Dr. Sarah Marusek

One of my favourite films is ’Wings of Desire’ by Wim Wenders.

Actually, it is more than a film. It is kind of like an artistic prayer.

Released back in 1986, the film takes place in a still divided Berlin where angels are stealth guardians over the city’s residents, quietly listening to people’s thoughts and longings. Only children and a few perceptive others know that they are even there. Stunningly beautiful, the film is a soulful meditation on what it means to be human.

As Wenders shows us: ‘Every person is a universe all by itself, if you listen…’

The film is shot mostly in monochrome, because angels (like my monster) cannot see colours. The story follows the angel Damiel, who falls in love with a trapeze artist. He yearns to trade immortality for a chance to be with her.

Oh, and then there is the presence of Peter Falk!

It is indeed a long film, but one well worth indulging in for the philosophical journey that it takes you on. At one point, Damiel muses:

Why am I me, and why not you? Why am I here, and why not there? When did time begin, and where does space end? Isn’t life under the sun just a dream? Isn’t what I see, hear, and smell just the mirage of a world before the world?

These are questions we all ought to revisit time and again.

My invisible monster made me start questioning my own existence at a very young age. Way too young to be able to process what was happening.

It is really challenging to try and explain the impact of not feeling safe in your own body as a baby and thus not being able to self actualise. It is not just a mental problem, as there is a structural reason for this to be the case.

As a result, I cannot just think my way out of it.

Every single day I have to do multiple ice baths, alongside contrast therapy, oxygen therapy, red light therapy, and several hours of exercises. Yes, like 20-25 hours of challenging movement a week! I feel like I have been in boot camp for a while now, but especially this past year.

In addition to the above regime, the social isolation and artwork are also helping me to heal on an even deeper level, but that also means having to go to really dark and scary places. Unfortunately, I do not know how to let go of the monster logic if I do not learn how to fully express it.

The monster inside of me has wings of despair. This has made it impossible for me to realise most of my desires because I am too frightened.

As a result, I am always disappointed in myself and have felt suicidal my entire life. This has prevented any real intimacy.

While I have achieved many things in my life, that is because I am both skilled and adaptable to what is in front of me and desperately need to control something. My body, mind and soul have been out of control for so long that I do not know any other way to manage things. Even now, I am maniacally drawing and trying to produce these blogs, without telling anybody, in order to finally control at least some kind of public narrative.

It is precisely because of my monster that when I walk into a room and there is a challenge, I need to take it.

Give me the craziest ideas and I will run with them, like starting my own business in New York City or travelling to Iran for research.

Otherwise, the monster’s wings of despair overcome me.

Every time I desire something, especially that which I really care about, the monster gets angry and spreads its wings. These wings enfold me in a stream of consciousness of suicidal thoughts and feelings. There is an atlas of terror running throughout my body, lodged within scar tissue.

So, for example, during my fieldwork in Lebanon the monster’s wings would spread every time that I went to Hizbullah’s press office to seek approval for interviews. They never exactly said no, but they also refused any real access and so after each time I would uncontrollably sob, wanting to give up, not just on my research but with everything.

Or, when I had a crush on my British Iranian travelling companion in Tehran. After he left, I spent so many nights crying over him thinking that he was not interested only to later hook up with him in London and immediately freak out and cut him completely out of my life. Even so, the monster convinced me that he did not care and that I was totally unloveable.

I have felt unloved my entire life not because I am unloved but because my body could not receive love. I am only understanding this now as my body is finally healing and I am realising that the healer actually cared for me too.

I can finally feel a bodily kind of joy. Or at least glimmers.

My monster has wings of despair because the more I have wanted to participate in life, the more impossible my body has become. That is why I had to stop art as a young adult and also why drawing now is so healing.

Visualising the monster helps me to confront it.

Up until now, my body has simply been incapable of experiencing love like you know it. That is why none of you could understand why I was so prone to suicidal thoughts. My monster has wings of despair.

So, now I just need to learn how to cultivate those wings of desire…