Saved from the Cliff of Reversion

It was definitely a reversion. However, I really may have just been getting ahead of myself before. I still think that’s good. This is all fine and natural. I decided I need to fully give myself to some foreign thoughts before I can then find a balance between my old thoughts and these new enlightened thoughts, so that’s what is happening now. I’m trying to find the balance.

It’s all about balance!

I still haven’t really found it yet, but posts on The Daily Love really seemed to come just in the nick of time. I started feeling disoriented, and BOOM, here are a bunch of posts about accepting your partner in a relationship and about your ego trying to connive its way into sabotaging your efforts at breaking an addiction.

One post talked about relationships being more successful when you idealize your partner and focus on the positive instead of the negative. At first I thought of all the ways that was foolish and naïve, but since I already know that angle, I allowed the point to get across. I confess - there is some truth to it! When someone has faith in you, and sees the good in you, it makes YOU want to be a better person and do all those things that are expected of you. It is a boost in your confidence and self-image. The love kills the fear. If someone tells you that you are so loving and understanding, it really sets you up for success. If someone tells you that you always lie, and you are crap in some way, then you probably won’t feel so open to discussing things with them, which infects the relationship with negativity and avoidance, which sets you up for failure. Not only have I seen how that works on me, but I’ve seen how I’ve unintentionally used it on others, in both the good and bad ways, and the expected results followed.

But where is the line?

Regardless of whether or not my fears bore these thoughts, can’t some of my rationalizations be true? Even if I decide something isn’t completely evil, can’t it still be bad? People’s past behaviors and thoughts indicate how they see the world and how they see other people. Mistakes they’ve made in the past can always happen again. You can’t ever really know when someone is repressing desires and when they have had a dose of enlightenment and truly snapped out of it. If they don’t want you to know, you won’t know. I can understand that people just want to feel “good enough”, and fear causes all these lies, deceit and mistakes, but where do you draw the line? At what point do you love someone through their issues and through your own, and at what point do you decide that it isn’t your job, it hurts in valid ways and they just aren’t right for you?

I’m looking for the balance. I understand better why people make mistakes, what is actually happening, and why they aren’t completely evil. However, knowing the issues people may have, there are probably issues worth your time to work through, and issues that aren’t. Maybe a little bit of a band-aid relationship (formerly known as a romantic relationship) is okay, as long as the wounds have gone from deep and infected down to tiny little cuts.

I think it’s pretty ridiculous to expect us all to live in La La Land and be completely fine if your spouse cheats on you, or people lie and steal from you, etc. We can try to understand where they are coming from as a human being, but that doesn’t mean we should just walk right into situations like that because we refuse to analyze situations and see all the red flags. That certainly doesn’t mean we should tolerate that sort of behavior, either. Maybe this new enlightenment can minimize the feelings of anger and betrayal, but to forgive and forget is disrespecting YOU. That’s not giving YOURSELF love. By all means, forgive them as you smile and gently show that person the door. Know that they have their own fear issues, and it isn’t anything about you. Send them some light and love, and wish them well on their own journey to find real meaning in life, but don’t allow that in your life.

What do you think? Am I starting to find a balance, or am I just reverting?

Acceptance or Reversion?

A strange thing happened the other day. I’m not really sure if it was my heart closing or just accepting a situation for what it is. It was a feeling I got when thinking about my ex. As I’ve said, I see through his mistakes and I love his soul, but I couldn’t handle his past. Most people probably wouldn’t care, but it bothered me. So now with all this acceptance stuff, I always seem to throw it up against the situation with him and see how I feel about things.

I already accepted that his mistakes, like anyone’s, are just “missing the mark” in a human being’s endless quest for the feeling of unconditional love. And I now sort of understand that people can really change, grow and mature in a valid way. So I was feeling really forgiving and accepting about the whole thing, and almost wanted to give it another try. I decided it wasn’t the time though – even if I did, now is not the time. We both have a lot of things to sort out about ourselves. We learned together, and now we have to go our separate ways to implement and do the work. But the other day – I don’t know what I felt. It feels like I shut the door on that relationship forever. I have obviously felt that way before, but that was before all of this enlightenment. So now I don’t know if I’ve backtracked or if I’ve honestly accepted all the pieces to this, and have decided in a healthy way that he still isn’t right for me.

It isn’t all about him, really. This is kind of a platform to work through my issues, which is why this gets tricky – separating my growth from his place in my life. He was such a perfect combination of good and bad that I saw a crack in my wall of fear and could see him for the beautiful person he is. But the wall is still there, and while I’m working to remove it, there is a lot to be done, and I don’t fully know what is on the other side. This is why I’m not letting myself trick myself into getting back together with him, at least not now. That can’t be decided right now. There’s too much going on; too much I’m sorting through. And he is, too. So for now I’m purely going to use my feelings for him to help me through my issues.

