Tapas is real. It can also be a bonfire you keep feeding because you don’t know what else to do with your anxiety.
You can only hold “extreme” for so long in a normal human life. Then the exits show up. You start lying about your practice. Or you double down until it gets weird. Or you quit and pretend you never cared.
None of those exits are about wisdom. They’re about image management. They’re what happens when the driver is fear, or the need to prove you’re the kind of person who never stops.
This isn’t a plea to do less. It’s a plea to stop worshipping exhaustion. There’s a different urgency available—clarity, transcendence, healing. The kind that doesn’t require a performance.
So ask it plainly: am I practicing, or am I just not quitting? If the answer tastes like panic, adjust the flame. Keep the heat. Lose the burn.