I had so much pain I never dealt with. I’m only just coming to terms with how compartmentalized I was and the whys and the how’s of it.
I went swimming yesterday. Floundering awkward. More tuned to everyone else at first hyper vigilant non breathing. As it turns out rhythm and breathing is essential to swimming and well every other aspect of life.
I used to experience such shame for being so out of sync and step with those that were given acceptance and love.
I could feel it radiating through me as if I myself were a neon (because I was born in the 80’s it’s neon lol) beacon of different.
I am trying to wear that proudly now and to teach as I go. To advocate for myself and others to not be silent or more accepting. To not cut off parts of our stories or ourselves in favor of making other people more comfortable. I won’t.
In fact I am doing the opposite I’m excavating my story and working at believing it myself, getting it down, getting it out, writing it.
This is not easy. I have a thousand suitcases (white oleander reference), and it’s so overwhelming to even try. It makes me short of breath to even try.
So that’s where I am. I won’t be ashamed or change trajectory for anything. This is me.
I’m doing all body therapies currently and stretching only to my edge moderately until the muscle gives a little. Gentle yoga. Regular kills me still. Being in the water. Taking too much in, feeling headachy from being stiff and awkward and scared.
Just breathing …. Acknowledging…. Being with….
I took this season of writing immersion off to better balance some other things that need attending to and I’m scared shitless to lose the flow I found. But I often share in sessions we can’t lose “the work” it’s integrated and part of us. Accessible anytime, think Dorothy and her Ruby slippers.
I am reading It’s Not You by Dr. Ramani, I read it in like a day. That’s what happens when material makes you feel seen, you know it’s for you. I am reading Fight Right, which helps me hone my relational skills. I am reading Lessons in Chemistry. I am reading the list goes on!
I am watching This is Us. I’m shocked I missed the bus on this emotion porn, but also grateful because any sooner and I think it would have just made me feel worse about myself.
To speak to that I read something in Dr Ramani book, about permanent grief. Is that what I’ve been in?! That would make sense why I didn’t even know or couldn’t even feel other ones at times.
I became a doing. There was no being. And what has brought this so boldly into my attention is how my children felt in relation to me. As if their only value is when they are doing. Oh the heartbreak and regret.
So I’m working at becoming an open hearted and loving human being literally one minute at a time. The guards are many and they are intense. I have body guards upon body guards that I never asked for. Constantly telling me what I can and cannot do.
So much control. Lose control. No control. All control. Organize around others. Perform.
No breathing. No living.
So now I’m figuring out what this living thing is all about. Making friends with my emotions and my body. Introducing myself to them. We are pioneering uncharted waters here. So I guess it’s way finding then.
That makes sense !
Anyway that’s it for now but there may be more posts as I spend time with me this weekend.
First it’s a long walk for the dog and then gentle yoga and then massage.
So I’m on a health kick, actually let’s call it a revolution because it’s a lifestyle change, it’s whole. Rarely in my lifetime have I lost weight in a healthy way. I’m just realizing that now. I’ve lost weight in being devastated or starving myself so I could feel more attractive to someone else but never for me.
I’m realizing how much effort I must put in to trust. To repair my relationship with my own trust. That’s what sobriety is about for me. Repairing my trust in myself. Which a) I don’t think I’ve had much in a consistent way, and b) there were some significant breaks in it that when misunderstood I used my own information against myself. Fell on my own sword.
So now I wield the thing a lot more mindfully.
I wouldn’t say carefully because I have that much self awareness. There’s an edge and a fierceness and a pace of me that I’d like to think is part of my authentic self and there for a reason rather than a set of symptoms. Sorting through my rubble and piecing together a self I want to leave as a legacy has been my life’s work, and I’m less ashamed of that and more proud these days.
A former partner’s spouse has reached out to me. They are moving far away for two years, they asked if we would come have dinner before they leave. I find myself thinking about it this morning. That some of my relationships yielded lifelong bonds where love still exists and is allowed. Nothing wrong about it. Those with healthy boundaries and senses of self are able to do that without there being anything dangerous present.
Clean. Clear. And I can receive that love. And not worry where I belong or drown in a pool or self made shame. We have moved on, we are all adults, and what’s beautiful is what we meant in one another’s lives.
