it's true, sometimes; you are your own worst enemy.

it's interesting how the mind can play tricks when it really wants to mess with you.

for instance, person x hints something that is somehow disagreeable to you (an insult to your person, your boyfriend, your girlfriend, your mother, etc.). person x is an idiot.

when these thoughts are formulated by your own (sub)conscious, however, they're the long-awaited truth. you are hideous; your boyfriend is too good for this; your girlfriend is in love with someone else; your mother doesn't love you as much as she tells you she does.

thankfully, most of us are aware that our minds are evil things when they want to be and can work against our best interests sometimes. we learn to tell our brains to shut up, to stop being silly, because the sane parts of your brain know that those trickster thoughts are absolutely wrong. we adapt to this. sometimes we dismiss these thoughts without consciously being aware of what we're doing. it becomes second nature.

but our minds know where we're most vulnerable, and sometimes, they just enjoy watching us suffer. they will pick out the smallest comments, thoughts, emotions, etc. from throughout the day and store them in our subconscious — not for our dreams, but for those half-dreams we have as we fall into and out of sleep, those hazy moments where everything and nothing simultaneously seems real. those two points in our nightly routine render us paralyzed, unable to move or turn away or open our eyes, because we're already too far gone or still too far invested in sleeping that we don't want to get out of it, no matter what sorts of terrors our minds are constructing for us. and this is the point when the terrors do exist, when the soundless images become real, when your worst fears become reality and there's nothing you can do to escape them. and when you wake up crying, you know why.

usually, though, you'll forget everything within ten minutes of awakening. your cheeks will still be damp, you'll be filled with an overwhelming sense of depression and loneliness that you can't seem to shake, one that will ultimately render you inconsolable.

forgotten terrors are the worst sort.