Tag Archives: love

Shadows and Light

Posted on by learning to live like water

I’m doing the Deepak Chopra/Oprah 21 day free meditation “Become what you Believe”.  They offer these 21 day free meditations about 3 times a year, and I’ve done them all, I think.  They are invaluable.  The insight I get is generally very enlightening.

Today’s meditation was about the shadows, our darker, hidden beliefs about ourselves that, when brought to the light, lose their power.  I think I’ve had a few, lol, that have led me to not learning the lessons and so repeating them.

With my ex…when we met, and in the early years of our relationship, he was a different man. He was a nationally ranked swimmer.  He had what appeared to be a big close family, and his father ran a very successful business. The family exuded success. I was dazzled by the accumulation of wealth, and what seemed to be a close intact family.  It took me years to see the underlying dysfunction.  He and his older brother dislike each other immensely.  His father had a foul temper, and could lace into people, my ex and his wife, and anyone in his way, at any time.  He knew it…he always said, “I will knock people down, but I then give them a hand back up.”  Well yes, he did.  He gave them a hand when they were bloody and beaten and their brain scrambled, because then one was the most vulnerable to do what he wanted, to listen out of fear of being beat up again.  When my ex was young, it wasn’t just verbal, it was physical too, until my ex got too big and could and would have fought back. The brothers hated each other because one of them had to be at fault for anything that happened bad, and they learned to point the finger at each other from the time they were babies.  The mother, stood by and watched, and allowed it all, in the interest of “backing up her husband.’  Which was really just inability to face the fear of life alone.

So there was the dysfunction. It was all about power and control, it was a gift from my father-in-laws own alcoholic father, passed down through the generations, to my ex.  I hope to have broken the cycle by getting my son away from it, and working with him, to help him understand his own shadows.

But I digress.  The point is, the dysfunction.  S also had a family of origin that was dysfunctional.  More dysfunctional? I don’t know but small bits and pieces, because I never met them.  But in neither family was there unconditional love.  In both families the mother allowed the father to run rampant over the family. That I am sure of.

So, my own shadows.  When I realized this about my ex, gradually over the years, I began to consider leaving him, which would have been the best thing to do.  But I didn’t. Fear mostly.  Of many things.  Finally, the universe put in front of me something that was just unacceptable on all levels, and I was able to gather the strength to overcome all my fears, and I left him, and began a long battle to reclaim my life, and my son’s.  Leaving earlier would have been the right thing to do for my spiritual evolution.  With S, it didn’t take me as long.  Last summer, when I realized all he wanted was a physical relationship, I tried to leave him so many times, but again…I chose the easier path, and allowed myself to be pulled back in.  The universe actually helped me out, bringing Betty Boop back, because I needed something drastic to happen in order to get away from him for my own evolution.  I needed to regard myself with more value, more worth, and to stop believing obvious untruths that soothed my ego, but hurt my soul.

I chose the easy path too long with both. And even after Betty Boop came back, and he chose her for his own reasons, (choosing the easy path, perhaps? It’s way easier to repeat the lesson, than to rumble through it. But that’s his business, not mine.) I continued to talk to him, to want to find an easy path to stay in his life, but thank God, I loved myself enough then, to not take the one he offered.

I now need to learn that I DO deserve a healthy relationship.  I went from one so controlling I couldn’t breathe, to one so uncaring that it ripped me open.  I gave both men my full heart, I tried with both to make it work, no matter what it took.  And it took me…it took pieces of my soul in both cases.  It took me giving myself away.  I reclaimed myself from my ex, but then, I hadn’t learned the lesson, along came a different wolf in different sheep’s clothing, and I gave myself away again.

I think I am learning the lesson now.  I think I get it.  I am reclaiming myself from S.  I woke this morning feeling ownership of my life again.  I haven’t even checked the phone to see if he tried to leave a voicemail. I am hoping he’s finally leaving me alone, and has stopped trying to keep me on the periphery of his life.