What’s beautiful is the way her wife honors her connection with my children and is open.
I think about some of my pain at a past situation where my reaction appeared not supportive of family first and I almost gaslight myself in hindsight but then I don’t. These days I have my back vehemently. The difference is my feelings on the matter would have been considered as part of the equation.
My greatest work these days is being mindful beyond my trauma reflexes and responses, of how those things affect those I love. I am the worst with affect and effect. Why is that one so hard for me?!
Anyway this morning I’m marveling at how big my family is. Family defined as those that want to be near your energy simply because they appreciate what it brings to their life. That’s the ticket folks. Or it’s my ticket anyway to the show I want to be at.
I am a writer who is writing. I am a mom who is momming. I show the fuck up and I intend to be loud and proud about that without believing it to be grandiosity or demanding or something it’s not. Something I’m not.
Fear will not drive my car, bus, airstream, tank, nervous system, choices, anything. It’ll be buckled into the toddler seat.
We watched instant family last night and I recognize why I get so emotional at that movie now. I relate so much except I never got those parents who didn’t give up on me, and you know what?! I became one anyway, somehow, and I’ve traveled through my own hell to be on the path I am on now.
I’m proud every day of myself. I’ll shout it and fly my flag. So many types of pride for me, in everything I am and everything I will become.
Theories and dreams were always foreshadowing and I recognize that now.
So today I’m two weeks sober. Quitting all addictions that don’t serve me one step at a time. So there’s more room, for learning, for reading, for loving. More room to discover my gifts and to share them. How I want to be living my life.
Anyway I have a client walking down into my office very shortly….
So I’ll write more soon…
But for now you can find me getting consistent about movement, being joyfully in my body and reading and writing….
I am listening to Ruelle radio. I heard a song by her I loved in a movie last night. Wildflower I think the movie was called.
My chest has been heavy lately. Only partially the bad cold I just had. I’ve had anxiety. Which is interesting because in the zoom out, big picture of it all things are going really well. Me doing the work is going really well.
I’m being and becoming more consistent and grounded. I’m in my body more than I’m not. It’s a disconcerting sensation attaching inside a body after years of compensating in a variety of ways and adapting to disconnection.
I am nothing if not adaptable. It’ll be on my headstone. She adapted. It’s not the strongest of the species, but those that can adapt that survive. What was necessary became a lifestyle. What is no longer necessary leaves room for what is essential.
Insert a quote about a prince and his lesson….
Belmont street beckons always. Woodmont is busy today. Normally that would bother me but I’m making time and space for myself anywhere these days.
Today I recognized I’d been too long without the oxygen that being alone provides. Despite all the events being good ones including Elizabeth Gilbert and Rob Bell, it’s a major non negotiable of mine to be alone often and for spans of time. I crave it.
As today I was craving my smoothie water drive and park and meander, through the world and my mind equally.
One day I will look up and…. I lost my train of thought. It went off the tracks. Just like that.
One day maybe I’ll have one of these houses that faces here, because this space is sacred to me. There’s not an explanation. I’m just called to it always and feel at home here.
Hearts are like that too. Inexplicable. Finicky. Unpredictable. I’ve learned a lot about that during my life.
I miss writing here. There’s always so much to say I don’t get to, it pains me.
Life around me is moving fast, and inside me it’s much more still. Thank god.
My nest is nearly empty and yet absolutely full.
My triggers subsiding. Fingers gliding across your surface.
My poet and my scribe and my novelist are all scrambling for front and center lol, no surprise there.
Found twin B her first car. Milestone moment. Able to help and have her do some in her own, the epitome of success as a parent, in my opinion anyway.
I appreciate it all now. Every moment I can get. Yes, even when it’s difficult. Even with a thousand triggers. I’ll take a thousand and one deep breaths. I don’t wanna miss a thing.
She’s leaving for her first year in college. Florida. Bless her. I hate Florida. Hate the humidity and one or two other things. But I’ll love to visit her and hear about what that’s like for her.
The Little Prince has his first apartment with roommates and it’s very close to the house. He’s taking care of himself and learning life.
Twin A is going to finish her second year of college and then head off to UCONN.
In one years time ish unless one comes home I’ll have none of my children living under my roof.
