, the seconds of non-perfection and latch onto those as the whole instead of its other truth. Is there something in the brain? In the lining of our heart that is defect? Our disposition? What brings this correlation that so suddenly pops into our minds?

It’s an honest question. I don’t know much about the controllable aspects of an average brain. I know a lot about my brain and how I function. I often have to wait until the feelings have passed for actual diagnosis, but I am pretty good at recognizing my emotions and what steps need to be done to get past whatever it is that has come up this time. And I recognize that I am not speaking in definite terms because I simply can’t; my diseased brain doesn’t always follow the patterns that others can come to depend on.

It is frustrating, to say the least, to not know who and what you are. It is frustrating to all of a sudden find yourself snapping at your child despite the fact that while they have done something wrong, it certainly isn’t worth the reaction it is given. It is frustrating to know that I can’t make myself write when I don’t have the power or mental flexibility to come up with words; especially when it is my writing that gives me so much joy. It is frustrating to justify to myself certain behaviors knowing that they aren’t the best for me. It’s like having the ability to see yourself from one direction while you are walking in the opposite. And stepping in that poop and equating it to my life is just another example.

It is frustrating to look at this world and see not the beauty of a perfectly orange and pink sunrise. It is frustrating not to hear the birds flap their wings as they move through the air so nicely. It is frustrating to wake up sometimes and not feel what you were feeling the day before. After having a beautiful day full of sunsets it is difficult to live a day with none. And even if you clean up that poop there is no guarantee that it is actually gone. Who does this? Why do we do this?

I always try to equate it with the ability to look into a perfectly calibrated mirror and see the exact opposite of what is actually shown in the mirror. The world sees brown hair; the mirrored image is instead gray and rather dull looking. The world sees a slim body; the mirrored image sees cellulite, fat cells, bad skin, etc. etc. But just like the poop, although it seems to define it, it really shouldn’t. It really shouldn’t. We aren’t poop, we aren’t the poop that we stepped into.

But yet, that is the only person we see in the mirror and in the darkness of our minds. Maybe it is even the person we are most familiar with. The person we see, rather than the real person, becomes a definition. It is comfortable to blame the fact that we aren’t dying our hair on the ugliness of the presentation in the mirror. It is more comfortable to see ourselves as the one who lives in a world of a manner of disgust rather than look at the fact that who and what we are is not the poop I keep going to. Maybe it is just easier to put ourselves down and walk away then force ourselves to see our self in another way.

Many will tell you to just change your mind. Many will tell you to get another mirror. Many can’t understand the physical deformity that is brought from the mental angst. We put ourselves down causing a rippling effect that others don’t know how to handle. Many ask how we can just sit for hours and not move, not have any desire for moving, food or even some clothes. Many will ask how it is that the body doesn’t respond to an active mind. Because many of us know that there are times when we know we have to get up but their isn’t a force in this world that can actually make it happen. The feet don’t move, the heart barely beats, the lungs just won’t grab enough air.

Poop is just poop. And when you have a cat it comes with the territory. And although I wish I could say it is easy to change the mindset of the mental consequences of stepping in that poop, you really can’t. A therapist will tell you that you can see it all differently but the truth is that once you learn that your perceptions, whether real or not, are in fact your reality there is nothing you can do but try and avoid the poop; with the sure knowledge that it will be there anyway.