The Weight of Can't

I can't. Such a short phrase, and one that effortless flows from my mouth all the time. It's almost become a greeting in my vocabulary, a heavy 'good morning, how are you?'

It's so small that it feels so innocent, so guilt free. 

"I can't do this, because...." 

Or 

"I would like to, but I can't."

And it's always followed by some bullshit I feed to whoever may have half-heartedly been listening. I have a litany of excuses for any situation, stored, ready to roll off my tongue. 

Sometimes it's actually met with a rebuttal and I just string together another loose turd of an excuse.

What's more is I've told myself, CONVINCED myself, that this is OKAY. This is NORMAL. And it's not. 

The truth. The truth is for any situation I have created, there is a way, and in most cases a relatively easy way. My dogs, my husband, my location, MY DEPRESSION...cannot be to blame for giving up what I want. 

The truth is, I'm scared. I'm scared that what I want to BE, what I want to do, will fail. Or it won't be GOOD ENOUGH, no matter how hard I try. And so I just don't. I look at the ocean, and instead of jumping in and learning to swim, I make an excuse and walk away. 

So I guess as a resolution, if you want to call it that, this year I will jump. And I might drown, but most likely not. Because I do know how to swim...and the ocean, really isn't as deep as it seems...