I’m just sitting here facing my beloved water and thinking about this. My life is vast, and full. I’ve lived every inch of it, every corner. And yet there are lifetimes more. How exciting.
My chronic pain is profound. It is not trivial. But I learn to cope a little better every day and it no longer makes me anxious the way it used to. I just learn what I need and how to love and talk to me better. How to listen better.
Heart opening, softening, thawing. Mercy, Grace.
My goal is relaxation and creation. No more hustle and grind. An early retirement of sorts, a peace treaty of the mind.
Man or a monster Sam Tinnesz et Al.
I am proud. That’s what I am. I show up. I stay. I’m steadfast and strong and loving and everything I never came from. And I am finally, finally, not kept out of my own warmth. No more gaslighting. No more making myself small. No accepting less …..
I can’t believe how much cold, hard, estrangement and desolation I lived with inside of me. That breaks my heart.
Monsters by Ruelle. Some kind of theme here :p. I feel endless possibilities at this juncture.
I’m Christina Jenkins now. I’ve never had a last name that felt like home. Now I do. It’s extra ironic and pleasant that was my notebook name of practicing when I dreamt of marrying my first love. And guess what I still love him. A wholesome heartfelt relationship that has lasted our whole lives with a family who loves me as a bonus.
I love my name. Who knew getting married wasn’t the only way to have a name you love or a family for that matter. Now I have many.
An abundance of belonging. And an abundance of tender affections for me.
All my love,
C
Ps it’s a beautiful Saturday. I’m not working. I just saw a Frenchie. I am loved. My needs are met and I now allow my whole story and every inch of my memories and emotions regarding that to exist.
There are things that need to be written from the origination point.
Im listening to I Will Find You by Audiomachine and it is transcendent. It’s making my experience of staring out at the water with my toes in the sand somehow more magical.
In this state I can feel everything I need to feel to have daily presence with myself.
Feeling is safe. Feeling will not kill you.
Writing is safe….
I’ve somehow managed to make my favorite day even better by permitting myself the experience of Victoria Erickson’s writing immersion: Ashes and Rain.
This is where we come alive out of the shadows and into the light….. next song! I can feel it rising, golden waves of sound. Ruelle Radio. The smell here is divine.
So many things are coming full circle for me at this time in my life. Breaking out of the story, any of them and into pure presence. Less perfection. Who knew how much of that I actually had hanging around. Not me that’s for sure.
My third immersion class today, and yesterday was my third Saturday that was my own. But who’s counting? Me. I am!
I’m reading the exact book I need right now. It describes this path I’ve been on. Stephen Cope Soul Friends. I can’t believe how similar so many of the experiences described are and that someone else was able to articulate it in this way.
So of course I’m on a reading journey that book spurned. Exploring Thoreau, Dickinson, Forster (Maurice), a separate peace. And many more. And also being introduced to many new poets via Victoria. Ada Limon, David whyte and more.
I will carry you came on. As I’m getting ready to depart and back in my car in its usual spot.
I have an immense feeling that I will live in Milford the rest of my life. When I die I’d like my ashes spread at Woodmont, at all my spots along this stretch. It has called to me long as I can remember. I first found it by wandering on some of my first run/ walks with self as a young mother trying to create a space for her thoughts.
I still remember the day I first walked down Belmont St. And as the road rose up there’s a moment when you can first see the water. That moment is my favorite part. I still feel that when I drive here. The moment water and I meet, magic.
I’m more embodied now which means that I’ve expanded from hours in the bath to bodies of water out in the world and to nature as well. I’m learning to keep my attention when out in the world, and to still be able to write.
We write alongside life…. Not separated from it. I am learning.
I think a new Sunday routine may emerge of contemplation by the water along with my exercise prior to my writing class 12-3.
I go to therapy one time weekly now. Friday mornings. It was a long time I did two days a week. Doing only one isn’t some accomplishment, as in I’m more healed. It’s just a natural progression to using that time in other ways. So maybe it is ha 😉
I’m getting ready to embark on a new level of healing with that therapy that is focused on the trauma held within my bodies. The things my mind cannot access. Denali sized blocks.
I’m scared. Raw and shaking. Heart racing. Sweaty scared. And I’m grateful to be able to fly that close to the truth and to survive it.
Transmuting pain into personal power. Becoming a healer also to myself.
