welcome to the new old real me.
I have so much to say about Anika's visit... but what's really on my mind right now is something inspired by her but not about her.
I have been growing less and less interested in LJing, even thinking of dumping it entirely, and didn't realize why. It was becoming another shell, another way of being 'perfect' -- too much about what other people would want to read and no longer about me being myself. Too much about methods and rituals -- organizing how I would post, how I would comment, and then hating the methods and so avoiding the whole thing entirely. I have a war within myself between my old, method-bound, organize-and-follow-directions self, and my true self, who prefers to live by instinct, following the callings within and ignoring the pressure from without. Sometimes I get confused as to which is the true self.
Being around Anika, my soul-twin, and seeing how she lives, moves, believes, reacts, taught me a lot about myself. We are both passionately honest, but neither of us is completely open. I'm not as open as I thought I was, and she's not as open as I thought she was. I had completely repressed my intense, overwhelming desire for a 'soulfriend' -- a relationship so much deeper than friendship as most people understand it -- to the point that I had forgotten about it. That means that I haven't even been truly open with myself for long while. I have been locking away my emotions because I haven't had a safe person to share them with -- my marriage has been rocky, and it only hurts more to share my feelings with someone who loves but does not understand. Anika is my soul-twin, she understands me so well. Even as insecure as I have felt this week, not wanting to burden her since she is already hurting, and not sure how much of me she wants to know, I have felt safe enough to open up several dusty locked trunks inside. In one of them I rediscovered my desire to know myself, despite the pain that inevitably comes along with that.
In another I found my desire to be my true self -- that messy, organic, magical, primitive, wild self. I'm not inherently a neat, thoughtful person. I can be, but it's not one of my stronger qualities. My true self is impulsive, mercurial, changeable, unpredictable -- with all the crap that comes along with that. I can make people feel left out or forgotten or overlooked, because I AM so impulsive. And I've been trying to be this person who is steady and dependable -- it's just not me! I am the kind of person who will walk over burning coals if I know that you need it, but I am not the type to watch everyone I love and figure out for them if they need me. I have to be told, usually. Which requires a sacrifice on the other person's part -- they have to be vulnerable enough to say, "I need you to __________." And it's okay for me to be the kind of person that I am. I will slowly grow better at discerning needs, but I will never be as good as people who are born with that gift. And that's okay -- but I didn't realize that until I looked at Anika and saw a person with many of the same gifts (and lacks!), and saw how incredibly perfect she is just as she is. We weren't meant to be steady and dependable and predictable -- we have other gifts.
What this means in LJ-land is that I am deleting the ton of posts in my "temp" bookmark folder, and I will comment as I feel the impulse. I will post when I feel the impulse, rather than carefully filling every box in my calendar with a post every day. This will probably mean that sometimes your friends-page will be spammed with my posts -- and I refuse to lj-cut text, because I like to read my journal without having to flip between pages. Selfish? Perhaps. But it is important to me and I am not willing to sacrifice it. I may also de-add some people whose journals I tend to skim, because with my lack of commenting I want to be able to promise people who are on my list that I read their every word. And I won't respond to every single comment in my journal, but only those that I feel the desire to (or that ask a question, of course).
I have been growing less and less interested in LJing, even thinking of dumping it entirely, and didn't realize why. It was becoming another shell, another way of being 'perfect' -- too much about what other people would want to read and no longer about me being myself. Too much about methods and rituals -- organizing how I would post, how I would comment, and then hating the methods and so avoiding the whole thing entirely. I have a war within myself between my old, method-bound, organize-and-follow-directions self, and my true self, who prefers to live by instinct, following the callings within and ignoring the pressure from without. Sometimes I get confused as to which is the true self.
Being around Anika, my soul-twin, and seeing how she lives, moves, believes, reacts, taught me a lot about myself. We are both passionately honest, but neither of us is completely open. I'm not as open as I thought I was, and she's not as open as I thought she was. I had completely repressed my intense, overwhelming desire for a 'soulfriend' -- a relationship so much deeper than friendship as most people understand it -- to the point that I had forgotten about it. That means that I haven't even been truly open with myself for long while. I have been locking away my emotions because I haven't had a safe person to share them with -- my marriage has been rocky, and it only hurts more to share my feelings with someone who loves but does not understand. Anika is my soul-twin, she understands me so well. Even as insecure as I have felt this week, not wanting to burden her since she is already hurting, and not sure how much of me she wants to know, I have felt safe enough to open up several dusty locked trunks inside. In one of them I rediscovered my desire to know myself, despite the pain that inevitably comes along with that.
In another I found my desire to be my true self -- that messy, organic, magical, primitive, wild self. I'm not inherently a neat, thoughtful person. I can be, but it's not one of my stronger qualities. My true self is impulsive, mercurial, changeable, unpredictable -- with all the crap that comes along with that. I can make people feel left out or forgotten or overlooked, because I AM so impulsive. And I've been trying to be this person who is steady and dependable -- it's just not me! I am the kind of person who will walk over burning coals if I know that you need it, but I am not the type to watch everyone I love and figure out for them if they need me. I have to be told, usually. Which requires a sacrifice on the other person's part -- they have to be vulnerable enough to say, "I need you to __________." And it's okay for me to be the kind of person that I am. I will slowly grow better at discerning needs, but I will never be as good as people who are born with that gift. And that's okay -- but I didn't realize that until I looked at Anika and saw a person with many of the same gifts (and lacks!), and saw how incredibly perfect she is just as she is. We weren't meant to be steady and dependable and predictable -- we have other gifts.
What this means in LJ-land is that I am deleting the ton of posts in my "temp" bookmark folder, and I will comment as I feel the impulse. I will post when I feel the impulse, rather than carefully filling every box in my calendar with a post every day. This will probably mean that sometimes your friends-page will be spammed with my posts -- and I refuse to lj-cut text, because I like to read my journal without having to flip between pages. Selfish? Perhaps. But it is important to me and I am not willing to sacrifice it. I may also de-add some people whose journals I tend to skim, because with my lack of commenting I want to be able to promise people who are on my list that I read their every word. And I won't respond to every single comment in my journal, but only those that I feel the desire to (or that ask a question, of course).