Category Archives: acknowledgment

Some Personal Thoughts on Surrender and Non-Judgment

Posted on by learning to live like water

Making choices and decisions that are consistent with who we are striving to be is not always easy. Setting those boundaries is not so hard. Holding them can be hard. Not sliding into past behaviors can be hard. Not looking backward can be hard.

It’s important though, that we don’t beat ourselves up for any of it. Just acknowledging it is good, beause it makes you aware of your behavior and the nature of it, and where it comes from. I know for me, hypervigilance is something that I backslide into easily. I didn’t really realize or comprehend that I still do it, until I moved to Florida and my life left that hectic pace of full-time work and keeping a house and family. Now I am able to reflect on my actions more, and in a more relaxed atmosphere. Someone said to me the other day that hypervigilance is very defensive. I never thought of it like that, but I guess that is true. It’s like pre-emptive defense. Trying to figure out what’s going to happen so you don’t find yourself blindsided and face down in the dirt. I think anyone who has been in and gotten out of an abusive relationship probably suffers from hypervigilance. And a good bit of PTSD.

One reason I like the Veterans Art Center so much is that instead of drugging people, and telling them to “get over it”, they encourage vets to look at their experiences and create from them. Some of the art can be scary, as they exorcise the demons in their heads. With some artists, you can see the progression from the dark, battle images, to beauty as they are able to let go of some of the bad memories by putting them on the canvas.

That’s what writing did for me. Whether it was journaling, or blogging, or writing poetry, I’ve been able to put it on the page, and let go of the anger and fear and pain. Not saying I’m done yet, but compared to the early days when I left my marriage, and didn’t have a clue who I was. My son provided the motivation, to make a huge change, but how that was going to happen I hadn’t a clue. I basically had to surrender it to the universe.

Now, when faced with a dilemma I can’t solve, and when I recognize that I’m trying to control the outcome, I am much more able (though not all the time) to take a deep breath and allow things to unfold as they will, and accept them as they are. I guess I should add that trying to be non-judgmental is a huge part of healing. Non-judgmental of those who hurt me, and non-judgmental of myself, which is even harder. It has helped me to believe that most people are doing the best they can, from the state of their consciousness at the time. Looking backward without pain and anger can be hard, but when you can take that step across the threshold into creating a better future, it gets easier.

Which, getting back to the beginning of this post, surrender and non-judgement are really part and parcel of becoming the person I aspire to be. It’s a work in progress, for sure.

A lot of stuff rolling around my somewhat hung-over (from my writers group meeting yesterday) mind this morning. Not meaning to preach, lol, just working things out for myself.

Love and light…..

Recognition, Remorse, Repair = Resolution

Posted on by learning to live like water

I woke up at 1 AM last night, on the nose. And as so often happens, my mind tried to resolve unresolved issues. Like my ex, who I will have to deal with until he signs the quitclaim he has to sign. The thing is, with him, that I’m sickest of, is him trying to use me to manipulate my son into talking with him. I don’t do it, won’t do it, but I’m so tired of him going around and around in long, ridiculous circular conversations about it. I’ve said I was going to block him, when this last legal thing is done. I hope I can follow through on that.

The reason I say “hope” is because I don’t know if I have the heart to cut him off from his only access to even know how his son’s doing. However…..his actions have been, and probably always will be, about control. My problem is that I know his need to control things come from the shame he feels that he’s not worthy of unconditional love. He was brought up in a household where love was earned, and could be taken away, and often was, on top of being extremely abusive both physically and verbally. This was an upper middle-class family, he grew up in material wealth, and was taught that it was what was important. To understand that, is to feel sorry for him, because it so messed up his own life.

However, he was so abusive to both my son and I, I have to eliminate him from our lives. Just have to. My son has, for all intents and purposes. And I will too. My idea in the middle of the night was that I would send him a letter, so that he couldn’t talk over me, or pretend he didn’t hear me. And tell him that he is cut out of my life because of he has never acknowledged, owned, or apologized for what he did to us. I will list some of the things he did, so he has to look at them.  He apparently does not know that I know he physically abused my son as well as emotionally and verbally abused him. My son told me, when he came to live with me. I will tell him that I know. Then I will tell him that until he is able to accept responsibility for what he did, he needs to stay away from me. And I will suggest, that until he can do it for his son, he won’t be welcome in his life either.