I’m writing poetry. I’m thinking of the connections that drew that side out just based on the emotions encompassed within. Those who recognized the poet and the passion within me. Who saw. Who felt me.
I am with them all the time. They are with me all the time. There is no need for separation.
I’m learning to no longer censor myself. I am de compartmentalizing all that has been and this is a painful process.
Becoming fully embodied and present. It’s excruciating and also the most beautiful suffering I’ve ever experienced. That look you saw wasn’t darkness it was the depth of my ability to connect. Interpret as you will. But I see it now.
I see it now.
The transformation is exquisite…
I’m on the rise is the song on now….. pay attention…..
“You can do something now to live the life you want to live.”
Grrr this was written the other day. And now I’m on a different one but just noticed this didn’t post.
Running book title: Understanding me.
If I wrote a book now that might be what it would be entitled right now. That’s what I’m working at each day.
Now that I’m not desperately trying to understand the actions of someone else (most of the time ;)), I am figuring out what I want, need, etc. Go figure. And also for me, easier said than done.
So today I find myself in the Storrs Library just over the CT state line. I’m here for my insert number here energy healing. I wonder how many that’s a good question.
I went to look it up on Venmo because I’m me, and the internet here inside the library has not lived up to my patience threshold. I crack myself up. So maybe something to get a statistic on later, if I remember. Slim chance.
So I’m sitting in the library with Things That Matter by Joshua Becker on my lap. Knew nothing about this book before I opened it. So far it begs you to ask the question of what you would regret about not finishing in your life. It speaks of a person’s work with the dung and their shared regrets and those commonalities.
It’s talking about how to live focusing (my fear kicks in with self knowledge here, my arch nemesis), on how to achieve the focus necessary to live according to your priorities.
Living in a way that makes a difference and not “wasting” that.
If you were to die today, what one thing (or few things) would you be most disappointed that you weren’t capable to complete.
Let’s see if I can work through mine here. There is the obvious sharing of my story and writing a book, the two may not be mutually exclusive. I’m still figuring out that.
I would regret not having fully apologized to those I’ve loved, where appropriate, based on the understanding I now have of myself.
Perhaps I would regret not giving enough attention to develop a counseling theory or movement based on the knowledge I have.
And not having a healthier relationship with myself, how I treat myself etc.
So I suppose reading this it’s pretty clear I’m on the path. That’s comforting. Seriously.
I just read make it a point to read books from different centuries because it will come from a different perspective and will challenge your thinking in new ways! That’s why East of Eden! Woooo! I’m ahead of the game.
So these are the five regrets people cited…
💜
And our time together today in this blog is almost at a close. I certainly do not regret making this post.
What I learned today is how close I am to living my life in a way that leaves few regrets and I could have lost all of that by obsessing over some of my mistakes and getting lost in them.
Stop it! I say to myself… stop it and carry on.
Onward! (Thanks Liz) and now I can truly embody and feel that message and how you got to it.
All my love, all of it!
C
Ps lately my thoughts are highly influenced by Soul Friends and exploring the connection that have most deeply impacted me, trauma work, understanding what triggers my symptoms and how that affects my life. Also the reading of Come as You Are, as well as Letting Go. Energy healings, movement, nature, self discovery, reflections, and the places that shows or songs or moving or reading take me.
It’s a gorgeous Sunday. I feel beautiful. Clear and peaceful and calm. Whole. Myself.
I no longer feel I’m outside of my body watching my life, or that I don’t deserve things coming my way today, or any other. Now I say this, but there are moments. The pain is not gone, my trauma is not gone.
I’ve just found a lot more peace in living, created a lot more.
I do however want to write more. I went to Kripalu and that was such an experience and I want to capture it. I made new and dear writer friends. I read bravely, shaking and crying even, but without hesitation and without shame.
I showed up!
I wrote pieces I didn’t know I had in me, many fragments of my life.
Sea glass.
I found myself in others there and vice versa.
I found out I’m a poet, a lyricist, that there’s a rhythm to my writing, and that I’m all in. I knew that. But I don’t mind finding out over and over.
I’m all in. With my whole heart.
This day feels beautiful. It doesn’t just look it. I’m no longer invisible or trying to make myself that way. So much unworthiness is being shedded.
