As a teenager, I was struggling, I had a lot of emotional wounds I was trying to work through. I joined her a few times, by her invitation, but was not sure I really needed to be there. I had to keep going back, something drew me there. Looking back, perhaps, this was the beginning of my spiritual journey, which would unfold, slowly, over many years through many channels, to arrive where I finally feel like I am on the right path.
One of the phrases, always used in these meetings, "Let go and let God," was common. It symbolized the ability to accept it as it is and let it go. The point was not to stay stuck in it, to give it over to God or your higher power. I always struggled with this idea, not really believing in God anymore, by this point in my life, wanting to accept the idea. Looking back on the phrase, it is a way to give your power over to someone other than yourself.. that is what I struggled with. I was 18, female, at the brink of women's lib, women had jobs, women raised kids, women did it all and took names doing it. I could not fathom giving my power over to someone else, let alone, a God I wasn't sure I believe in.
Later, as my life progressed, I dabbled in different paths towards self fulfillment, enlightenment, spiritual healing and openness. I came across the phrase again.. this time it was "let go with love." This was more palatable to my conscious mind.. Letting go after all, was from the serenity prayer, which I have always said to myself when I felt out of control. Let go of those things that I cannot control. At this time in my life, I was married to an alcholic and trying to find my way again. I found some solace in al-anon. I understand this phrase has more to do with letting go of someone or something, without malace, rather good intent and love.
Letting go... while that phrase has always seemed a process I needed to learn. I have an obsessive personality, A compulive obsessiveness... not like I need to wash my hands, throw salt over my shoulder and spin around 10 times OCD.. But OCD in that when my mind is driven towards something I will obsess about it, compulsively. For example, when I started scrapbooking.. I read everything I could, I purchased everything I could afford and many things I could not afford. I slept and went to work and then scrapbooked. When the pictures started to run out, I started taking road trips on the weekends, so I would have pictures to scrapbook. When I started taking photos of those forced, special moments, I became obsessive about photography. I had to have the best camera, read voraciously about photography, tripods, camera bags, flash bulbs, screens, lights... and so on and so forth. When I started printing the pictures I captured, I needed a better printer, than a bigger printer, than a faster printer....then, I need photo editing software.... you get the idea..Obsessive and Compulsive.
Anyway, this compulive behavior is the same, no matter the sibject, thousands of self help books, recipe books, photography books, scrapbooking books, scuba books, essential oils, essential oil books, wine books, wine, wine decanters, glasses, sewing things, quilting things, crocheting things, surf board (I have never even used it and have only been on a board once in my entire life.) etc etc. Besides the financial burdeon this causes my life, and those around me, this was always considered part of my manic state. Maybe... it seems more obsessive compulsive than manic... I don't know...
Anyway, these material things and NEED to educate myself.on everything new.. this compulsion also happens when I fall for someone. IN the begining, I am able to maintain an adult presence, a mature relationship.. yet manipulative in someways.. As I write this, I realize that I have a real knack for getting what I want because I have been using my empathy to manipulate them.. SHIT, now I have another thing to explore....Also, because I have read enough relationship books, self help articles, dating advice columns etc, to know how to play the game.. pretend I am not interested, pretend I am not waiting by the phone, pretend I am cool and light and fluffy. This is who I want to be, my dating face, because this is what men want from me.. it is NOT who I am.. I have been obsessed, consumed with a man, waiting for my life to start, once they make me their everything.... slowly becoming more and more insane at hiding my truth.. passive aggressive behavior begins, things bubble up and I cannot keep them down anymore. This is where I think I start to suck the energy out of them.. they feel my obsessive need, even when I do not show it.. they may not even know what it is, but they feel better when they are not near this energy I am putting out. I take a hug and need a kiss, I take a kiss and need a word, A word and I need a ring, a ring and I need.. whatever it is it is not enough.
Now, as I am trying to find myself on a spiritual path of healing... I am trying to lose that obsessive need to be loved and loved in my way.
I am in a small relationship at the moment. I say small because it is new, very recent and it happened super fast. (Part of me thinks this is a problem.. any man that can fall for me so quickly probably has major issues.. lol.) I want to dive in and bathe myself in the positive emotion. I feel needed, I feel loved.... then he does not call.... my intuition told me something was off.. my heart screams, "No, this is what we always wanted and needed," my rational mind is telling me that it is ok, just go with it...