Well, does this mean I’m done? Is that what that feeling was? I grew, I learned, I accepted, and now I’m back to just analyzing the “us” and I’ve decided it’s a no? Or is this an oscillation in my growth; a small revert? Is this about him or about me? Isn’t closing your heart and getting upset always about your fears?

I guess I should feel this all the way out, “meditate” on it, and see what happens. Time for a sub-journey within the overall journey!

Overcoming Sneaky Fears

Some (if not all) of the fears I’ve expressed in previous posts were pretty sneaky. They convinced me they weren’t from fears. They dolled themselves up and pointed to other observations, events and morals as their causes. Over my life I’ve spent a lot of time trying to figure out why I am the way I am. I thought I had myself all figured out. I always had a deep desire to fix myself and my life. While I was maybe 90% correct in my conclusions, there was still the fear I was denying that probably seeded those issues in me, and everything else just sculpted it and fine-tuned it into what it is today. Sneaky! I’d look back on my life and say, “This is why I am like this now.” Well, that was partially true, but it just goes a little farther back than that. There was one more layer I had to remove to really understand it and get to the core of the problem. The Untethered Soul, my ex, and my open-mindedness and desire to live a better life finally helped me to shed that final layer and stare the cause right in the face.

One of the fears I’m most pleased to deal with is my issue with my physical appearance. Identifying that I have probably been undermining all my efforts by a deeply-rooted belief that I will fail has given me a new sense of confidence. Now I honestly believe I can do it. I didn’t even realize I doubted myself before, but now I see it. My mind was a double-agent pretending to push me to get healthy while it secretly sabotaged everything. I usually don’t eat that much, and I don’t eat unhealthy, but I don’t eat great, either. I generally stick to some sort of chicken and rice type meal, and salads every so often. Bland and boring. I think that was maybe punishment. My mind was telling me, here, eat this. You can’t have anything awesome because you look like crap. This is healthy enough. But really, it wasn’t. I wasn’t getting many fruits or vegetables. I ended up being vitamin D deficient, and recently iron deficient, too. So I bought carrots, spinach, squash, zucchini and a bunch of other things at the grocery store the other day. I experimented with different combinations and cooked a few meals that were delicious. I think I had spinach every single day last week. Without even thinking about it! How awesome is that? I got back into drinking that green juice smoothie stuff that has the super foods spirulina and chlorella. Right this very second I’m cooking some chicken that was marinated in this Hawaiian marinade, and I’m going to prepare a mango kiwi salsa to go on it. I’m not even sure what was keeping me from doing this before. I just have this new desire to do it. Hopefully it isn’t temporary – well I’ll just have to use my will-power if it tries to go away!

Acknowledging that you have a problem is the first step. Finding the root of the problem is the second step. And I almost feel like, that’s it! Once you really truly find the real problem, after peeling back all of the layers, the wisdom seems to remove all the road blocks. Some issues take a little effort to talk yourself through and remind yourself what’s going on, but it isn’t as challenging as trying to cope when you didn’t understand what was happening, and put your focus on all the wrong things.

I feel so free!

What sneaky double-agent fears do you have?

Put Love In, Get Love Out

This post is just going to be an overall update on my implementation of all this acceptance and enlightenment I’m learning. I think I’m doing really well. I think I’m maybe 70% there. I still have some crazy feelings, but I’m able to acknowledge what they are, and quickly release those thoughts and talk myself out of the feelings.

When I think of my recent ex-boyfriend, the one I wrote about in my first post, I’m able to truly send him “love and light” and wishes for his happiness. If I start feeling the terror of wondering what he is doing and if he is doing things I wouldn’t like, I am able to see right through myself. I have this desire to be someone’s everything – their one and only love. I basically want them to obsess over me and never get over me. That’s horrible! I always knew that was wrong, but I really couldn’t talk myself out of those feelings before. Not completely. Now I get it. Now I believe myself when I tell myself that those feelings are wrong, because I know why I’m feeling them and why I don’t have to. I don’t even really want that. It is all just about me. I want to be important. I want to have touched someone’s life so deeply that they will never forget me. I just want to have mattered. I already know that I did matter, and I did touch his life. I know that. I don’t really wish to ruin someone’s life by having them pine over me forever, living a completely miserable life because they can’t have me. It is all just about me. And this guy is so special – he helps me bring out this selfless unconditional love within me. I really do want what is best for him. Whatever he does, even if I don’t like it, I just want him to be happy. However he has to find that happiness, whatever wrong turns he makes, I just hope he can continue living, continue growing and find the happiness he truly deserves. And he does deserve it, so much. I get really emotional thinking about him sometimes. He is such a sweet, caring, loving person, and he has touched my life so much, even in the short time he was in my life. I know I’ve helped him, and I’ve tried to make sure I didn’t leave any bad impressions on his soul. I tried to make sure I was always a positive force in his life, and I’d promised myself I’d leave if I started to not be. I did a good job. I’m really proud of how I handled the whole relationship. I always handled relationships really well, but with him, I just felt this extra feeling of wanting what is best for him, really early on.

