tiny baby / text anxiety

It’s a bit embarrassing how all-encompassing waiting for a text from a crush can feel. I’m a person with so many interests and passions, so many things that I care about and people that I love. And yet, if I go out on a limb and send a text and don’t get a reply soon enough, the wait can become a weight.

This feeling was the inspiration for this whole project – that’s how strong it can be. It can yank me out of my body so thoroughly when someone doesn’t reciprocate enthusiasm that I needed to write my self a song about how to ground back into myself. The best that I can do in those situations is to remember to love my little self as thoroughly as I can. I’ve done an incredible amount of work on self-love in the past several years, and I’m proud to say that deep down, I am absolutely and overwhelmingly in love with and want the best for myself.

Years ago, in the midst of one particularly egregious anxiety-spiral of a relationship, I was trying to clean my room and could not get a grip on my thoughts. I ping ponged around my finished attic bedroom, a frantic pinball game in my brain listing off all of the things I had said wrong, all of the mistakes I’d made in this relationship and my entire life. Suddenly, I forced myself to pause, take a breath, and gaze out my second story window. I felt an overwhelming rush of calm and warmth and the words “I love you” played through my brain with a knowing chuckle. I recognized my own voice, bubbling up from deep within me, reminding me that I didn’t really think all of these horrible things about myself.

Shortly thereafter, at a personal retreat, surrounded by deep thinkers and folks with insatiable curiosity for life, someone posed the question to me: “Can you tell the difference between when your mind is talking to you versus your soul?” And I knew that was the distinction – “I love you,” says my essence, my depths. “I doubt you,” says my mind. “Tiny Baby” tries to call upon that essence, even when she’s overwhelmed by the mind. This song tries to remind me to listen to her, instead of the surface-level things around me.

I’ve heard the theme of treating yourself as a small child from a few different places. One notable advocate is Elizabeth Gilbert, who talks about how an encouraged practice in her Letters from Love is to write to yourself with a term of endearment. Another is through parts work I’ve done with a therapist, who recommended figuring out which of my selves is loud and needy in any given moment. Hence the song begins by addressing myself: “Tiny baby.” You sweet, beautiful thing. You tender, precious being. You delightful, frightened child. What these other people are saying (or not saying) to you is insignificant. What matters is that you are my tiny baby and always will be: I will always care for you.

Anxiety can wreak havoc on my system, though. I have one specific symptom of anxiety in which I, sometimes for weeks on end, don’t feel like I can take a deep breath. One of the primary and initial strategies for combatting the symptoms of anxiety is naming it. “I know lately you haven’t caught a breath…” By expressing that I sympathize with myself for experiencing persistent physical discomfort, I’m starting the process towards healing.

“Happy little hill” is a bit of a joke, really, and also a practice in “show; don’t tell.” What is art without a little play? A friend has an absurd bit in her standup set that mentions Bob Ross’s happy little hillside. I love art fueling other art, craft fueling craft. And given how important friends and community are to me, every time I play this song, it’s warming to remember that moment when Kelly performed at Sarah’s birthday party. To remember that there are people who exist and care.

Anxiety is a fast-moving loop; a high-speed centripretal spiral. The chorus reminds me to take a beat like I did out my attic window. To give myself a moment of calm instead of staring at my phone, checking and checking again; actively waiting for something. I list a few things to distract me and re-introduce some enjoyment: writing in my journal, reading a newspaper or book, watching a TV show, calling someone and chatting for a minute, or putting on my Dancing Alone In Home (yes) playlist and shaking my ass.

Self-loathing can appear with shocking immediacy when my affection is unrequited. It can even make me feel confused about who I am. But if I dig down, I can see glimmers of my inner essence. Verse 2 reminds me of this shiny, beautiful thing that I have to share, and that if someone is not welcoming it with open arms, it shouldn’t be so hard to walk away. Damn, is that hard advice to follow.

Once again, I tell myself to pause. This time, to ask myself a couple of grounding questions. My friend Sarah Levy shared with me a question from a friend’s therapist, for when your brain is involuntarily spinning out in overanalysis: “What is one thing I know to be true?” That truth can come in many forms: My hair is auburn. I love my dog. I can go for a walk right now. But whatever the truth is, it’s a good reminder that a lot of the narratives driven by the lack of a prompt text reply are not objective truth. Is there a way to change that toxic narrative into something kinder?

Coming back around to the tiny baby line is a soft landing place and reminder of how I want to care for myself. To end where we started, now with some strategies that might help us get there.

What’s my actual main strategy for this now? I call.