Into The Rabbit Hole

I believe that much, if not all, illness is a physical manifestation of psychological unrest.  I can say this, having caught some sort of virus, that what I needed– and finally reluctantly gave myself– was a break.  A break from my responsibilities, my constant movement.  I needed to stop and to be still.  To allow my natural resources to find balance again and replenish itself.

At first I felt extreme guilt and agitation… and rationally, I realize that these emotions were not helping the healing process.  After much thought, and a seriously hot, long, bath, I found my center again, and have begun feeling emotionally better about taking today off from everything.

With the emotional tethers let loose, I am now able to focus on allowing my body to recover.

I love books that make me think.

I’m not through the Celestine Prophecy yet because I’m forcing myself to sit through it and think. I find enough value in it to truly reflect what I’m learning. This is all part of the process: learn, reflect, learn, reflect…

The part I’m currently reading has had a significant impact on me. I’m on the sixth insight, which basically says that every one of us has a basic sort of control drama– a way that we control situations and steal energy from other people. I fall primarily into one of the four categories: I am aloof. In order to control a situation, I will be silent, waiting for people to tell me what I want to hear– what they need to say. I have discovered that I can gain attention just by being quiet.

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We totally loved on our plants tonight. I love lovin on the plants. We re-potted more than twenty of them. Gave them the love we’ve been meaning to give them but never found the time to. Thank Goddess for Christmas break, right???

The house is looking rather jungle-y. I’m a big fan of jungle-y.

You might think I’m weird for this, but I’m going to tell you for the sake of you either thinking, “My she’s weird,” or, “Hey, that’s rather cool.”

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Warning: this is a sensitive topic.

I feel like I’ve jumped head first into a deep sea of mental illness. This is such a sensitive topic, that I hesitate to address it, but know that for my own sake, I have to write about it. Somehow, in some way, if I can help someone else out with my thoughts, then I feel it necessary to post it. So, I will do my best to be sensitive about what I say. It is not my intention to divulge identities, nor is it my intention to spew forth drama or unnecessary stress… I just want to get some things straight in my head so that I can have a more solid stance on what/how I think and feel about this stressful situation.

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Yunno me… always thinking.I had a rough start to the day.  I was feeling bad, though I couldn’t quite figure out why.  Could be the full moon, or maybe my hormones.  Could be alcohol I drank yesterday– or all the sugar I’ve had over the last 24 hours.  Maybe I’m fighting something off, or it’s the stress of the holidays, or even me just figuring out this parenting and significant other role…

Regardless of why I was feeling bad, I conquered yet another conflict within me: I felt bad, was able to express it, and then worked through it.

For a good part of my life I’ve been hesitant to express when I don’t feel good.  I don’t want to be one of THOSE people who no one wants to listen to because they’re spouting off negativities… I’ve never liked THOSE kind.  I don’t want to be rejected for my feelings, which is something I’ve apparently been conditioned into fearing.  That goes right back to my good old Fear of Abandonment issues… Alas, I recognize those feelings as such and have learned to identify them for what they are.

I’m feeling better now.  I knew the feeling was fleeting.  It’s been a challenging experience dealing with all of life’s stressors, all of the things that just add to the weight I place upon myself. I learned something new today about myself: be gentle.  Allow and accept the bad feeling, and then set it free. 

I’ve also learned about frustrations… about parenting and financial woes… that I DO actually have a breaking point.  Not that I broke that point, but that I have one.   Huh, and all this time I thought I didn’t!

These, to me, are great things to recognize.  To acknowledge them, validate them, and to allow them works far better than to deny them or to hide from them. 

As the evening rolls in, and my tensions are lessened, I’m grateful for the lesson about myself.  Amazing how I can be solidly into adulthood and still be learning about me.  That’s a good thing, I suppose… that’s something that I think everyone should strive to reach for.  It’s a good indicator that I’m still capable of implicit change within me.  To me, that’s one of the best lessons of all.

I’m torn between feeling ecstatic and panic. If this is what manic feels like, which I’ve heard it is, then I can’t imagine cycling through this emotion like a pendulum– one moment invincible, the next moment pummeling through the depths of depression like a fiery comet through the pits of hell… well, then, I’ll pass.

This life is so crazy. Insane. Crackers. Cooo-cooo.

Inevitably, amazing things happen. Of course, then, so do worrisome things. I’ve felt a lot of emotion today… a lot of the precursor towards guilt… not quite guilt, but just enough question in my mind that if I really did fuck things up with so many of the people I’ve experienced in my past, then ouch, I must not be as good of a person as I had thought. At the same moment, right as I’m about to succumb to feeling sorry for myself, the faint whisper in my mind hastens me to stop… Why can’t I be just fine as I am, mistakes and all?

