Seventeen Times: From Running Away to Becoming the Listener

Seventeen times, I changed jobs.

A blank resume lay on the desk.
I picked up a ballpoint pen and began writing from the first field.

Name, address, contact information.
Those parts were still fine.

The problem was the work history section.

I wrote one. I wrote two. I wrote three.

I ran out of space.

As I tried to write the rest, the tip of my pen stopped.
It stayed there, and only the whiteness of the paper seemed to spread.

I have never been able to put that feeling into words very well.

It wasn't a neat, organized emotion like embarrassment or shame.
It was something stickier, something closer to my own body.

A faint blockage in the back of my throat.
The feeling of someone quietly rubbing the inside of my chest.
As if I were breathing fine, yet not breathing at all.

I couldn't show that paper to anyone.

I folded it up and put it in the inner pocket of my bag.
I didn't take it out even when I got home.
I put it deep in a drawer.
When I opened the drawer next, I closed it while making sure not to look at it again.

I no longer remember when it started.
I just repeated that process over and over again.

I thought I had run away.

Even now, there is a part of me that thinks so.
There was certainly a time when I had finally stopped, having lost even the energy to run away.

When I was young, I thought I was quite right about everything.
If something was unreasonable, I thought it was unreasonable.
If I disliked something, I felt that I disliked it.

That in itself might not have been wrong, but I handled those feelings a bit too roughly.

Even when someone tried to talk to me, I would interrupt them with "That's not it" or "I already know that," prioritizing what I wanted to say.

During a training session, an instructor once told me, "First, you must listen to what others have to say."
At the time, I didn't really understand what those words meant.

I will write about just one story from a certain workplace.

I was told at the morning assembly, "Please act more proactively."
The very next day, I was reprimanded, "Please do not make decisions on your own."

From the same boss, in the same week.

I remember that feeling in my body.

It wasn't so much that something broke in the center of my chest, but rather that it felt like it was being twisted around.
It was a sensation like the floor beneath my feet disappearing, leaving me unsure of which way to stand.

Even though many words to retort came to mind, I couldn't actually say anything.
The words would stop right in the middle of my throat.

When days like that continued, at first, my head would ache as if it were being tightened only while I was at work.
Before I knew it, that pain began to last all day on the days I had work.
When Sunday night came, it started suddenly in anticipation of the next day.
In the end, it didn't even matter what day of the week it was.

It was around that time that I became unable to sleep.

No matter how tired I was, even on days when I had to be at work by 5:00 AM, my nerves would stay wide awake the moment I lay down.
My mind was no longer functioning, yet I couldn't sleep.
That state continued many times a week.

On nights when I couldn't sleep, as I stared at the ceiling, the words I had swallowed during the day would return, ignoring any order.
"Please act proactively" and "Please do not make decisions on your own" would alternate.

While I was trying to figure out which one was correct, I lost track of what I was even thinking about, and only the dark ceiling remained there.

Even when morning came, nothing had been solved.
It was just another day beginning.

Eventually, the option of visiting a psychiatrist emerged.
It didn't mean I was immediately put on leave, nor did it mean I resigned.
It was just that the things I had been cornered by were gradually changing their form.

So, rather than saying I ran away, I had simply stopped in my tracks when I realized it.

Telling myself, "There is no need for me to be in a place like this."

But in truth, perhaps I was just scared.
The fear that nothing would change even if I put my feelings into words was what blocked my throat back then.

Even though I still had the energy to be unreasonably angry, I no longer had the strength anywhere to put that into words.

It wasn't just that workplace.

In workplaces where I was exhausted from reading my boss's facial expressions too much, my shoulders were always the first thing to relax on the train ride home.

At a workplace where I absorbed all the customers' anger into myself, I couldn't speak for a while after returning home.

At a workplace where no one would tell me where my work was heading, I felt detached even before putting on my shoes in the morning.

Each had its own reason, and each had a moment where I felt I couldn't stay there anymore.
But every time I faced my resume later, those moments all looked like proof of my own weakness.

The employment history section that I couldn't finish writing felt like a 'tail' attached to me as a person.
Something I wanted to hide as much as possible, yet couldn't cut off—something long and difficult to manage.

I remember that winter morning well.

It wasn't a day when anything particularly bad happened.
I left the house at the same time as always, took the same train as always, and that was all.

The train was crowded, and I was standing holding onto a strap.

Between stations, suddenly, something just gave way.

It didn't feel like my emotions were overflowing.
Rather, it was the opposite; it felt like something that had been taut for so long had loosened without a sound.

And then, tears started to fall.

I didn't know why.

I wasn't remembering anything, and no one had said anything to me.
Just by being swayed on the train, the corners of my eyes grew hot, and in the next moment, I couldn't stop them.

There were people around me.

I looked down.

They aren't looking, they don't see me, I am not here—I kept my head down, thinking things like that.

I looked at the tips of my shoes.
I looked at the pattern on the floor.
I looked at anything other than myself.

The moment the train entered a tunnel, the window became a mirror.

I caught a glimpse of my reflected face, just for a second.

The moment I saw it, I thought.

This person has been in so much pain.

