That feeling of suffocation, you can’t seem to catch a breath, where did all the air go? Deep ragged breaths and you cannot get enough to fill your lungs. The heat boils from inside, rivers of lava, coiling and creeping up your skin, the fear, the loathing, tastes like copper in your throat. You flail your arms at the sky, you rail against the storm-ravaged waves, pulling and dragging you under, trying to trip you, catch you unaware. Pulling, pushing, splashing up against, cold and wet, the salt spray in your eyes and on your face, like tears. The skies darken and the wind howls, sunshine all but forgotten, the sky is left forlorn and ravaged, even the birds take flight in search of safer havens.
Some days just putting one foot in front of the other is the challenge, something to be proud of accomplishing. When all is dark and forlorn, you feel lost and alone, looking for an errant stream of light, a beacon of hope to lift your spirits and guide you on your path. As you push yourself forward, quieting the raging storms from within, finally able to draw deep calming breathes, the internal fire cools and the shaking subsides, you find that centred part of yourself, you manage to open the door, even if just a sliver to gain access to the safe haven within your own mind. There is a room, cool, calm and quiet; somewhere you can withdraw without the voices in your head screaming at you, pulling you in a hundred directions at once. Somewhere you can just exist and just be. That warm cosy cocoon of self-awareness, where you can take long deep breaths, calmly, the voices are quelled and the flames are extinguished, this is not a luxury, but a necessity. Some feel that the door remains locked to them, but no key is required, just a tangible remembrance of inner peace is enough to grant succour. To just sit and be and bring quiet to the raging tempest that is your own mind.
Each must follow their own path, for some it is music, reading, writing, solitude, quiet, white noise, running, sitting, reclining, it matters not how you obtain it, it only matters that once you find that door you must step through.
~ Julz
Julie Powell - Photographer & Graphic Artist 
Fascinating read. So well expressed and described.
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