I feel loved. I feel seen.
And I feel felt.
My home is full of loving people and music and food and joy. When I observe from the outside this is what I see and hear. People feel welcome and loved here.
I have new piano lessons that are so much better than the other. And I was able to realize that I didn’t lose any of what I learned (we never do). Once it’s in there it’s in there.
I got paperwork Friday to move forward with changing my name. Yes, I am being adopted at 42 years old, and no I don’t mind the administrative nightmare that ensues. I had been avoiding because of that.
I had a hospital trip last week, and a nurse said my last name and it felt weird. I don’t think I’ve ever felt I belonged to a last name. Sadly even those I share with my children, and is also the name of my business. It would be so easy to go back to that one. And also has the bonus of sharing it with my kids.
I need to belong to myself, and I also want to belong to a family that has known young me, that has shaped me, and that showed up.
I’ve spent long and hard thinking about this and even though I had acceptance and love from a family I kept it at arm’s length because of fear. They will write that on my grave perhaps. I was too afraid to lose it and that they were just being nice and every other fear you can imagine. Judging myself left and right. Analytical to a fault.
I’m done with that. It is with an open heart only, and still some better senses about me, that I choose to embark on the rest of my life.
How did you do it?! Not lose your heart….. it wasn’t easy.
So I am going to be Christina Nicole Jenkins soon.
When I think of love and being loved it’s them that I think of when it comes to family. Them that have known and loved me all the years of my life unconditionally and without expectation or becoming upset with me for the choices I’ve made.
When I think of how I love. How I include my daughter’s boyfriend as he’s one of the family, and holidays, it is them I have modeled the most after. How I have loved friends as my own, my desire to make anyone in my area feel like family. That’s me. That’s my own. It always was.
My first love Michael Jenkins and I… we are still in love. Not the romantic be together kind, but the kind who experienced first love together. I always did wish to marry him, so the last name will do. 😉 I feel warm and safe and seen and felt all these years later with him, and the family who loved me naturally. With him or not. They love me for me.
They just lost a daughter recently. My heart hurts for them. I’m sorry.
So I’m just realizing more recently a lot more about love. What it is. Who I am in its arms. How it’s shaped my life. Whether it was the having of it or the lacking of it. Whether it was lightning bolt love that jolts you awake to so many things, slow love that is learned, love of a friend, love of self, passion, vocation, nature.
What is love is my writing prompt from Melissa. And even if I do know a lot more about what it’s not, I am an eager student.
I used to just go blank when Melissa would ask me anything about me.
So on this Mother’s Day I have a mother and I am a mother, and there’s no internal conflict or pit of pain and despair to be found.
My life is “good enough”, not longing for anything else. Always that burning longing…. a purgatory my childhood years left me to resolve and I’ve turned pain into art.
The art of life itself.
And I love living.
So I’m sitting here pondering the consistent stable things I’ve created this past two years.
I am consistent and committed to my healing. Which includes routines I crave and love. They include exercise, nature, connection, writing, touch, learning, reading, and play. In no particular order because writing would be first, though play in last does track.
And little by little the hyper vigilant guard let’s down my walls and I swim in a sea of love without drowning or jumping out. I’m finding ways to navigate the waters. Ways into and out of myself that are constructive rather than destructive.
It’s not perfect. I’m still doing a lot of grieving. My heart is still heavy in ways that are felt in daily life, especially on holidays, and milestones. There are aches of what was, and what never was. Phantom limbs that tingle. Vivid moments.
I still do grief rituals. Deep moments of allowing. No blocking.
Those are part of life now, and I don’t worry that they will bitter the sweet. They are the product of a life well lived of pursuing that which sets my heart on fire and there’s no shame in that.
I have nothing to be ashamed of or regret, only to peacefully sort my way through gently, ever so gentle with my heart.
Tread softly on me. I have a lot of scars.
I deal with a lot of pain physically and emotionally daily. That’s normal for me. My normal. When I get too down about it life gets harder. When I have some story like I’m meant to be this suffering thing. That’s ridiculous.
I just take things one day at a time and get better at coping with those difficulties and at being at home inside my body and with my wide open heart.
