Fatima Moflehi
9/14/2023
Stranded Island
There was a time I had a whole psychological breakthrough in the middle of my kitchen. I
was doing my daily chores and with it my usual escape to my mind and thoughts, whether it was
replays of events that happened throughout the day, or imagining conversations and scenarios,
or even diving into self reflections and personal realizations. That day I thought of an ex-friend
who sadly left me with many unanswered questions. My brain started its usual run of questions
associated with that person like “Why did she leave?” and “What event was the changing point
for her?” “What did I miss and not realize?” and of course the biggest one which was “What did i
do wrong?”. I let my thoughts run wild reaching every possible assumption or memory. It wasn’t
the first time I reflected on this person so I thought I would find myself back at the same usual
conclusion of “don’t be stuck in the past and time moves on” but that day I found myself meeting
a different conclusion, all because of a new question that popped in my brain. “What question
can you really find an answer to?” I realized how much wasteful thinking I put into questions my
brain can’t give an answer to no matter how long I thought and how long I searched within
myself. All those questions were not meant for me to answer. So I changed the course of my
thoughts and wondered what question I wanted to find the answer to the most. I thought of the
most important part of the whole event which was the hurt and confusion I felt during it. With
that I found the question that my brain might have an answer to. “What part of it all hurt the
most?”
My brain immediately went to work and I found myself on a stranded island. My
immediate reaction was to search for “everyone”. I kept thinking “where did everyone go?” I had
no idea who that everyone was or what group of people I was searching for. I was in complete
panic mode wondering why I was all alone. The scared feeling turned from just my imagination
into real physical feelings. I quickly stepped out of my thoughts and stopped cleaning. I found
myself teary eyed and instead of thoughts, my brain flooded me with past memories. A memory
of when I was four years old waking up to the house being empty and my immediate thought
was that I was abandoned and I felt a surge of panic and cried until my parents and siblings
came home. Another memory of me getting lost in mecca amongst thousands and thousands of
people I was looking for any familiar face I could run to but when I saw how big the place was
and how fast the thousands of people were moving and how fast I was moving I thought it was a
lost case and panicked and felt my heart beating fast until out of luck I was found and went back
to the hotel. Another time when I was lost at a huge convention with no phone and no one
around me I ran up and down the stairs and circled around the whole place until I found old
family friends who had my dads number and with just an instruction of where to go I was left and
luckily found my parents again. More and more past memories came to me that shared the
same repetitive scene. I realized I’ve always had this deep phobia that was actually built by so
many events in my past that all shared the same feelings. I’m a person deep down always
scared of being alone. That concluding thought brought me back to the present world and so I
finished up with sweeping the kitchen floor and went to bed.