Once we went to a concert where his favorite band was performing, and I was getting thrown around in the mosh pit and was miserable, and I decided it wasn’t fair for him to keep pushing people off me, and decided to just stand to the side, and let him have his moment. I told him (later) that “we” were possibly temporary, but he was always going to love that band, so he should have that moment without tainting it with worrying about me. And that was my genuine feeling about it. Most times even I would have ducked out because I was mad, and would have been mad if he didn’t come try to find me. And granted he took a little too long to come find me at the end, but I sucked it up, because that wasn’t the overall intention. I really did want him to have that moment. I really wasn’t trying to test him or something. It came from a genuine place.

So now when I start pondering scenarios about what he is doing now, I just stop, and remind myself that I know I was a positive force in his life, that I mattered, and now it is time for him to regroup and continue down his path to his own happy life. I can genuinely be happy for him. I feel the sadness a little, and miss him, but I just remind myself of everything, and I know he is on his way, and he has to do it on his own, make his own mistakes, and find his own path.

Well that was more than I meant to say on that topic. In addition to my ex, I’m finding it easier to converse with my parents. I think everyone has pent up mommy and daddy issues, and talking to them brings back all sorts of childhood insecurities and pain. Luckily, I’ve been able to sort through some of that, too. I can acknowledge that not only is how I’m perceiving what they sometimes say tainted by my own fears, but they are even saying what they are saying based on their own fears and judging based on how they judge themselves. I’m able to dust off the real message despite any thorns that I interpret, and see that everything is coming from a loving place. Again, I already knew all that and had tried it before, but now I actually believe myself. I always used to get stuck on people’s intentions. “Yeah, well they said that because they think I’m stupid, and I’m mad because they think I’m stupid. I’m not stupid! Let me explain to you why I’m not stupid! Stop wording things like I’m stupid!” Well, maybe they are, but who cares? Really I just felt that way so much that I built up this wall, so I hate comments that come up against my wall. And they just say things because they’ve feared that kind of stupidity in their own lives. It’s one of their fears that they are conveying. They may be projecting onto me. Either way, just ignore all that and see the message beyond it. “Take what resonates and leave the rest.” You can’t fix how people talk to you – you can only fix how you perceive it. But now I have ALL the tools to do that. I’m not just lying to myself “They don’t mean it that way” without anything to back that up with, when my mind has a truck load of evidence that says that they DO mean it that way. Now I’ve thrown out all the evidence. Finally! Such freedom!

I’m assuming sometime soon I will hit my current maximum, and I will topple over from my place of balance. Something will make me take a few steps back. This is a process, and I’m doing really well, but I’m not perfect. If that happens, I’m not worried. It happens. It’s all part of the journey. It will just be my time to grow.

Sorry if this offends anyone, but that’s why this way of looking at everything is so much better than believing in the commercialized definition of God. Events can break you down after a while, and you can lose faith in a loving all-powerful God, even if you don’t think he can come save everyone. I feel like there is always the possibility of losing faith if your life gets bad enough. With this other view, it is still spiritual, but no matter what happens, it isn’t a matter of losing faith. Things are going to happen, good and bad, and some of it you have no control over. God isn’t dispersing good and bad times based on merit. Life is happening in random ways. No all-powerful being has any influence over it. It is all in how you perceive it. You have the power. The love you bring to any situation is proportional to the love you get OUT of any situation. It may not even be a quick result. If a bunch of people you know die horrible deaths - that is a tragedy. If you spend time honoring their lives, comforting their families, giving to any causes or charities that may be applicable, that is a way to give love in that situation. And maybe down the line when you need support, others will remember. I’m not saying to be manipulative – I’m just saying, even when something horrible happens, you can still put love in and get love out. Or, you can put fear in and get fear out. You could just stay broken from that experience. You could decide to never care about people again, because people just die anyway. You could decide your life isn’t worth living without some of those people. Well, then you will get exactly what you’ve put out into the world. See, instead of giving God all the power, you give yourself the power. You always had it, all along. Like Dorothy in the Wizard of Oz. Whatever tornado comes your way, you have the power to get yourself home. Remember that.

Bad things are going to happen. That’s okay – that’s life. When you don’t want to bring love to the table is exactly when you need to do it the most. Remember: Put love in, get love out. It’s up to you.