This is where I am 💜
It’s the first Mother’s Day I’ve truly let go and forgiven myself for not being able to stay where I was being harmed. Not wondering if I would attend a funeral for someone who died for me a long time ago. For someone who didn’t consider my well being.
How can a mother ever be that way with a child. I’m not perfect, not near to it, but I’d never give up becoming a mother.
I never give up, and I am loyal when safely connected and seen and felt.
I would have stayed loving her if it wasn’t burning me alive.
She never became a mother.
And thankfully I did and am.
It’s hard to not regret how long it’s taken me to get here. To give without resentment and that edge I always had. It creeps up like bile crawling up my throat. I now know where to put it, and life is much easier.
I want to give now. I’m not as exhausted all the time now.
I want to be a mother and someday a grandmother who my loved ones feel felt by. That I am able to pay attention to them without getting overstimulated, freezing, isolating, fawning, covered in panic.
Separated off in my mind in some terrible intrusion.
So I do the work, walk the line, show up.
I’m emotional often now. Like a raw exposed nerve. Like a burn victim. No longer reacting at every touch. I can lean in to connection and learn.
It’s humbling and rewarding and I am present and accountable.
All my love…
Mom
Ps: oh and the entire reason I began writing was to write about my schedule adjustment, and how that feels, but this feels complete. So next post…. My writing has a mind of it’s own and takes me on the ride.
Because to take away a man’s freedom of choice, even his freedom to make the wrong choice, is to manipulate him as though he were a puppet and not a person. Madeline L’Engle
It’s so interesting I’m reading East of Eden right now. Nothing is an accident ever.
Years of generational trauma are coming to a head in my little family. We are all facing our stuff.
I had a dream ……
I think of the beginning of Mama Mia, how many times I watched that movie thinking I just liked Abba. Ha. It took years to click that a movie about a girl who has three father’s that show up all wanting her, was obviously going to tickle my fantasy.
I remember my own father (during a short reconnecting I initiated, it was not a warm reception) mocked me for liking such a corny production. Oh the irony there. He was a smart man from the little I knew him, but severely lacking in emotional intelligence and empathy. Or maybe that’s just because he never continued his connection with me. I most likely will never know. It matters less in this present time. Not as much of a gaping wound.
Mama Mia is an intelligent play with a brilliant cast. You’ll never make me think differently.
I also dreamed of being a good mother, a dream that often felt out of reach. People would try to encourage me, and I would make sure they knew they just didn’t know what lurked inside of me well enough.
But as it turns out if you’re courageous and you don’t give up, you can absolutely attain what you desire.
As a generational curse breaker it was never going to be easy. I couldn’t have imagined it would be this hard, or this worth it.
I stand with the misunderstood and the misunderstanding in their pain, and now I also stand with myself.
My children are strong and beautiful and all heart, at times to their detriment, but that’s normal.
They are kind to others.
My children are kind to others, not perfect. They are kind.
They too are learning to turn their pain into power.
We have been in family therapy for going on three years now. We have all wanted to give up I’d imagine. We have been through therapist’s, and harmed by them at times. Others have helped.
We show up.
It’s often a slow hard slog through painful sludge. At times it’s excruciatingly like being burned alive.
Most of the time I’ve doubted it’s the right thing, as it’s not the popular way. Just let them be kids leave them alone, and do it in a more acceptable way. Make things look better don’t introspect it’s dangerous. I feel the opposite, it’s dangerous to people when you don’t/can’t/ won’t.
Most of my life I’ve doubted the good in me. I’ve spent it separated from myself. That is excruciating. It is torture.
Then I became tortured.
I didn’t want to breathe anymore I was so lost. All of the truths I thought I knew shattered and an even worse view of myself to climb out of.
I stayed the course.
I still have plenty of healing to do. We still have plenty of healing to do. But the heaviness is lifting, and in this new freedom we all attempt to connect naturally as best we can, with no force involved.
No having to constantly control my own emotions or attempting to control anyone else’s so I can have an illusion of safety.
Just a free fall into the clouds. This blissful peace that warms my sore bones.
I feel at times like I’ve been hypnotized or am in an alternate universe. That’s how far away good has felt for me. If something is good it feels like it’s in a dream, foggy ethereal, surreal.
And certainly not mine…..
I remember driving to my office in Fairfield and just asking over and over if this was really my life. I actually was aware how dissociative I was, but I stayed right near me until it was safe enough to embody my body.