Unfortunately, every time in my life I heard something and turned it off, it ended up being right. Rather than ruminating that my intuition is right and I need to hop off this bus, I confronted him with my questions. To my logical mind, all of his answers make sense, something still feels off...
As I sat here earlier tonight, waiting for a call... again. It occured to me that no one... and I mean no one deserves so much of my energy more than myself. If I had put half as much love into myself as I do worrying about someone elses feelings, many of my relationship issues would deslove. I do not need anyone.. I want someone, I desire someone, but I do not need anyone.. not in the way I have felt, like I could die without them.. what is that?
I feel like I am rambling again.. I did know where I was going with this... As I drifted off into medetation tonight, I found myself asking the universe for an abundance of love. I asked all of the negative self doubt to leave on each exhale and a light, filled with love and positive enrergy and self worth enter me on each inhale. Again, this idea of letting go came to mind, this time from a spiritual teacher of mine. She always said, you have to let go without attachment to the outcome.
I can love someone today, without worrying about tomorrow. I can enjoy spending a day, a week, a month, a season ... without worrying if it will last a lifetime. By setting my sites on the future all the time, worrying about the future, obsessing about it.. I am missing what is right in front of me. The kiss, the comfort in the crook of his arm, the feel of his breath on my neck.. rather than, does he really love me... is he really working late tonight.... does he have two phones.... does he really mean it when he says that... I find it challenging to mitigate that .. but I finaly feel like I have the right phrase for me.. let go, without attachment to the outcome.
Last night, in my vision, I saw my wedding, I saw myself holding hands in the rocking chair, I saw the love of my life take is last breath, as my heart stopped... I saw them, clear as day... I was breathing the salty air, smelling the flowers, feeling the wind brush across my skin.. I was there.. it is going to happen, I saw it.. but... he did not have a face. This could be a way of my soul telling me to relax and let the process happen, enjoy the journey.. or this could be my souls way of telling me that I do not know him yet, he is not in my life yet or we are not on the same path yet... but it is coming.
As I sat here this evening waiting for my phone to ring, I realized this is the less I need today.. I do not like the way it feels when he doesn't call. That is real, that is today. It does not mean he doesnt care, it could mean, he really was working late, like he said.. my intuition tells me otherwise.. but.. then again, that could be paranoia, old demons creeping their way back into my thoughts. I do not like the way it feels.. I feel unimportant to him at that moment. Now, this does not mean I should accept bad behavior, when letting go.. what it does mean that I need some boundaries.. (another known issue of mine.) I need to tell him what my feelings are and what I need for them to resolve, come to some kind of agreement and then let it go. If he chooses to continue bad behavior (assuming that not calling is bad behavior, of course,) I have to stick to my boundaries. I will not make ultimatums, I just need to do what I say. It is not a threat, it is simply taking care of myself. I cannot be in a relationship like that.. Of course.. I have to be careful, is not calling really that bad, when he said he was super busy on a project at work.. or am I projecting negative experiences from my past into this relationship. That is where everything gets murky.. I know I do not like the way it feels.. rational or not. present feelings only or compounded by the past, I do not like it. I have a few choices here....
- Do nothing - this sounds like the best option at this point, early in the relationship, a distance relationship at that, while I am trying to figure out what my boundaries are, what they should be and whether or not these feelings are now or the past. The problem with this idea is that.. first of all, if my instinct is right, I will later beat myself up, knowing that at this moment, when something doesnt feel good, I brush it off as paranoia when later, it will be revealed to me that I was right all aloing.. This assumes it is intuition telling me something is off, rather than my insecure emotional self leading the parade. Hard for me to tell the difference at this point.
- Determine my boundaries and express them, I tried this the other day, I laid out my needs and expectations for the relationship. (though, I did not mention the calling part, lol) To be fair, there has not been enough time since that conversation to know if it was successful or not. Honestly, I fear talking about this irrational thought pattern may damage the relationship at this point.
