[40Days] #N+3? 4?: No rest for the brainful
I was going to give myself a day off from hard-processing - there's some stuff on the schedule for tonight that has been there for a month that I am loathe to skip, but the circumstances are becoming extremely difficult to manage under the best of conditions, and this week has been anything *BUT* the best of... well, anything. I was going to go back to the 40Days meme of answering questions, but half of the remaining questions are so very relevant to the work I'm doing that there is no safety there, but a lot of jetsam still swirling about in the mental eddies.
For the sake of brevity of layout at least, I won't try to tackle them all at once.
The questions of "When did I not speak up but should have" and "In what way am I my own worst enemy" are inextricably linked, and not just in the heat of the current chaos.
I *don't* speak up, and because I don't, I become my own worst enemy.
Yesterday I wrote about fear triggers, and how little it takes for me to see the worst in any situation, which leads to a pre-emptive, self-protective shut-down agains the external factors I become convinced are arrayed against me.
Unfortunately, in the absence of confirmed data about those factors - you know, the kinds of data that come from direct engagement and conversation, fact-finding missions and clarification-seekings - I pull shit out of thin air to feed the internal confirmation biases, and use that to construct the house of cards that in turn neatly *justifies* my disengagement and rising anger.
Because, y'know, anger is so much easier to cope with than fear, yadda yadda yadda. *sigh*
The pattern of not speaking up is huge in my life. Dependency was a big part of that early on (financially, emotionally, whatever), which is a big part of the underpinning fear during the dependency issues in grad school. The pattern of not speaking up for myself or what I want then later leads to disappointment and ineffective thrashing in a pattern that Matthew describes as "Moving towards what we want whether we consciously realize that's what we're doing or not". I really haven't been a nice person during these particular times in my life, and a big part of the reason is that there's an inherent duality in the mind to exist in that state that pushes everything into chaos.
Neil manipulated it (and I let him). Brock hated it, though I think he hated my attempts to grow out of the pattern even more (because it rendered me less dependent, and he really needed to feel needed). J was better at picking up on it, but was horrible at managing to navigate through it with me. With Matthew things have changed a great deal in that there's less of the duality a lot of the time, but the big fears still create a faulty double-blind system in which even I will stop looking at the things that I know are bothering me until it's too late and the thrashing has begun in earnest.
You know, if I'd just studied the map first, I would have known there was a swamp here and might have avoided stepping in the sinkhole. The thrashing just makes everyone drown faster.
This pattern also constitutes probably the single most devastating mistake I keep repeating. When I *don't* speak up, Bad Things Happen. When I *don't* ask the questions I need or want to have answered, Bad Things Happen. When I *don't* put myself and my own emotional state or needs into the equation, Bad Things Happen. When I *don't* stay open and encourage my partner to be vulnerable with me and share things I need to know, Bad Things Happen.
When I don't engage... Bad Things Happen. It really is that fucking simple. (And yet... )
I used to joke that my life could make a great Object Lesson in "What Not To Do" in relationship communications, and then I let pride get in the way of thinking I could handle just about anything that came along (because Look! At! Us! We're! So! Clueful!). Why yes, I sometimes forget and buy into the hype as well... the "wanting it to be true" is a powerful lure when the real truth of the matter is the fact that I'm sitting on the trunk of an elephant.
I blog because I want people to NOT make the same mistakes I do. (I also want the love and validation and adoration that comes with performing for an audience, but only on some days. Like every day ending in "-y".) I also blog because it's an excellent safely-contained exercise in experimental vulnerability. Given the issues I have in speaking up or speaking out in a literal sense, writing has been a way to "be the change I want to see in the world", and if there's a lesson to be taken away from that, it's that vulnerability is the only way we grow.
We have to take down the walls that stunt the organic processes; personal development can still be trained and encouraged in particular directions thereafter, but we are our own worst constraints. Airing my successes and failures in such a relatively public manner is a way of shining a light on both the good and the bad of those change processes (or lack of, as the current case may be).
I say "we"... of course, I mean "me". The biggest lesson people could learn from my life is that in the end, we have to be accountable to ourselves. Failure to account for our choices and actions is disempowering. Failure to be accountable for our own responsibilities in life cheats us of some really good opportunities for meaningful connection. It's not a one-time-only lesson, either, but one life keeps throwing at us until we finally get our shit together and move on to some *other* lesson.