As it turns out that can be the most painful “surgery” you may ever endure. Once inside you feel everything via the body.
“And now that you don’t have to be perfect you can be good.” Steinbeck
I’m listening to a Codependent Mind, Brian and Stephanie talking about trauma and shame from a unique perspective.
I’m reading East of Eden. Sometimes novels are a lifetime of therapy all in one story depending on what you bring to it.
I’m working a Course in Miracle’s, albeit very small bites at a time and lots of reflection. See my tendency to explain my ability to produce. Would ya look at that 😉
Atonement. Atunenent. To self and other.
Slowing. Staying with me.
“Am I practicing what I preach” is my usual alignment question. Or preaching more than I practice. Preaching is easier, less vulnerable. Vulnerable is the heart opener: it must be exercised over and over.
A typical refrain lately is “it’s a practice not a perfect.” Annoying counselor isms for 500 please Alex.
Double or nothing.
I have returned from the shore. Restful bliss. How did I go so many years without? That is the question of the hour, the day, the week, the year, and my life in so many ways.
Along with how did I learn how to cope, and how has that impacted the trajectory of my fate.
Amor Fati
I’m on episode 7 of the first season of the co dependent mind and they are talking about how emotions become cut off and compartmentalization. Yep I’m in the right place.
I love the rainy ness of the day. I never understand why people don’t like the rain. I love how it feels on my skin just as much as the sun. Both are necessary.
The green is here and so also is the sounds of lawnmowers and gardeners alike. My hair is doing that wavy thing it does with moisture.
Plumbing work on the house. The deck is in finishing stages (finally, I hope). The pool will be opened soon.
A house continues to become a home: as does my heart. Parallel lines in my universe.
I’m here just swimming daily inside the depths of myself, and coming up more often for air than I have in the past.
I love that for me.
Long time coming.
If I’m a poet I’m a poet.
If I’m a song I’m a song .
Less obsessive thoughts about what’s right or wrong.
Where did that come from anyway….
You know
A story for another day.
For now all I have to do is walk.
I was finally ready, and chose a new piano teacher. The scar is more brown than pink now. So despite the argument of my nervous system best to get back on the horse and all of that.
Tally Ho !
I’m making some schedule changes I’m anxious and excited about. I’ll have significant more time for myself, and my god does that challenge all the programming cable car pathways.
I commandeer my own vehicle these days. Any mistakes are mine, and all victories large and small as well.
I’m no longer agonizing in so many of the ways I was, as if every step could be a land mine.
What life is this I often say.
Heaven really is a place on earth and make me a believer baby.
I am
It’s evening Christina. After six clients Christina. Walking again. Taking in the spring sights and smells. As the day winds down.
I just used foresight of regret as a motivation for change with a client and it’s giving me pause to contemplate my own. Because of course it is.
The trees are aglow. The clouds highlighted in the same.
I don’t have what I thought I did in the tank for writing. Only being for me this evening.
Good thing I got a little down during less wiped out Christina time.
I plan on writing here more. My follow through and consistency has improved in so many other areas, it’s time for it to be so in my relationship with me.
Oh but before I go a random but probably not thread. My piano teacher is the mother of the boyfriend of a favorite bartender at the place formerly known as Crave. She introduced me to East of Eden. She (my new teacher) just finished it.
I remember the day I sat at the bar with my books and drink exactly. She has quotes from the book tattooed and I was excited even to be in the presence of another lover of the written word and thought whatever makes a person feel so passionate to preserve this art on their body…. I want to read that.
And several years later here I am, with her boyfriend’s mother as my piano teacher.
“Inside my skin there is this space, it twists and turns, it bleeds and aches. Inside my whole heart there’s an empty room, it’s waiting for lightning it’s waiting for you. And I am wanting….and I am needing you here. Inside the absence of fear.My bones call to you from their separate skin, I make myself translucent to let you in…. “ Jewel My favorite set of lyrics from way back and all time, and believe me there are many.
These days I’m most often looking at the nature of my relationship with myself. I am sifting through my history more objectively than I ever have. It’s a good feeling. I know that it means I’ve moved forward in health with my mind.