Of course I’m not perfect. You all have followed me along this path of realization that one– that I– cannot always be the perfect (fill in the descriptive role here). I’m not an angel, after all. I may try, but alas, I fall significantly short. So if that is true, and right, and perfect, then why should I feel a negative emotion such as guilt for being human?

My passion for people is proving to be another roller coaster ride… highs, lows, and every place in between. I shed tears for my lost friendships… but in the same body, I recognize that I have three options: change my thoughts, release my thoughts into the Universe, or come to resolve. All of which are valid options, none complete without the others, but some more permanent in healing than the rest.

Choose to resolve. To revolve. To evolve. To embrace the life lessons as my own– my learning opportunities perfectly suited for a Work In Progress such as myself.

How I will go about resolving myself from my sins… is a challenge most people would gift a god. Dear Father in Heaven, save me from myself. Forgive me my sins.

What does a child do who has no Father? Does she cry out with self pity? Does she wallow in misery knowing that no imperfect creature such as herself could possibly pursue the expression of bliss?

I can’t go that route. I can’t allow myself to rot that way.

Instead, I will learn to forgive and embrace myself. In all my passions– my pitiful behaviors– my oversights and loose tongues. I allow it to be my experience, and yet strive for perfection.

They say perfection is god’s work.

And in saying yes, I recognize the goddess in me.

Tonight, I feel validated.

With so much going on in my world, I have needed a temporary break from myself– from the constant thoughts that swim in my head.  I have had to take a few days to be quiet… to just Be.

I have been absorbing it.  Re-aligning myself with the inner guidance that drives me towards feeling good.

I have learned a great many lessons through these most recent experiences… learned that as long as I keep putting one foot in front of the other, that I will get through the maze, regardless of where I end up… I have been forced to trust myself, my judgment. To know that I have my best interests in mind.

I was given some great advice.  It was that one should not go around with their head in the sand, not lie in the dark waiting for whatever happens next.  I believe that I create my experience, through intentions, through thoughts, through my attitude towards my experience… and that I shouldn’t ignore what isn’t working– to address it is far more liberating than to lazily allow things to happen to me.

There are so many opportunities to learn from what we go through.  It’s a matter of whether or not we allow ourselves to absorb those lessons or if we blindly grope in the dark looking for the reasons behind why we go through them.

I awake to find myself on the bus.  It is crowded here.  People stare at me, the white woman, finding herself there, on the back of the bus, wondering how the hell I got there and where we are all going.

There is an ebb and flow of people, getting on and off at each stop.  I can’t see the street names.  I look around to orient myself, but the signs are all fuzzy, and I don’t recognize the buildings. 

Being sober has a strange effect on me.  I am in and out of surreal experiences, waking up in places, not knowing how I’ve come to be where I’m at.  I can never tell if I’m dreaming.  My lucidity is shot.  Maybe it’s because when I am putting intoxicants in my blood I am actively aware that I need to remain aware of what’s happening.  Maybe.

So this is what life is like.  I peer down the aisles of the bus, watching the knees of the other patrons moving in and out of the center as people slide in, standing room only, finding their place amongst strangers.

There are glimmers and flashes of light poking their heads through the skylights, and with each flash, I am blinded, catching myself having memories that I don’t remember– memories I don’t own.

Being human is so difficult for me sometimes.  So this is what it’s like, this is life on this planet.  There’s so much I don’t know, don’t understand, and so much I want to know more of.  With a single flash, I am transformed into a feather that flits around the traffic, in and out of wheel wells, under the bus, down into the sewer, popping back out at another drainage grate… this is what it’s like to be alive. 

*flash* now I am the child, running ahead of her mother, whispering, “catch me, mommy,” and the mother isn’t looking, she’s watching the cars stream past her, honking, and I can’t seem to catch her attention, so I bolt into the street.

*flash* there is a man sitting behind me.  He is wearing a baggy, shiny, silver jacket over his massive body.  There are black skulls on his shirt, and he is listening to loud music, so loud we can all hear it.  The black girl sitting next to me cringes when the man starts rapping with the music, “White woman, sitting in the back of the bus, she won’t look at us, she ain’t one of us.”  I bite my lip.  It’s not that I’m uncomfortable with him, but everyone seems to be uncomfortable with me. 

A young mother with her three children stream onto the bus at the next stop.  She has to direct them to stand close to her, but they are curious.  Prejudice and ignorance are learned behaviors.  The youngest child, a boy no more than two years old, smiles at me.  “Hello little man,” I say.

*flash* “Next stop,” *garbled* No use in worrying where I’m at.  I’m disoriented, it doesn’t matter where I am. 

