The present

In my last post on this blog, written in May of this year, I was talking about waiting for the next phase of my degree, my practicum. I spoke of it as a destination and of the plaintive cry of someone on a journey asking if we were there yet. 

But as it turned out, the practicum was not a destination, but only the beginning of another journey - one that took a sudden turn I wasn't (but should have been) expecting: basically, my practicum supervisor fired me. The sense of failure was very real, and I began to question everything about the last ten years of my life: my recovery from codependency, my personal growth, my relationships with my extended family members, my desire to become a therapist, my self-image as a kind and compassionate person, and my suitability for a helping profession. It was quite wrenching - traumatic - overwhelming.

In addition, the shock of that experience tipped me over the edge emotionally and after the initial days and days of crying, it's like the water that overflowed the dam just froze in place. Nothing penetrated. Nothing affected me. I could not feel sad, or happy, or angry, or worried. Sleep was fitful and gave me no real rest; motivation went out the window. I started to isolate myself from things, lost interest in the things I loved to do (music, word games, etc.) and just buried myself in escapist behaviors: binge-watching shows I had seen so many times I could recite the dialogue, mostly.

So I sought professional help. I asked my doctor about it and he put me on an antidepressant and referred me to a psychologist. I have my first appointment with her next month. And although I didn't want to do it, I forced myself to do certain things for myself: read something inspirational every day, brush my teeth every day, eat regular meals, and find something to do that got me out of the house once in a while. 

Photo by Tirachard Kumtanom from Pexels

And - of late - I have been pondering the idea of staying in the moment, and not thinking about the past or the future. Like yesterday morning. I had eaten my breakfast and was finishing my coffee when I saw a box of Turtles (TM) on the table. I decided that I would like to eat one. Just one. Slowly. And as I bit into it, there was a part of me that said, "Hey. You'll be late for work. This is ridiculous. You're wasting time here. You have to get your makeup on and pack up your stuff to go." And from somewhere inside of me came another voice, one that said, "No. Just enjoy this moment. This is self-care. Taste the taste, really focus on it." And I did. When I was done, that part of me said, "Now, see? THAT is being in the moment. Nothing more simple than that." And I realized that I had rushed through so much of my life trying to get to the destination or the next big thing, and missed out so much on the "in-between" stuff of everyday life: the journey of thousands of moments.

It is a new learning experience for me, this 'savoring the moment' notion. It is this moment right now that I have: the now. Who was it that said, "Yesterday is history; tomorrow is a mystery. Today is a gift - that is why it is called the present"? 

In that same vein, I received another unexpected present this morning, before we even opened our gifts. Our little family was having breakfast together, talking about a movie we had watched together recently, "The Greatest Showman" (which I highly recommend, by the way!), and we were saying how all the little threads of P.T. Barnum's life, which seemed so random and unrelated to each other, the glad and the sad and the mad, weaved themselves together in his life to show him his purpose and help him fulfill his dream. And that's when it hit me. All of those things in my life - glad, sad, and mad - also had purpose and were being woven together in me in the present. 

That was the gift I had been given, and even though it was not yet complete, I caught a glimpse - a freeze-frame, if you will - of becoming who I am meant to be.  In the moment, in the now, in the present, weaving the past threads together, the dark and the bright and the gray and the colored threads that seem so purposeless by themselves seemed, for one brief moment, to coalesce. 

And in that moment, I felt something. For the first time in weeks, I felt something! An emotion, a state of being, a ... whatever you want to call it. The closest I can come to describing it is by calling it hope. But it was not the wishing-for kind of hope. It was more an assurance that I am where I am supposed to be, even if it is hard. That right now is a gift: the Present. That it is okay to be where I am. And my throat tightened, and my nose stung, and tears welled up and spilled over onto my face. 

And I lifted my face upward and whispered, "Thank You." 

Let Go - Let God

It hangs in just about every recovery room I have been in. Along with several other slogans, like "First Things First" and "Honesty" and "Humility" .... there it sits.

"LET GO - LET GOD." 

I used to think I knew what that meant. I guess, to a certain degree, I did (and do). However, the further I get into recovery from control-freaking and doormat-itis, the more I am convinced that I don't know what it is, because it appears I have to keep learning it. 

"Anchor and Navigation" courtesy of njaj at
www.freedigitalphotos.net

Or maybe it's just something that comes with practice. If so, I get to practice it. A LOT. 

Especially since getting into recovery nearly 4 years ago now. Stuff happens, and I'm allowed to feel what I feel - that part I'm getting, so it's not such a stretch for me anymore (even if it is pretty tumultuous at times!)  It's the "letting go" part that's never easy ... and the "letting God" part seems just as hard now as it was the first time!! 

