 Lately I have been ruminating on what it means to be the bigger person. I have become very good at this in public in certain situations, but then, in private, as in, my own head, I beat myself up. I have had several interactions with women where they flirt with my partner in front of me. Sometimes, they pointedly ignore me. Sometimes they tell my partner he looks good several times in the course of an afternoon and touch him repeatedly. In these moments, I hold my tongue and smile, because I know in the end, they are doing it because of the sickness within them, and nothing I do or say in the moment will change that. But later, when I talk with my partner about it, it becomes a heated debate, and it is not about whether the women are doing this or not, but why this bothers me and why it should bother him. I admit I am at a bit of a loss. Most of these women, as he says, are not people to admire or aspire to be, and in fact they are usually without boundaries, but still, it hurts when people behave in this manner. I have struggled for the last three years or so to let my pain over these encounters go, but I have not yet been able to do it. If I take a step back, I know that I allow this into my head and I don't have to. I also know that this is in my life because I am supposed to evolve past it somehow. So I meditate, I focus on my breath, and I release the pain that resides in my chest every time something like this happens. It is synchronicity that today is the day of my father's birth, and he is the one who first put me in this type of a helpless position with his third wife. She was boundary-less, like the women that bother me, and she was completely competitive with me and my siblings for my father's affection. This also happened with my mother. Her partners were always taking her attention, energy, and ultimately, affection, and leaving my brother and I with...mostly her rage. This is a pattern within me that I know I am supposed to break. I feel like being the bigger person would be not saying or doing anything in the moment, and also not being bothered by people and things that don't, in the end, really matter. But my insecurities and history get the best of me, and I am left with the pain of being put in a painful horrible place. It reminds me of the years, from the time I was 8 or 9, that I was always a secondary concern. I am re-living this over and over at the hands of people who have been sent into my life to heal me. So I will continue to work on this, write about it, and maybe, eventually see these events for what they are; opportunities to put myself first and recognize that no matter what other people do, I am always the priority. Here we are, one week from the end of July. I have been considering not writing this blog and changing it up to a podcast. I will still have my newsletter, so if you are not signed up, and want to see what I am up to, please do. The podcast is called Wellness Off the Grid. It is a podcast based on body positive wellness. I will be interviewing all kinds of professional healers and folks who know the insurance industry first hand. I will let you know when I release the first episode.
0 Comments
 The tightness in my legs, from my hips down to my ankles, feels good, unfamiliar, and awakens a new awareness in my body. My tendency is to move and now, with my increased strength and energy, I am moving more. It is in fact hard to slow down. But I slow. I slow when my heart breaks a little, or when my expectations, high and unrealistic, are not met. I slow when my new body starts sending me new messages, and because I have always listened, I must listen now. I have left so much behind this year. I have given up so much that I thought I wanted. Now, I am following hope. I am following inspiration. I am following a dream that I can feel but can't yet see. I try to remember who I am because it is what soothes me most; knowing myself. I learned that through years of turbulence, struggle, depression, that to know myself, and to accept her, is to be home. I have become so comfortable with a dynamic environment that now, that I am creating some stability, it is freaking me out just a little bit. Part of me has always believed that the less I have, the less I have to lose, so building a life, building a great future seems like a huge risk. I have to come to terms with the fact that losing love in my life is part of the engagement I crave. I have so loved the new things I have learned, the new parts of the world that have opened up to me. These things, this new knowledge will not be lost because it lives in my heart. But I have come up against my fear of building a success I value, and I admit to being petrified into stasis. I will eventually break free and keep moving, but like the dream I work toward that I cannot quite see, this fear of loss is the constant I feel creeping up on me and can't outrun. It is inevitable. I struggle to conquer it, the pain of it so familiar that I know it like a second skin. But this is part of me. This is what holds me back. I lost my heart once, when I was young, maybe too young to understand that I could, maybe too young