I have been nothing if not an excellent examplary lesson in how the circular nature of all things loves to keep coming back until we get it right.
http://www.marcandangel.com/2012/04/13/40-questions-everyone-is-afraid-to-ask/
For the sake of brevity of layout at least, I won't try to tackle them all at once.
The questions of "When did I not speak up but should have" and "In what way am I my own worst enemy" are inextricably linked, and not just in the heat of the current chaos.
I *don't* speak up, and because I don't, I become my own worst enemy.
Yesterday I wrote about fear triggers, and how little it takes for me to see the worst in any situation, which leads to a pre-emptive, self-protective shut-down agains the external factors I become convinced are arrayed against me.
Unfortunately, in the absence of confirmed data about those factors - you know, the kinds of data that come from direct engagement and conversation, fact-finding missions and clarification-seekings - I pull shit out of thin air to feed the internal confirmation biases, and use that to construct the house of cards that in turn neatly *justifies* my disengagement and rising anger.
Because, y'know, anger is so much easier to cope with than fear, yadda yadda yadda. *sigh*
The pattern of not speaking up is huge in my life. Dependency was a big part of that early on (financially, emotionally, whatever), which is a big part of the underpinning fear during the dependency issues in grad school. The pattern of not speaking up for myself or what I want then later leads to disappointment and ineffective thrashing in a pattern that Matthew describes as "Moving towards what we want whether we consciously realize that's what we're doing or not". I really haven't been a nice person during these particular times in my life, and a big part of the reason is that there's an inherent duality in the mind to exist in that state that pushes everything into chaos.
Neil manipulated it (and I let him). Brock hated it, though I think he hated my attempts to grow out of the pattern even more (because it rendered me less dependent, and he really needed to feel needed). J was better at picking up on it, but was horrible at managing to navigate through it with me. With Matthew things have changed a great deal in that there's less of the duality a lot of the time, but the big fears still create a faulty double-blind system in which even I will stop looking at the things that I know are bothering me until it's too late and the thrashing has begun in earnest.
You know, if I'd just studied the map first, I would have known there was a swamp here and might have avoided stepping in the sinkhole. The thrashing just makes everyone drown faster.
This pattern also constitutes probably the single most devastating mistake I keep repeating. When I *don't* speak up, Bad Things Happen. When I *don't* ask the questions I need or want to have answered, Bad Things Happen. When I *don't* put myself and my own emotional state or needs into the equation, Bad Things Happen. When I *don't* stay open and encourage my partner to be vulnerable with me and share things I need to know, Bad Things Happen.
When I don't engage... Bad Things Happen. It really is that fucking simple. (And yet... )
I used to joke that my life could make a great Object Lesson in "What Not To Do" in relationship communications, and then I let pride get in the way of thinking I could handle just about anything that came along (because Look! At! Us! We're! So! Clueful!). Why yes, I sometimes forget and buy into the hype as well... the "wanting it to be true" is a powerful lure when the real truth of the matter is the fact that I'm sitting on the trunk of an elephant.
I blog because I want people to NOT make the same mistakes I do. (I also want the love and validation and adoration that comes with performing for an audience, but only on some days. Like every day ending in "-y".) I also blog because it's an excellent safely-contained exercise in experimental vulnerability. Given the issues I have in speaking up or speaking out in a literal sense, writing has been a way to "be the change I want to see in the world", and if there's a lesson to be taken away from that, it's that vulnerability is the only way we grow.
We have to take down the walls that stunt the organic processes; personal development can still be trained and encouraged in particular directions thereafter, but we are our own worst constraints. Airing my successes and failures in such a relatively public manner is a way of shining a light on both the good and the bad of those change processes (or lack of, as the current case may be).
I say "we"... of course, I mean "me". The biggest lesson people could learn from my life is that in the end, we have to be accountable to ourselves. Failure to account for our choices and actions is disempowering. Failure to be accountable for our own responsibilities in life cheats us of some really good opportunities for meaningful connection. It's not a one-time-only lesson, either, but one life keeps throwing at us until we finally get our shit together and move on to some *other* lesson.
I have been nothing if not an excellent examplary lesson in how the circular nature of all things loves to keep coming back until we get it right.
http://www.marcandangel.com/2012/04/13/40-questions-everyone-is-afraid-to-ask/