This way, I can eliminate him but also give him a path back. I cannot deal with his absolute insanity. His re-writing of history. His tales he weaves to manipulate and draw me back in. The lies. So many lies. I am grateful my son has been able to just eliminate him, because he knows that’s all his dad will try to do to him. I’ve kept that door open out of compassion for my ex, but I think I need to put it in proper perspective, and hold him responsible for his behavior in a much stronger way.

I’m going to prepare the letter to him, and send it as soon as the sale of my slip is completed. I just have to do something to keep the dogs from barking on my phone (his ringer is dogs barking), blind-siding me, filling me with dread, triggering PTSD from all the years of abuse I suffered from him. I need to take my power back, and put the truth out on the table with him, again. It’s not the first time I’ve done it, but with the passage of time, he seems to think that the slate is wiped clean. I want to make it clear that until he can recognize, feel remorse, and attempt to repair the damage he did to our lives, and even moreso to his own, that the slate will remain engraved.

Once I figured out what I would do, I almost got up and wrote him the letter. Then, decided it didn’t need doing at that moment, and that I needed sleep more immediately, since a friend is coming over this morning, and because I have open mic night tonight, and I have to get to Walmart today too. I have probably a week until this sale is completed. Instead of getting up, I relaxed and fell back to sleep.

Resolution to issues is always a good thing. You can’t always get it with the other person, as in this case. But you can get it with yourself, and decide on a pathway that will give you peace of mind. You can eliminate toxic people from your life. It seems I’ve been doing a lot of that lately. All of them have a way back if they want to take it. Recognition, remorse, and repair. Real change. And if they don’t want to take it….well, love and light to them. I hope they are able to find peace with themselves and their actions but they are not welcome in my life, until they can do those three things. Recognition of what they did, real remorse for what they did, the kind of remorse that causes real change in behavior, and then, repair of the damage.

Resolution is a good thing. Love and light everyone.

Golden Idol

Posted on by learning to live like water

golden idol

Mindfuck
is so hard to deal with.
Senseless stories
Told in earnest
To no reasonable end
For no reasonable purpose
Except to mindfuck.

Hanging onto the past
When it’s dead and gone.
Over….
I’m not your wife
Anymore.

Unable to give up control
Even for your son.
It’s incomprehensible to me.

Bend down on the floor.
Cry, let the tears fill the room.
Reach for the golden cow
That led you into ruin.
Hold it close,
Imagine it is all you lost.
Blame the idol
Or me
Or God
For it all.

Soaked with your own salty tears
On the floor of your prison
Alone
No one there but you
And your cold golden idol.

Does it bring you comfort?

 

By Deborah E. Dayen

Image from Propmonicon, via Google Images.

Sculptor Christian Hartmann

3 AM Observations

Posted on by learning to live like water

After not being able to write much while my friends were here, last night I couldn’t stop. I wrote the blog, Manatees and Men, and then two poems. In between the poems, I wrote another whole post as I tried to figure out what it is that holds me back with Tim.

I realized that the whole day together we did not really laugh. And laughter is such an aphrodisiac, I so miss hanging out with someone who makes me laugh hysterically all the time. It actually has overridden the fact that I was betrayed on a grand scale, so many times. I think that’s why I kept talking to him periodically over the last year, because I wanted to laugh, and feel sexy at the same time.

I went to sleep easily last night, and didn’t wake up until about 3 AM. I knew yesterday was the anniversary of the night my mother died last year. And that also marks the beginning of Scott’s re-entry into my life. I pieced it all together like a movie in my head for a couple of hours last night, just observing all the emotion I felt then. Because I wanted to understand what the incredible attraction to him was, when he was able to so betray me, and lie to me and to Betty so easily. Why did I still feel affection for him, so many times, and let him back in? The answer to that would be the answer to why I could not feel a connection to the other nice men I’ve dated.

Scott and I had been talking the whole week before my mom died, every day, many times more than once a day. because Betty had just found out about me and this blog a week before, and was never going to talk to him again. He and I had fallen into our old routine, of talking, texting, picking up where we left off before Betty’s re-entry into his life. When my mother died, I called him.. It was late at night, I’d just hung up the phone with him and knew he was up. He offered to come just be with me the next day, so I wouldn’t have to be alone, and I was so bereft, and so grateful that he would do that. He came, and we swiftly fell into bed and a relationship again. For 3 weeks, til Betty found out, got jealous, and wanted him back. I’d known that would probably happen, that at some point she’d want him back, I understood the pattern. But I didn’t expect the attacks from him, designed to convince her that it meant nothing to allay her jealousy, when of course I knew better. Later on he confirmed what I knew, and I thanked him for that, because I’d taken so much shit about our relationship from him, and then from Betty, who in her jealousy, felt she needed to weigh in on my relationship with him. And then his cryptic messages….oh it went on. We stopped talking at all for 3 months. It’s all here in the blog over the last year.

