Making me Feel...

In a holding pattern again. Sometimes, it's necessary. To deliberate thoughts and feelings and properly place them where they need to go. In the context of time, I think that there's never enough to be completely satisfied with what you feel you've lost, but then again...too much when you're waiting for something else to happen.  Frelling holding-pattern. 
What we feel in many ways is a reflection of what and how we interpret another's actions and allow it to then impact our own status.  Precisely what I'm having difficulty with. Yesterday, I imploded to the degree that there was nary a dry eye in the room...they sat, single-rowed and content until I opened my mouth. And it wasn't even planned -- that "coming out" of feeling.  The time limitations didn't seem to matter because there was a rapid boil of issues all competing for attention, or at least to be verbalized.  So I spewed.  Like a geyser...and it did feel good. To let it go - part of the reason that when you impart too much thought into any subject, your thoughts become the feelings that, when they're weighed against what you're intently trying to relay, are skewed.  Jibberish that I can't seem to formalize into something constructive, but which I know IS constructive and needs to be lived through, contemplated and then brushed into the wind. For once and for good.

The 90/10 Principle in 2010

In many ways I am a creature fueled by fear, anxiety and low self-esteem.  I gauge my own personal growth upon the "feel-good" measures that I have culminated for the day - only to find that there are far more triggers in my reactionary phase which I didn't give honorary credit to.

The 90/10 Principle basically states that life is made up of 10% of what happens to you and 90% - your reaction to that 10%.  In measurement of reaction to circumstanes beyond my control, I have failed.  I have aligned my fear with the tally sheets that adorn my notebook for what I think should happen; consistently keeping track of the efforts toward self-improvement, and I recently slung a good line of BS at the person who is my hero because of it.  The man who has, for four years been my daily breath of sanity, thick and thin, hot and cold, good and bad, he is there for me.  Though as any wandering soul can relate, being bombarded with a constant barrage of "did me wrongs" gets old well before it becomes compelling.

Consequently, does one know what one does when one is called out on one's shit? I will tell you...

One that is fear-driven, denies the magnitude of one's shit.

After 4-1/2 hours of discerning this enlightened view point, I feel it fair to say that I have been a slow-learner in the category of what constitutes acceptance of mistakes.

I made a mistake.  I played a tugging battle between the highs and lows which has kept this man chasing boomerangs for far too long!  And at this point, the cryptic messages that actions were sending (even though cryptic) ...have served to adorn, or really cloud the intention.

Buggers!!

In the meantime, and with 90/10 in-tote, I'm putting out there that my Hero deserves a medal. For contending with this, with me...thank you Love.

The Elements

There were changes that brewed slowly - they took nearly a year to come to the surface in true light, bubbling ever so slowly until they spilled over the top of the pot in a rolling boil. Similar to the way that those "watched pots never boil" the adage to be calculated into the scheme of things once it makes sense in hindsight.

Friendships, they are like candy bars. Made of similar ingredients: chocolate, peanut butter, cocoa, oil and mix of those other names that you can't really pronounce. Some have nuts, some have spice. Others come with coconut and chewy nougat...they're all delightful in their own way, but there's always a favorite. A good and trusted stand-by that satisfies hunger when those chewy mixtures fail to fill the urge. This is the spin that bubbled over the surface. One of those "I'm thinking of looking to enjoy a new kind of candy bar in order to broaden my horizons".

I welcomed the opportunity and even drew on the strengths that were in the mixture. I put aside the begrudging after-taste and aspired to recognize what elements were really worth filling in the rating sheet on. In all honesty, there were many categories to that rating sheet that I added when I got to what should have been the end. I filled in more because it was worth it to me at the time. To have more categorizations of what my little candy bar could be - there was so much more potential that existed outside the 1. Satisfies hunger A: yes  / B: no...2. Decadent mixture A: yes / B: no...and so forth.  There was substance to the friendship and I had reached a point where the basic rating of beneficial - or - detrimental wasn't substantial enough to throw out the wrapper. You know; might wanna buy it again.  Until now. When the pot boiled over.

Having invested more than the potential called for, I felt that I'd given friendship more than its due course to prove sustenance. I feel that I even mellowed out the taste with a bit of sherbet in between bites just to cleanse my pallet so I wouldn't be judging unfairly. Then, there...at the crucial point of proving its worth, it crumbled. It blamed and pointed, accused and acted out. Dammit.  Why?! I stated my peace. I've said my fair share where it concerns what the power of cocoa beans hold - and the ways that they can be so distinctly different, but still yummy. I gave chance, and chance, and chance...for the cocoa bean to come to fruition in its own time.  I even waited. Damn cocoa bean.  It's like waiting for a productive harvest from the orange groves of Florida this year; ain't happening. 

Shame really, I was looking forward to having a new favorite.  Guess that's why there's always a stand-by candy bar. Because some things never change - and others, the ones that do change...they're like a nuance to self-improvement. RE-focus attention where attention be: to the improvement (and change) only accountable to the self. 

I didn't judge you little candy bar.

Emotional Affiliations

(Originally published in DivineCaroline.com > October 9, 2008)

I step outside with a wet head, draw my coffee to my lips, and realize that these are the mornings that I love. It is through the mist of the clouds, setting low in the yard, that the smell of wet leaves and dewy gloss waif over the grasses starting to turn to brown. There is the sound of birds rustling high in the trees and I take in a deep breath for the attempt to relieve this pressure on my heart. Many times, I can turn back the pages of my mind and recall the days that I would nestle into the crevice on your arm and wrap legs around in a mass of tangled morning warmth. I rest fondly with that memory and then suddenly, feel the pangs of love gone wrong.