to understand how to handle it, and I was left in the dark. The world deadened to a cold black and white and I could not feel out the point. I could not discern a reason to engage in a world that could take your heart so swiftly, soundlessly, carelessly. I have slowly come back, and to all the world, I am fully engaged. But still, I hold myself back. I keep myself busy with less important work so that the work I must do can go undone. The work that could provide a deep love, an astounding success, a resonant triumph. I hold myself back because the loss still echoes in my hollow bones and chills me with a warning; do not accumulate that which you could love. Do not accomplish that which could be taken. Do not dare to attain a life that could shatter and leave you flattened. I struggle to silence this fear, or at the very least, live with it. At the very least, I will live with it. TMI? I am not sure. This new way of writing sure does churn the butter. I am two weeks away from closing down my GoFundMe for my tiny house build, so if you wanted to help out with a small donation, it would be super cool if you could do that in the next two weeks. I am finished digging out the small piece of land I need to build on. Now I will start! Well, actually, I am starting next weekend. It is very exciting. I will probably post pictures here. Being less concerned. I wish I had had this earlier. I used to worry and worry and worry about what other people thought. Bend myself a little in order to suit the needs of the company at hand. Go over conversations I had for hours, hoping I had not offended anyone, or wishing I had said something differently. I spent a lot of my creative energy worrying about things I had already done. I spent a lot of my emotions attempting to be what I thought would be more a more lovable version of myself. It made me resentful. Bitter. Hopeless. Maybe time is the only way to gain this confidence, maybe it is the trauma of dealing with people who don't consider you in their lives but expect you to consider them in yours. I don't know how many of these lessons it has taken me to get here. But I have never cared less about what people think, and this feeling, or lack there of, is accompanied by a new found courage which has opened the world to me. New things and experiences fill my life. I am less worried about looking foolish and distracted by my curiosity for things. I feel things more viscerally. I do things that scare the crap out of me. That's my new freaky. It used to be expressed in other ways, which were also good, but I have come upon the joy of soaking in the moments where I am single-mindedly focused on discovery. I do feel the heaviness of this moment in history. I have spent days/hours/weeks in emotional torment over the pain of others, over the fear and hatred that has been indoctrinated into this culture. I have witnessed in shock and sadness as people, heavy with the pain of centuries of abuse and oppression, turn their backs on society at large. The fear and hatred that is prevalent in the world is a disease of the mind and heart that I build my immunity against by doing what I want, when I want, and being as kind and generous to myself as I am to others. I have tried arguing, listening, discussing, and I end up in the fruitless endeavor of defending. I have given up on this. I can only be me, and hope, through this example, that I encourage others to just be who they feel like they are. We are taught to compromise ourselves and convinced that there is safety in finding a community of like-minds in which to reside. I believe the opposite to be true. I want conflict. I adore heated conversations on matters of importance. I want to know people with different backgrounds, experiences, values. I want to understand them. I want to be able to talk freely, and listen without prejudice. This, like everything else, is a practice. I cannot do these things if I surround myself with people who are just like me. I cannot challenge myself to be better and better versions of myself if I operate in an environment where mediocrity is the norm and small talk is the local dialect. Things matter. It sounds simple, stupid even, but the truth is that if I don't treat every aspect of my life like it matters, then it doesn't. Simple post, I know, but I feel like it needs to be said. In other news: I broke ground on my tiny house/covered deck space, and have gathered more materials for the build. I am getting help with the solar installation from an expert, and the donations have slowed to a stop. But that's okay. BUT, if you can, please help with a small donation. Just visit my GOFUNDME Out of My Storage Space. Thanks so much!!! |
A Love Rebellion.
Be a part of A Love Rebellion. Spread love, hope and compassion.
Artist WebsiteOnly the highlights from my creative life. Just click on the image.
Most Popular
My work is supported by my readers. If you feel like you get something out of this every week, and you feel you are able, a $3 to $15 monthly subscription will help me bring you all the ass-kicking content possible. Thanks so much for your support.
Archives
June 2019
|
RSS Feed