But the point is, no matter if I was crying, or if I was furious with him, or loving him, he made me laugh. I mean, wonderful belly laughs. I once cursed him for making me cry, and then making me laugh while tears were running down my cheeks. When we broke up, he used to say the thing he missed most was hearing me laugh.

I won’t go there again with him. I am just too tired of the games that get played, of the insecurity of caring for someone I could never trust. The last time we talked, I just looked at my phone and exhaled “I am SO sick of this game.” That was the end, and I won’t start again.

But neither will I settle for someone who can’t make me laugh.

I don’t want to hurt Tim. He is a nice guy, really nice. Kind, loving, sweet. But he doesn’t make me laugh. He makes me smile, but that’s not the same. And, I think it’s too soon for him after his wife’s death. He doesn’t think so, but he has said that he really needs a woman in his life. I don’t need a man, I really don’t NEED one. I am quite happy to be alone most of the time. But I want one, I love men. I think I should call it quits with him before I end up hurting him, because I don’t see me ever feeling very amorous with him, and I know he’s heading there now. He said he has his own life that he loves, and he does, but he’s got a hole to fill. He says he NEEDS a woman. I don’t think I will ever want the job of filling a hole left by the death of their spouse.

I’m just going to keep on looking. And, to keep on loving the life I’m creating here. As I get more involved in community projects, maybe I’ll meet someone in real life, who can make me laugh hysterically. I can only hope.

But I’m going to stop obsessing over it. I know better what I want now. But I’m also very grateful for the life I’ve created, and live. It’s seriously joyful most of the time.

It’s nice to have the house to myself again this morning. I haven’t done my meditation since before the girls came for 3 days, because I need quiet, no distractions and none of them are meditators. It’s something I need to do, to keep myself centered.

I think I’ll go do that now. Love and light, all.

Not Foolish, nor Destined to Repeat the Past :-)

Posted on by learning to live like water

The sun was almost up when I awoke this morning. Daybreak had broken, the eastern sky was alight. I slept the sleep of the dead last night. I didn’t go anywhere, both of my friends who were going to go to the artwalk with me were sick. One with a cold, the other with a migraine. As it turned out I fell asleep on my couch from 5 to 6, and then stayed up late because I wasn’t tired.

I was in quite a mood last night, and yesterday, with those poems I wrote, Foolishness and Destined. Today my waking mind was in a far more indifferent place. It is always therapeutic lean in to that discomfort when it shows up, to write those feelings out, and send them out to the universe.

This morning I’m out on my deck, sipping my coffee under the canopy of the banyan tree in my nightgown, feeling quite content. I am still seeking a love that can last, but have no regrets over the past, nor really any attachment to it. Just moving forward, and expect what will come will come when it’s supposed to, if it’s supposed to. In the meantime I have friends and family here that I love and who love me, and a wonderful life. There is no reason to feel bitterness or angst.

And who knows? I had a short text with C last night. He’s always up, it seems. In a good place. It’s a refreshing change for me. I hope I hear from him again soon.

I always say that the people I loved I will always love. But really, some of those people are out of my life for a reason, and the reason is that they were in it to teach me, part of the lesson my soul needed to learn. They’ve taught me and we’ve both moved on to our own next lessons. Today, I am grateful for the lessons, and for the fact that I have such a wonderful starting point for my next adventure. Love always? Yes, I suppose so. But maybe not desire, not hope that things will be different. Oprah defined forgiveness as giving up hope that the past will ever change. I think that’s where I am. Glean from it what we can, and go on.

Like my horoscope said, I am an Aries and I like to move forward. I can backslide like anyone else, but not for long. I don’t like that place. I hate covering the same real estate twice. A relationship that takes me over and over the same ground without ever moving forward is not compatible with me.

Feeling so much more myself today. I’m going to go down to the water, take a long walk. Go to the grocery store and get the stuff I need for Christmas food. I’m making baked stuffed shrimp for Christmas Eve at my sisters. And for Christmas night, my traditional raspberry angel food cake with Raspberry Amaretto Sauce. And whatever my sister and I decide we want for Christmas Day. We’re invited to a friends in her neigborhood for Christmas night, which will be fun. It will remind me how I always went to my bff’s in CT on Christmas night. I was often the only non-blood family there, but that huge family always treated me like one of their own.