For a while, I couldn't take my eyes off that face.
Even though it was supposed to be my own face, it looked like the face of someone I was seeing for the first time.

Because I had kept my own feelings pushed to the back for so long, the face in the mirror looked like a stranger's.

It was so visible on my face.

I had intended to keep it hidden all along, but there it was, reflected in the train window where there was nowhere to run.

Looking down, clenching my back teeth slightly, with a faint darkness under my eyes.

That was when I first understood the phrase 'the world losing its color' as a visceral reality.

It felt less like it was disappearing and more like it was fading.
As if everything I saw had become translucent.

I could hear sounds, but they felt far away.
Even though someone was standing right next to me, I was the only one inside a transparent membrane.

I got off at the next station.

I had no reason to get off at that station, but I did.
I sat on a bench on the platform and watched the train pull away.

I did nothing until the next train arrived.

On some platform, I heard a departure announcement.
It was a destination that had nothing to do with me.

I think I needed that time of doing nothing back then.
It was only much later that I realized that was enough.

Back then, I was trying too hard.
Back then, I was desperate.

Being desperate and being able to act correctly were not the same thing.

I sat on the bench and did nothing.
Just that simple act allowed me to catch my breath, if only a little.

What I needed that morning was just enough space to let one train pass by.
I feel like I learned that on that platform, starting with my own body.

I don't remember exactly how many times I had changed jobs.
Was it the seventh time, or the eighth?

When I was accompanying a client to a large shopping center for work, I suddenly stopped in my tracks.

Sparkling products were lined up within reach.
Families were walking by, laughing.
A child was begging for a toy, and their parent was giving a wry smile.

It was bright, lively, and everyone was there as if it were the most natural thing in the world.

I felt as if I were the only one standing on the outside of the glass.

It was a time when I kept working, putting my own exhaustion on the back burner, unable to get my dwindling savings and debt repayments out of my head.
I had no room left to think about myself.

I had become unable to look up at the sky.
I had developed a habit of walking with my head down.
A feeling of wanting to disappear somewhere had settled at the bottom of my heart along with my fatigue.

The idea of consulting someone didn't even occur to me back then.
I didn't know where to go for help, and I didn't have the energy to find out.

One day during that period, I stopped on a roadside after the rain.

A small bud was there.

It hadn't bloomed yet.
It was just there, holding onto several raindrops.

Oh, how beautiful.

Even though it hadn't bloomed, it was beautiful.

For a long time, I had forgotten how to see things that way.

The gray scenery regained its color in that instant.

I still can't explain well why I felt that way.
But before I knew it, I was looking up at the sky.

It was only later that I faintly thought the same might be true for me.

A few days later, I thought about talking to someone for the first time.

In the middle of the night, I typed a few short words into a search bar.
Even then, it took several more days before I finally called one of the counseling services that came up.

On the day of my first interview, the room was smaller than I had imagined.

A desk and chairs were facing each other, and there was almost no view outside the window.
Booklets and documents were lined up on a shelf, and only one corner of a sheet was slightly tilted.
The setting sun shone through the gap in the curtains that didn't quite meet.

Tea in a paper cup was placed on the edge of the desk.

Steam was rising in a thin wisp.

I was told, "Please, go ahead," but I couldn't reach out.

My throat was parched, but I felt that touching that cup would mean admitting something.
I felt that if I accepted it, my weakness would become a reality.

With my hands resting on my knees, I watched the steam grow thinner and thinner.

A psychiatric social worker was sitting across from me.

When I started to talk, the person listened while nodding.
Sometimes they would start to say, "That is..." and then stop.
There were several times when they would start to speak and then stop.

Partway through, I realized it.

This person was choosing their words carefully.

Even when I fell silent, they didn't rush me.
They didn't seem to be preparing the next question either; they were just there.

At first, that silence was frightening.

For the me of that time, being waited for without a word was harder to endure than being blamed or rushed.

During the silence, I felt like I could only hear the sound of my own breathing.
I didn't know what I should say next, if it was okay to say it, or if I had to say it.

But that person was just there.

They didn't rush me. They didn't fill in the blanks. They didn't try to get ahead of me and fill in the rest of my words.

Before I knew it, I was talking.

I spoke in a way that left my words just as they came out of my mouth, not even knowing if they would make sense.

I don't think it was very coherent. I even lost track of what I wanted to say halfway through.

Even so, that person listened. Quietly, facing me properly.

Their tone of voice was calm. It sounded like the waves.

It was a sound that didn't blame or rush me, just existed there. Carried by that voice, my words began to come out little by little.

When my voice failed, the room fell silent. There were moments like that several times.

That must have been painful.

It was sudden.

For a moment, I didn't know who it was said to. I even wondered if they were talking about me.

When I realized those words were directed at me, I felt as if something that had been stuck for a long time suddenly started to move.

I couldn't tell if it was an emotion or a memory. Just that something came rushing in all at once.

Back then, I still had a wall built between myself and others.

That one phrase stopped in front of the wall for a while. Then, slowly, it seeped in through the gaps.

My head, which had been bowed, lifted slightly.

The room looked wider than it had before. The light was brighter.