However, the depth of experience I have been getting in that area convinces me that this letting go and letting God is the only way to navigate the storms of life, to ride them out, maybe even to be a little happier. I'm learning to own my own stuff and let others own theirs. That's sometimes really hard to do, especially when the current attitude and expectation of our society toward certain types of relationships (such as the parent-child one) tends to front-end-load them with a feeling of responsibility for the way someone else thinks or feels. 

It's an illusion. How someone else reacts to their stuff is not my responsibility. The outcome I want in his or her life is not my responsibility. It's the responsibility of the person with whom I am in relationship. If I hang on - even a little bit - I will end up pushing the person away from the very thing I so desperately want him or her to embrace. 

I know this - deep down. 

I guess I just need more practice.

Serenity to Accept

It's humbling to admit that you've lived most of your life in a state of denial. That's where I have lived most of my life. 

Mostly I've denied my own powerlessness to change one or more things about people - either myself or the people I love. I liked to think that I could manipulate a situation ... or a person ... even resorting to intimidation at times, so they would be funneled into a course of action that would benefit me. 

I was wrong. Yet it took me nearly five decades to realize it. 

My manipulation took the form of emotional blackmail, usually. It is something that I still struggle with, on occasion. I'd treat the behavior of someone else as an attack on me personally so as to make that person feel guilty and therefore do what I wanted. They'd do what I wanted, all right, and resent me for it. Or, I'd overreact to a decision someone else had a right to make, and refuse to participate in it, ruining their enjoyment of it. 

Occasionally, I'd even lose my temper and make people afraid to cross me in certain areas - ruling and controlling by making them feel threatened, unsafe.

It's not something I'm proud of. But it happened. Frequently. 

About two months into a healing process that for me took a total of a year, I was introduced to the concept of acceptance - an acceptance that is based on my total inability to change any person, any outcome, any situation - acceptance of what is and that which cannot be changed. It involved learning to let go of my need to control something - ANYTHING - about someone or something. 

Within weeks of that mental attitude shift, my loved ones - those closest to me - noticed, in a way bordering on astonishment. "What's with Mom? why isn't she freaking out?" I heard whispered behind me. And I'd smile to myself. Of course it wasn't easy to let go, to NOT "freak out" - but the dividends paid off every time, and the positive response was incentive to keep at it. I got to like the way my relationships strengthened when I let people be who they were without fear of my disapproval or my other equally unpleasant responses to their beliefs, choices, and words. 

In fact, the more I practiced the skill of letting go, the more I realized how many things there were over which I had no control, much as I would have liked. Even things I had always thought I could influence - and sometimes I could - I discovered that I had no right to touch. 

Having grown up in a dysfunctional home, I never knew that anyone had a right to have boundaries. Nothing was ever private; nothing was beyond the scrutiny and judgment of others who wielded power (real or imagined) over me and my brothers. Everything was everybody else's business. The only boundary there was pertained to the shroud of secrecy that covered anything that happened inside the four walls of the homestead. Everything else, though, was fair game. Every word, action, thought was subject to being evaluated, praised or condemned after it passed through the parental filter.... and by parental I mean that every adult in the whole family (and extended family: aunts, uncles, grandparents) felt he or she had the right to pass judgment on the appearance, words, and beliefs of everyone else, especially every child.  The children, on the other hand, had no right to do the same to the parents. Infractions of this code were met with swift and severe punishment.

Nobody ever questioned this fact of life. The attitude was that as soon as we grew up and had families of our own, we would have the same right they exercised on a daily basis, with our own children. 

When I began to heal from that toxic atmosphere, which unfortunately carried into adulthood, I realized more and more that this assumption of the right to pass judgment on others was not just dysfunctional, it was downright sick and wrong. I familiarized myself intimately with the notion that everyone has boundaries, and that these boundaries need to be respected - including mine. That knowledge helped me figure out what, who and where I needed to let go, to accept not only who and what I couldn't change but who and what I had no right to change even if I could. 

And even then, I had (and have) no power in myself to accept those things and people that I need to accept. That power comes from above - from the peace of my continued relationship with God. Knowing and resting on the fact that God looks after me, that He is calmly and lovingly in control of all things - including me, including those I love, including every circumstance - gives me the strength and the serenity to accept what I cannot change.

This is not a fatalistic acceptance either. It is an active choice to allow people to be who they are, to let them make their own decisions and to let them live with the consequences of their own actions, no matter how much I am tempted to make it easier for them. It is a decision to not rail against circumstances, to not take them personally, to realize that everyone has "stuff" and that it's okay to feel what I feel about it, experience it and then let it go. 

The lifestyle I'm learning is like being handed a new key ring that unlock doors previously closed to me, opening pathways I never dreamed possible. Acceptance was the first key I learned how to use - and I have used it every day since. I have discovered, over time, that it is the first key to something that eluded me before, but which I have been able to experience more and more: happiness.