I have been really blessed, haven’t I?

Love and light, all.

4 AM Introspection

Posted on by learning to live like water

Awake at 4 Am, out of bed at 5. Not really a whole lot on my mind, except reflection of where I’ve been, and where I’m headed.

I thought a lot about the two men I’ve loved, my ex and S. I clearly saw how I fell in love with them, and why and how both relationships turned out to be so unhealthy for me. I thought about the article on Metta Buddhism, about how you can’t, just can’t, care for anothers happiness at the expense of your own. Any more than you should care for your own happiness at the expense of someone else.

So many of us were brought up to be pleasers, wanting to make everyone happy. Which is ok, as long as you include yourself in that equation. But when a relationship is making someone else happy,or even just filling a need of the other person, but bringing you a lot of discomfort….it’s time to let it go. I stayed in my marriage WAY too long, in the end it brought me only discomfort.  In trying to be the woman he wanted me to be, I lost myself.  It took me years to remember who I was.  Even now, that’s all that talking to him does, so thankfully, I don’t do it often. And S….yeah, I should have let that relationship go long before I knew the truth. It started bringing discomfort to me within the first year, even before his ex came back into the picture and he began the grand betrayal of both of us.  It was always a push-pull game, and I’m really not much of a player. I don’t understand the rules. Nor do I want to.  Again, I filled some egoic need of his, but he was careful not to allow himself to give too much to me.

Both relationships were a matter of me thinking that I could please them enough eventually, and they’d love me the way I loved them. In retrospect, with time and distance, I don’t think either man is capable of that kind of love, mostly because neither one of them loves themselves.

It was just an observation this morning. I could be wrong, but I don’t think so.

I get “Notes from the Universe” in my email every day Monday through Friday. (www.tut.com) They are written by Mike Dooley, who some of you might recognize from his work with the Law of Attraction. Everyone gets the same note. This was today’s note, which seemed to speak to the observations I was making in the dark, under my comforter.

“Just do it, Debbie.

Everything you need to know, you know, and everything you need to have, you have. Everything!

Time and Space is a primitive school. There are bigger challenges “out there,” bigger adventures, and lots more friends, but you gotta do what you gotta do, here and now. You gotta live the truths you’ve discovered, apply the principles, and never again think, “Why isn’t it working?” “It’s hard,” “I don’t know,” because such thoughts are like hitting the replay button for whatever you’ve just been through.

Look ahead with your dreams in mind and give thanks, because you know exactly what to do.

Tallyho,
The Universe”

I read this, thinking, I know this. I KNOW this. So…gonna try to do this more now. Not forgetting the lessons of the past, but incorporating them into my vision of the future. I hate covering the same ground twice, so I need to stop putting myself in a position where I’m doing that, going forward.

I guess some needed introspection was why I woke up at 4 AM, clear-headed and rested. I guess I needed to put this stuff in it’s place in my psyche

Love and light to everyone.


Saturday

Posted on by learning to live like water

PHEW. I made it through the day….

No, S did not show up here unannounced, just thought I’d clarify that at the beginning, lol. In fact, tonight I have my doubts that he even reads this blog any longer. The gongs, the gongs always set me straight. I don’t know anything for a fact, and I, at least for tonight, don’t give a shit.

After I stopped writing like an obsessed madwoman this morning, I did a couple things around the house, and then headed out to paint the deck. It was about 11. It was about 90°. I painted for an hour. Beads of sweat pouring into my eyes. The deck is on the backside of my house, southern exposure, no protection from the sun. I got a huge glass of water, and sat at the table on the deck, with the umbrella opened up, and drank it. I could feel my heart just pounding.

I went inside, where I had the air conditioning on, reluctantly, because it’s so expensive to run, but it was a lovely 75° in there. I sat down, I could still feel my heart pounding, so I checked my heartrate on that app that’s on the phone. It was 91. Seemed a little high, but I’d been working and only stopped for about 10 minutes. I checked it a couple more times, it was still high. It was slightly worrisome to me, because when I went to the dr yesterday my blood pressure was pretty high for me. Normally, my bp is low.

Anyway, I decided that it would be too hot to paint until the sun went to the other side of the house, around 3. So I showered, and then checked my heartrate again, and it was still 91. Then I decided to do a nice long meditation. Still 91. I went to the store.