I’m seeing myself with such compassion and so realistically these days. My light and my dark, and their origins. Blame or spirals or deep dark thinking seem far away. There is a lightness of being.
I am present with and for myself and the simple things become special. Like a haircut and seeing a movie on a Sunday. And moments with my loved ones. There is gentle where savage pain was.
I felt inspired this morning to write some truths I’m thinking about myself.
I spent years living with a myriad of health symptoms that signaled to me I was dying or would at any moment. This made my world very small. I became afraid to do things out in the world. The truth is I was having intrusive thoughts anywhere and everywhere and using all my energy to act as if I wasn’t. To try and stop the thoughts they made me have about myself.
Lately I’ve been noticing my coping so much more clearly. I’m able to know what I’m doing and why I’m doing it and speak my truth. Those words, just words, hold so much power. They rock me to my core. That is a safety I’ve earned and provided and no one can remove it.
I in fact do a schmorgasbord of coping mechanisms daily at the slightest hint of something that could become “unsafe” and it’s tremendously affected by the moods, tones, and behaviors of those around me.
So unsurprisingly parenting teenagers was a special kind of hell for all parties involved for me. I was being triggered constantly and fully reacting from that place. After the trigger comes the shame spiral, and after the shame spiral being a puddle on the ground that must resuscitate herself. After the whole process usually a week of symptoms. Flare, migraine, stomach pain, crippling exhaustion.
I must forgive myself for what I did not yet know…..
All the while showing up for myself and my work. Knowing I must give more than I take there, or I’d lose the one source of positive feedback about myself. Yes as a counselor I was also co dependent and I knew if I didn’t get that under control I wouldn’t be able to have a good relationship with myself or a healthy one at work either.
I reflect on the “one source of positive feedback about myself” and my heart aches with the lonely and scarcity of that statement. Things were out of balance. They were always going to be while I was separated from myself for safety.
I was my very own authoritarian parent abuser.
I could make the marionette dance, but not feel things. There are limits to that power. I sought a more gentle source. How when feeling feels immediately threatening to anything solid, and all you began with was a single plank a thousand feet in the air over a pit of poisonous snakes.
I spent a good forty years pacing anxiously back and forth across that plank until I finally sat still and accepted my circumstances and started being curious about what I could do to make things better. Not only was nothing else working, but I kept repeating cycles that affected more than just myself, so more evidence I was bad.
I was really trapped inside myself.
The only signal of distress was for my body to become sick, because it’s the only model I’ve ever had for getting to a point where I could allow myself to receive. If you know you must be sick to receive you will be sick I can tell you that.
These epiphanies have just clicked for me lately: with the help of many therapies. Julie, Melissa, love from my people, and most of all a connection to myself, rather than being disconnected from her. Always vigilant for her to mess everything up, and become horrible at any second.
So right now I’m grieving a deepest layer. The way I have regarded my tender beautiful self. My mouth gets dry and the tears come.
So lately I’m walking a lot and being with my mind. My poor frazzled scattered brain and how quickly it darts to all the horrible scenarios. I’m just providing lots of comfort and safety like I would have to those foster children, if I didn’t need it more for me at the time, and not even know it.
I needed to love me, not always look to be able to love me by loving someone else. And I have only grace and compassion now for the fact love was so foreign to me. It’s different when you learn it through concept and not experientially. It’s different.
I am still learning. I will always be devoted to learning and to being loving and gentle and steadfast. I crave consistency and I insist on building it. There’s nothing else I will accept at this stage in my life.
Of that I am sure.
In other news I saw Bros yesterday and I was so delighted to see gay men allowed to be seen in a major motion picture. I was also sad at how much we forget how much pain minorities have to endure, and how much is insidious and viewed as if it’s all ok now.
I loved seeing Ptown on the screen and all the gay culture references and it did make my heart swell with pride. Just two people each being who they were in all their stereotypes, boring, too much, all of it, showing their true colors to one another and finding love.
Trying for love to build it. You don’t find it, you must create it. Love is crafted.
Yes, I will always be a sappy idealist when it comes to love. No, I’ll never let it allow harm to come to myself again.
The light and dark of a life well lived. (put it in my tombstone folks, but not too soon ok, I have shit to say first)
Please
I have lived and I’m not even close to done yet. Let’s go as my teens would say. Lol.