My mind wanders to a memory of my lover, lying in bed with just the cotton sheet wrapped around him.  His breathing moves the sheet.  Under the sheet, his hair wraps around his body, and I can see it rise and fall as he sleeps sweetly.  

I am not alone here.  I can feel their presence everywhere… the others like me.  I can see it in your eyes.  I can hear it in your words.  A man up the aisle latches onto my eyes, he’s been watching me watch another.  He doesn’t smile, just stares. 

Time is no longer waiting for me.  My days last for years.  My seconds click by disheartingly slowly.  I can see the pulse of a man sitting in front of me.  His jugular throbs a silent cry.  beatBeat, beatBeat, beatBeat. “White woman, her pants fit so nice, I want to slap her ass and show her who’s boss.”

Suddenly the bus is silent.   Everyone’s bustle falls into a deafening silence.  “Sharon, we need you to come to the front.”

I get up.  My name isn’t Sharon.  But I can’t stop myself.  I can’t make my legs sit me back down on my seat.  I am walking forward, pressing myself through the crowd of people standing in the walk way.  I hear whispers.  I hear gum snapping.  I hear the thumping of his headphones, sitting in his lap.  He’s taken them off of his head; he wants to see what happens.

“Next stop,”

I get off the bus.  I watch the bus drive away.  The streets are empty now.  I begin to walk.  I have no idea where I’m going.  I am not lost, though.  I keep walking.  For hours, I push myself forward, one step at a time.  I ignore the ache in my side, the blisters rubbing against my shoes.  I look down, and instead of seeing my adult body, I see a child’s.  I touch my hair, and it feels soft.  I keep walking. 

There is a man, now.  He is riding a bicycle, walking his dog.  He goes into a shop, and disappears.  The building is old, crumbling.  The pillars are painted purple.  I follow him.

My fingertips press the heavy door in front of me.  It creaks open.  I step inside, and it is dark again. So dark that I can see nothing.

I hear nothing.  There seems to be a vacuum of sound in this room, a vacuum so powerful that I cannot hear my own breath.  I try to speak, to hear something– anything.  I can’t even hear my footsteps.

I say my name, “Ash.”

I can’t hear it outside of my mind.

I awake to find myself on the bus.  It is crowded here.  People stare at me, the white woman, finding herself there, on the back of the bus, wondering how the hell I got there and where we are all going.

Emotions are amazing.  I love being in love.  I love being filled with love.  I love happiness and joy, and in the right time, sadness.  It’s all part of the human experience. However, emotions will absolutely serve as a lens for any situation you experience.  When you feel tension, if you can set yourself away from the emotional part of the experience, I can assure you that this tension is a direct result from the emotions you feel about the situation.

One must consider when dealing with humans, particularly, that we are all emotional creatures.  Whether we admit it or not, we all want to have our emotions validated and reciprocated.  When we’re in love, we want love returned.  When we’re miserable, we want to be with people who share our misery.  When we’re happy, we seek out companionship that feeds our happiness.  Read the rest of this entry »

I suppose that there is one of two possible causes for humans to have created spirituality in the realm of evolution.   The first possibility is that we need it in order to cope with our own mortality, feeling less anxious about death because we know something “Better” will come after we pass on from our physical bodies.

The second possibility is that we somehow remember– not necessarily cognitively– that there is something more.  Perhaps our cells remember– though organically that wouldn’t make a whole lot of sense because our cells are what die.  The scientist in me struggles to make sense of it all- to understand how a majority of perfectly reasonable (okay that’s relative) people believe in SOMETHING.  It comes back to one of the laws of thermodynamics: Energy cannot be created nor destroyed.  So, in the scheme of all that exists, we are energy.  Every single cell in our body uses something carbon based as a “food” to make energy.  Every carbon based cell we consume once used something else to make energy to grow.  Animals consume other animals and plants. Plants use sunlight to make energy.  The sun expels energy from the dramatic process of nuclear fusion, which is a result of the cataclysmic nature of the creation of our universe– a creation that natural physicists insist followed the law in that the energy was already there– it just changed form somehow…  When we die, our bodies decompose into basic carbon that is reabsorbed into the ground.  Or, the process can be accelerated by cremation– either way, our cells are always carbon based, and eventually those carbons return to the earth to be used as nutrients for more plant life, which again is eventually consumed by another animal– us or otherwise.  I suppose another possibility to allow our cells to remember is that we are all the result of something living.  Every single one of us was created by two cells from two other living beings.  Perhaps that “memory” is passed down to us from the point of conception… I’m doubtful, but somehow there could be a connection.  Read the rest of this entry »