At the store I ran into my old next door neighbor and talked for about a half hour in front of the paper towels. I don’t know how the women in this town would keep up with each other if we didn’t have the grocery store! LOL.

Anyway, when I got home I felt relaxed. Checked it again, it was down to 78. Finally. It’s normally 72 when I’m at rest.

So by then it was 3:30, time to start painting again. Which I did, .in the shade now. I got the railings all painted by 6 pm. That was enough for today!.

When I came in I was starving, so made myself nice dinner. A kale salad from my mini-garden on the deck, with strawberries and goat cheese. A bratwurst and a piece of quiche. It was really the only meal I had all day. It really tasted good. I had washed my hands for about 20 minutes to get all the paint off, but as I was eating I realized how much paint I had on my arms and legs, lol. Back to the shower after dinner.

Then I went to my spare bedroom, to get a summer nightgown because I haven’t switched my clothes around. Last week I was still in fleece jammies, and this week summer nightgowns. I had closed the door to the spare bedroom, to keep from having to air condition it. So I go to open the door and it was locked!!!! Yikes!!! I had no idea how to unlock it. Who the hell would have locked it? One of the people looking at the house? Maybe my friend locked it last weekend when she stayed in that room.

Anyway there was a little tiny hole in the doorknob. I went and got a nail, thank God I had one, and stuck it in the hole, and eventually managed to get it unlocked.

Enough for today, lol. I sat down here and started writing, and watching my favorite show Outlander. Such a great show.

My friend texted me from Florida, she’s going to go check on my house tomorrow. And take care of the ants.

Blessed, just blessed. Overall, life is unfolding as it should. Ants, locked bedroom doors and all.

Love and light, all

Can You Hear Me?

Posted on by learning to live like water

hear-me-now

The first time we rode together, I chattered. We were in my town, he was exploring. Didn’t want me to show him. Told me he had a photographic memory and had looked at a map. I chattered anyway, about the buildings, the history, the day, the weather, food….whatever came into my mind. We stopped for gas. As he got out of the car, to fill the tank, he looked at me and said, “Could you just sit there, and be beautiful?”

He shut me up. With a smile. He could do things like that. Just stop me dead in my tracks. No one had called me beautiful for maybe 30 years. I look back and wonder if that’s the moment I fell in love, really in love.

We went to a park. We walked a bit. We found a secluded spot, and did some heavy petting, lol. I felt like a young version of myself. It felt wonderful. His blue eyes twinkled. We stopped for steamed hamburgers. He flirted with the girl behind the register. Maybe 50 years younger than himself. He made me laugh.

He spent the night…I don’t remember anything distinctive about it. I wasn’t used to having a man sleep with me.  It had been more than 10 years.  It wasn’t his first time, but I was just starting to be able to sleep a few hours with his warm body next to mine, hearing him snore occasionally.   But the fact that he said I was beautiful…he owned me, then.

For some months that was what we did.  Go on excursions, usually from his house.  He would take me to beautiful beaches mostly.  Hidden spots.  I knew the waters off shore as well as he.  Maybe better.  I felt at home there.  Once or twice we got on old dirt roads wide enough for one car in the woods.  Roads where the GPS made it look like you were driving through a field.  When we did that, I never talked much.  It was all new to me, what I was seeing, what I was doing.  He would ask, “are you ok, you are so quiet?”

I loved those days.

It didn’t last. It went from “could you just sit there” and “are you ok” to “can you ever be quiet” to “let it be” to “I heard you the first time” (but I didn’t know it because he couldn’t respond) to “shut up” to “shut the fuck up” and not giving a damn if I was ever ok, and now we don’t talk, at all. Once in awhile I message him, when I get the vibe…but he never answers. Once in awhile he leaves me an angry voice mail. Or sends me a one-line barbed message. Those are hard to pull out of your skin, without tearing a big hole in it. He refused back then to hear me. He refuses now.

It’s not that I need to talk….It’s that I need to be heard.

Just heard. Not agreed with. Not patronized. Just heard. Just hear me. Just someone to say, “I hear you. What you have to say is important to me.”

Just heard.  My ex husband refused to hear me too.  He’d yell over me, to make sure.  He had a voice like a marine drill sargent, one of those voices you didn’t compete with.  I swore I’d never let myself get in that position again.  But I did.  Eventually, I did.

Hear me. Someone, please. Just hear me. I’m real. I love you. I need you to hear me. I’ll hear you….I promise….

He’s out there, the one who can hear me. I already love him……