It was as if a downpour had cleared up before I even noticed.

For the first time, I felt accepted. I felt understood.

That was the feeling.

There is something I realized only much later.

While you are tense, your body can put fatigue on the back burner.
Whether it is fear or excitement, when you are in the midst of strong emotions, pain and heaviness feel a little distant.

When you are carrying a heavy load, you are so absorbed that you do not notice it.
It is only after you put it down that your arms start to throb deep inside.

Back then, I was always carrying something.

That is why my fatigue only reached my body once I felt relieved.

When someone told me, 'That must have been hard,' my body finally began to set down what it had been holding, at the same speed that those words slowly began to sink in.

That night, I went home and cried in the bath.

I did not know why.
But I could breathe just a little bit easier.

Nothing changed immediately after I left that interview room.
For a while, all I could do was continue with my daily life.

Even so, I kept wondering what it was that I had received during that time.

I could not easily say that I wanted a job supporting others.
Time just passed without me being able to say it.

Even so, one day, I decided to get my qualification as a social worker.

It was not because someone recommended it to me.

Even now, I am not entirely sure if I wanted to be the one to deliver what I had received in that interview room, or if I just wanted to put a name to my own experience.

However, every time I opened the textbook, the feeling of my workplace back then and the weight of the nights I could not sleep overlapped with the words.
Things I was supposed to be learning as knowledge became linked to the memories of my body.

I still remember the day I sat in the consultation room for the first time.

While I waited for someone to sit in the chair opposite me, I looked at the paper cup on the desk.
A thin wisp of steam was rising from it.

That day, the same thing I had been unable to receive was there.

Since I started working as a social worker, the side of the consultation room I sit on has changed.

One day, the person sitting across from me suddenly looked out the window while talking.

Holding a steaming paper cup in both hands, they said nothing for a while, just looking outside.
I believe it was a rainy day.

Then, their shoulders dropped just a little.

That change was so small that if you weren't looking, you wouldn't have noticed it.
A few millimeters, if that.

But it was definitely there.

At that moment, I felt happy about that slight change.
It wasn't about having accomplished something or provided support well; I was just happy.

As I have continued this work, I have gradually come to feel that change is a much quieter event than I had imagined.

Sometimes, the silence after a voice fades away says more than the voice itself.

Sometimes, gestures tell us things before words do.

The hand that pulls a coat tight when leaving.
The shoulders that exhale after a laugh.

When I see things like that, I feel that a person's true self lies in the place before words are formed.

I think I became able to notice that because I have been in that place myself.

There was a long time when I couldn't put things into words.

There were many mornings when I swallowed my sense of injustice.

There were certainly nights when I ran out of space on my resume.

I don't think I have become a person who can offer perfect support.
Perhaps I just know a little more than before about the length of time spent without words and the weight of days when it feels like nothing can change.

"First, you must listen to others."

I am now relearning those words, which I didn't understand back then, from the chair across from me.

Someone once gave me the words, "That must have been hard."

Now, I am on the side that delivers them.

Of course, it doesn't always reach them.

There were interviews where time passed without a single word being spoken.
There were people who suddenly burst into tears.
There were people who usually spoke slowly but could only communicate through writing that day.
There were nights when I repeated words to confirm them, only for completely different words to follow.

On days like that, I just set the date and time for the next interview and end it there.
There was nothing else I could do.

On the way home, I think about what was missing.
Sometimes I find an answer, and sometimes I still haven't found one.

Even so, the listener's body knows how that one word seeps into the gaps in a person's walls.

The workplace with those contradictory instructions, the nights I couldn't sleep, the mornings when I ran out of space on my resume.

At the time, they were just dots.
I couldn't see any meaning or connection.

But now, I can see that they have become a single line.

I think now that it was my seventeen job changes that taught me that feeling.

It might not be something to be proud of, but I can't throw it away either.
That employment history section was packed with that much time, after all.

Now, I imagine the scene of having a resume on my desk once again.

I hold a ballpoint pen and start writing my work history.
I run out of space.
My pen stops.

The sticky blockage I felt back then hasn't completely disappeared yet.
But now, I can look at that blockage with slightly different eyes.

That wasn't a record of failure.

It was a map.

A map I was drawing while traveling down roads I had never been on before.

Because I walked without knowing where I would end up, that map has traces of being rewritten many times.
It has traces of erasures.
It has records of the alleys I wandered into.

It took time for me to start seeing my resume as a map.
I couldn't think of it that way right away, and even now, there are days when I still feel a bit breathless when I look at that section.

But the feeling of being blocked has changed just a little bit.

It comes not from shame, but because I still know the weight of that time.

Today, too, I placed a paper cup in the counseling room.

A thin wisp of steam rose up.

I do not rush to see if the person sitting across from me will reach for it.

There are things that are beautiful even before they bloom.

Yuki's

[Welcome to Cocomichi's 'Library of the Heart']

I hope this article has brought even a little bit of space to your heart.
At 'Cocomichi,' I hope to continue delivering peace of mind and small realizations.

🌸 If you are looking for the next article to read
[If you're lost, start here]

You can find your next book based on how you are feeling right now.