It brings me out of that idealistic fairy tale and the clashing, banging horrors of what life was really like hits me square in the temple. That’s the part that carries with it resounding pain. The kind of pain that I can’t seem to drop now that I’ve moved on; now that I’ve been separated for more than three years; now that I haven’t twisted legs with the man in nearly as much time as we were married. One would assume that things could be suppressed enough to dissipate after enough time has passed, but they don’t. I’m finding that you have to pick them apart and dissect their innards in order to find the meaning to all the questions that surface when hindsight kicks in.

I talk to friends in a dire need to rid my soul of these horrors—wanting for the nostalgia of the good times to rely on and the bad days, the ones that dragged me to the bottom of despair, to go and eat themselves through until they don’t exist. People listen—my friends, they listen—but I question whether or not they really hear me. The agencies, they’re all set with convenient slogans of promise to help us through these agonies. They give tomorrow a shimmer of hope, but through my experiences, they lack a main ingredient. The one ingredient that extends achievement to make it real: accountability.



When you retell your life so many times over to stranger after stranger with an undying hope that they’ll be able to direct your sobbing soul somewhere profitable and yet, they jot down a few notes and schedule another appointment for some future meeting. My resiliency and idealism tells me that things aren’t as they seem; that people really do care and that they’re in their positions precisely for the reason to assist and amend. Why then, do they seem to take some long in the realization that I’m telling the truth? Why do I continue to feel the way that I do when I step outside and that dewy fog hits my face, the little pods of moisture stagnating on my skin and relentlessly wrapping me? Why is it that when I reach the points of clarity, I can’t maintain that perspective?

Maybe it’s because memories play tricks on these dear hearts of ours. They plot and scheme and pose as benign stagehands for this play. I realize that in essence I’m living as though my life has already reached a pinnacle ending—its resolve to capture pain and heartache, wrapped eloquently in the warmth of a true love and a real partnership, has taken up residence in my void. In this cycle, I’m reminded that it is ultimately our choice to continue on down the path of righteousness and truth; our choice to turn the corners of our mouths upward against that prick of painful memories—to prove outwardly that we’ll be alright in the end. I must keep in mind that those in the positions of assistance are there in order to help but they, too, are limited in their approaches. Friendly affiliations do not necessarily allow for a hug when we walk through the door of a practicing professional.

In this pain and heartache of remembrances, I feel I might reach a place where my strength out of pain will resound in my ability to stand tall on my own. In the meantime, I pray for continued strength and understanding. I reach out to the friends that smile cautiously as they listen to my tales of woe and I appreciate their place in my life. To build upon our lives is the essential part of living—the accountability that may be missing is what can ultimately be replaced and/or created by the ones that have trod this very road. In lack of accountability on others’ part, I take ownership of my life. I am building this piece by broken piece and when I finish, I will have created my own masterpiece.

Indifference

Back to the drawing board where it concerns applying the self. In some certain situations, I think you try to care and you apply every effort of caring in an attempt to garner yourself an understanding, but it simply isn't effective...enough. Why is that? Why is it that you can even exist in a place where all you do is absolve yourself of the responsibility of being within an experience, and yet you still push for resolution though it doesn't concern you? Is that the power of having an integral position in something? Of being IN a situation and not living apart from it?

I deem this indifference.

A dangerous, suspicious place of occupying one's mind, indifference. It's nearly a beast of its own. To want to have care, take care, give care and yet...nothing. Can indifference be tamed? Be logical? Be fixed? Does it evolve to the next life form that is...say, a touch of misunderstanding, or displaced anger, fear, rage? More of a want to be indifferent, when everything else is suggesting that you do care, that you do want "difference" in order to change indifference. I see that there is hesitation when indifference comes to play for the weekend. Like that friend that you don't really care for in most instances, but that you spend time with anyway. Maybe for lack of knowing what else to do with yourself while they're there. Maybe because they always seem to show up at the most-inconvenient times and force you to contend with the issues that are them.

Oh, indifference...why is it that I speak of you when your very nature is that of not caring?

Okay to Feel

The power of letting go comes in the ability to feel without having to control where that "feeling" goes as you experience it. This came up recently in the event that called for attention from me on a level that existed outside the being in a room. When you're not letting go of all of it, you're crazy-making in your head and still trying to hold on to the control and of making reason where sometimes, there is none. Sometimes, it's the taking that sigh of relief without having to explain beyond that. And that's okay.

In some events, in the process of letting go, it takes over the necessary element of really listening and of hearing what's happening outside ourselves and that might mean that we're not supposed to come up with a plan.

When you can't really listen and you can't really hear - when you're afraid of what you're thinking because of the chaos of what you feel...it's because you're digging your fingernails in as a last-ditch effort to attempt being the one in control. Be in recognition that you're not going to die for what you "feel". And maybe that's part of the reason why the experience lacks explanation. Because its outside of the self. Because in the process of decades of repressed emotion bubbling to the surface, there is no capable way of explaining it away or justifying it to the inquiring self that will equal enough of a reason beyond simply feeling it.


When that occurs -- the point is to simply let it BE.