Perfectionism

So I’ve talked about some of my painful areas already. Well, there’s another one that’s really just as big of a wound. That wound is feeling incompetent. Logically, I know I’m not incompetent, but I keep having to push for it and prove to myself and others that I’m not, and if anyone ever makes me feel even remotely stupid or incompetent, I get really upset.

I first want to point out that my parents only wanted what was best for me. They loved me and wanted me to succeed. They wanted me to take full advantage of all the opportunities I was given. That comes from a loving place.

This is how all that love got interpreted in my mind.

So I had the painful area of thinking I was fat and ugly when I was little. Then I became a teenager. Well I wasn't fat and ugly anymore, in fact I was quite pretty, but the damage had been done. I fought against the damage. I decided that I don't care. Being pretty doesn't matter; that's not what's important. Things you can control are important, like your actions. And therefore from then on I strived to be perfect in all my actions. Grades, life decisions... Whatever. I don't know why, but it felt like my mother didn't ever seem to see all the hard work I was putting in. She was trying to push me to be better, but all I heard was that my "all" wasn't enough. So then I was fat, ugly and stupid, too.

So at that point, anyone liking me was a miracle in my mind, because I was a completely worthless piece of crap. So anyone that said I was smart and pretty was going to feel like the love of my life. I was so broken. Thank goodness I found that support, because it helped me realize I wasn't crap; I was actually very special. I tried so hard at everything, and I was good. I followed the rules. I studied hard. But only one person seemed to be telling me I was good enough, so I clung to him. I had finally found someone who thought I was valuable.

As life went on, the next part of the damage revealed itself. Here I was, busting my butt to be worthy of love. And here is everyone else, not trying at all! Everyone else doesn't think before they act, doesn't follow the rules, and acts stupid and selfishly (same words I've been fighting against). So now, since I'm the only one even trying, I am the worthy one. No one else is. Now I have to show everyone else how to do things. This is where I've been for my entire adult life. Honestly, I'm still there now. But at least now I see it. I see the cause, I see the result, and I see that I'm wrong. I just don't understand why yet, and I have no valid thought process to replace it with. All these situations and books and experiences are showing me that I'm wrong. But... I haven't let go yet. I'm still in the world of extremes. So what makes someone worthy of love then? Nothing. Then why love one person over another? Why love at all? Why not love everyone? Then what's the point of a relationship? I can't fit it all in yet, so I'm not there yet. I see, but I don't get the point yet. I don't see how it all fits together. But I'm trying.

Anyways, so as I was growing up, my parents would try to do things for me when I was doing something wrong. I always hated that. I felt like they didn’t even give me a chance. And then the next time would come around, and I’d have no idea how to do it the way they wanted me to, and now I was afraid I’d screw it up again. And sure enough, I didn’t do something right, and they’d take over. They were obviously just trying to be helpful good parents, but it was crushing my self-esteem. They didn’t really teach me, they just took over and did it for me. That’s not even their fault. Sometimes teaching by example is good, but I have to learn through repetition, so if I get no repetition, I can’t get it.

This is why I’m a perfectionist. This is why I want to do everything myself. I have to prove my worth. Now I’ve done things myself. Now I’ve compared myself against others instead of against my parents, and I’m damn good. This is an area I can compete in, especially since no one else seems to give a crap. This is my Olympic Gold. I’ve taken what my parents wanted, and I’ve amplified it. So when people don’t understand what I’m trying to say, or miss the point, or try to help me with anything, I take offense. They are interfering with my game. They are taking away my power. They are telling me I am not good enough. They are telling me I’m too incompetent and stupid to do it myself. I can do it myself. I don’t need your help! That anger is worst when it is my parents, still trying to “help” in the same way. I start to boil.

So this is still out of fear. I decided to interpret my parents’ love as a crush to my self-esteem, and now I’ve damaged myself, and my poor friends who are just trying to be nice are getting attacked for it. I need to learn how to control that. I interpret everyone’s help as if they are insulting me, and that isn’t good. I need to figure out how to handle that in a more elegant way. I need to truly believe that I am competent, and then simply accept or deny help from a neutral place in my heart, instead of pushing it all away out of fear of looking weak. If I was truly confident in myself, it wouldn’t bother me so much. I should be confident in myself. Haven’t I proven it to myself? I’ve now been on two vacations all by myself; maybe people look up to me for how I live my life; I coordinate and plan just about everything in my life and everyone else’s life… I think I can calm down now. Trying to control and be perfect at everything isn’t the answer. I don’t need to do that. Sure, at some level those are great qualities and habits to have, but as always, it is about balance. Don’t make yourself sick doing it. It’ll all be okay.