- Learn from it - I am trying to do this, trying to learn to discern the difference between insecurity and ituition. As I write this... maybe they are one and the same at some point. For example, in a previous relationship, I was madly in love, I truly thought I had met my soulmate. To this day, I think he quite possibly was my soulmate.. but again as I think about it, maybe he was just my soulmate for that moment in my life. Is it possible that we have different soulmates at different times in our lives... I digress. Anyway, while I loved him so very much, something always felt off. I knew he loved me back, I could feel his energy. But, something still felt off. It turns out, he was married. I proceded to stay in this relationship for almost 4 years... he never left his wife while we were together. Looking back, that niggling feeling that something was off was my intuition. My heart took over and allowed me to ignore my intuition. I said I would never, ever ignore that feeling again... now, as I journey on a path with this new lover, I have a niggling feeling again.. something is off. Is this paranoia over repeating past mistakes or is it my intuition telling me something is off. Am I projecting.. when he has to work really late... is it because he is married and cannot get to his phone until she is asleep? What is this other number he called me from when his phone went out? Does he have two phones? One for his wife and one for me? How do I know what is intuition and what is paranoia? What is bad behavior that requires setting boundaries for myself in the relationship and what is projecting insecurities from a previous relationship?
I suppose I have more options.. Frankly, I am tired now and I still have no answers.. I just want them to come to me.. Hopefully all this spiritual work will help me determine what is real, what is projecting, what is intuition, what is paranoia...
One of the things I usually do when at some sort of impass.. when I am feeling incongruent is state the serenity prayer. (My kids call this withcraft, because when they are ticking me off, I sort of mumble it under my breath, really fast) Being that I am not religious, I have changed this prayer over time.. I call it my serenity affirmation, rather than prayer. I have changed the word GOD to higher power, than universe, and finally I just give myself what I need, I believe after all that my higher power is within myself.
I give myself serenity to accept the things I cannot change.
I give myself Courage to change the things I can.
I give myself the widsom to know the difference.
Another variation is
I have the serenity within me to accept the things I cannot change, the courage to change the things I can and the wisdwom to know the difference. -
I think this is the one I will end up with.. I am not giving my power over to someone or something else, but by giving it to myself, it means I do not already have it. Trying out the power of positive thinking, the secret and law of attraction, I now just say that I have the serenity, courage and wisdom.
I think I want that on a tattoo: Serenity, Courage, Wisdom with an eternity symbol perhaps.
My eyes are heavy.. my heart is heavy from ruminating over this.. writing about it has not given me any clarity, meditation brought me something different tonight.. So, for tonight, his late night text message will go unanswered.. not because I am passive aggressive, but because wanting to hear from the one you are currently sharing life with is not a bad thing, it should be a given. If you cannot think of me until 10:30 pm, I am sorry but I am no longer available, I am meditating, writing and healing myself. Maybe he really did work late (we did take two days off last week together and he may very well need to get caught up at work tonight). If that is the case, then the behavior will be better tomorrow, as today was a one time thing. If it does not get better.. frankly, I cannot worry myself with it.. I need to focus on my self actualization and worrying about what he is thinking or doing is not helpful to that cause. That is letting go... I would like to continue seeing him at this point, I have a lot of fun with him and we had a very spiritual experience together, very powerful..something like that experience is not easily forgotten... but, maybe it was just a moment. Perhaps his journey is different than mine.. it really cannot make a difference any more. If our time together is brief, it has been an amazing ride.. I need to focus on that. I already saw my vision, my wedding, my love dying in my arms as I take my last breath... I saw these things, they will happen.... if I spend to much time trying to manipulate my current situation into it.. I am only prolonging the experince I am waiting for.
Like the waves crashing on the rocky shore.. chipping away at the sand and rock to create what will be a beautuful coast line... Whatever this experience with him is here to teach me, I accept it for what it is and look forward to seeing where it takes me... because I know there is beauty and love and light ahead of me.. I no longer wish to keep repeating old patterns of negativity, neediness, compulsive desire... I wish to travel the road....These are just scenes in my journey, passing by like road signs.. they are in my consicous mind now, which is only a blip of eternity and they are gone, before I am approaching the next. I choose to watch as things pass by me, notice them, accept them and move on. Maybe I need to stop for fuel or to change a tire once in a while.. maybe I will need to change vehicles a few times on my journey.. bit if I focus on where the journey is taking me, what is at the end of the road... I am missing all the beautiful things it has put in front of me today.. Wow, lol that sounds deep, even to me...
Goodnight all you lovely bipolar, OCD, empaths.. we are beautiful and we have a gift, I honor my gift and I choose to enjoy the journey.. today.. tomorrow I may have to go throught the same thing, but eventually, if I keep telling myself how beautiful the road is, all the spectacular sites along the way.. when I open my eyes and my mind.. all will be beautiful.. I have seen it.. and now I know that I cannot get there.. I am already there... I just have to open my heart and my mind.. life is beautiful.
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