Back to beliefs.  I really believe now that dysfunction does not have to be my lot.  I want, and will find a loving passionate relationship, or not.  But I’ll never settle for one that is again dysfunctional.  My eyes are open, I don’t want to repeat this lesson.  I don’t need another teacher.  LOL.  I see the shadow, and now, it’s in the light.  I will always have compassion for those like my ex, and S, who have been buried in dysfunction all their lives.  They have the choice to change it or not.  It’s not my job.  I can shine the light, it’s all I can do.  Its their choice, to stay in the darkness, and repeat the lessons, or bring their own shadows to the light.

As for me…Onward, as Liz Gilbert says. Onward.

The Transormation of the Leaves

Posted on by learning to live like water

In my morning meditation today, I saw my relationship with S like a tree in autumn.  One by one the leaves, the things that made it special, fell off the tree, onto the ground.  The tree is now bare.  The leaves, the things that made it special, lay on the ground, transforming.

Energy can’t be created or destroyed.  What was appears to be no more.  But it exists, in another form.  It becomes something new.  New growth from old decay.  I look for the signs of freshness, having let go of the old dead leaves.  I seek the tenderness of a new bud of love somewhere, that can grow within me and someone else.

I can’t harbor hate and anger, I can’t even feel bad about what was, what has ended.  I can only wish love and light to the old life, and the hope that the transformation is a beautiful thing for all involved.  It will be what it is, it will fit each of us as we allow it, as our level of consciousness allows.

While the leaves of that relationship have been decaying, the buds of another have been forming, deep within another tree, waiting for a new season of the heart to be seen.  It may be that those leaf buds, new and fresh, begin to open, slowly, gracefully, hopefully, as the last dead leaves fall off the old tree.  I think transformation has begun for me.

Namaste.  Namaste.

Sunday Morning Writing Therapy

Posted on by learning to live like water

Writing has saved me $1000’s in conventional therapy.

Yesterday, I recognized that it was the first weekend where I was not in absolute pain because I know he is with her.  I’ve been ok, and I guess it’s because I know the man that’s with her is not the man I knew and love.

My friend Megan wrote a blog about it not being the pain she fears but the void beyond the pain.  If it’s over, what is there but emptiness where all that emotion was?  Yes…thus my poem a few blogs back called The Void.  (https://learningtolivelikewaterblog.com/2015/10/29/the-void/   Some days it’s larger, some smaller.  Some days I can ignore it, walk by it, some days I fall in and disappear.

I also have realized that what I miss is the every day connection. I miss him being part of my life every day and being part of his.  I don’t like a man who changes his face for everyone he meets, but I have always seen S’s soul, not his face, and it’s always been his soul that I love, and that I know.  I see the inner child, just wanting to be loved because he exists, like every other child.  I can still do that.

He tried occasionally, to convince me he was a bad evil person. I always said, “I see your soul S.  I see your soul and I like what I see.  I don’t know what to tell you.”  Imagine being so convinced you don’t deserve love that you try to convince others not to love you.

I wish he and I could just talk, and be friends, without the sexual tension that’s between us.  But it always goes there, and for me that comes with attachment, and besides, I know he can turn on me on a dime, evidenced by his texting me at 4 am, and devastating me 6 hours later.  That’s not a friend.  I don’t even know what to call that.  It’s been 4 weeks, this weekend.  The wound at times is fresh, as if it just happened.  Then I remember how every time I’ve spoken to him since it has not ended well.  He has told me he cares for me.  Whatever he feels only causes me pain.  I can’t go there again.

The man I saw last week, Jim, sent me two texts yesterday.  The first was “Happy Halloween 300 times.”  which I didn’t understand at all. Like I said, I don’t get his sense of humor.  Then later he sent one saying he enjoyed my company the night before very much.  And I thought “How?  You didn’t make even the smallest effort to find out who and what I am.”  I didn’t answer either one.  I didn’t know what to say.  I was afraid if I said I was sorry, but I didn’t feel any connection, maybe we should just let it go, that he would call me, and I didn’t want to deal with it.  I chose to just ignore the texts, and hope it just fades away.  We’ve only been out 3 times.  There is no attachment.

And then there’s A.  Always there for me, always steady.  Never anything but loving and caring and honest.  Yesterday he sent me a pic, and there was a red truck in it. His truck, I thought, was black.  I asked him if he got a new truck when I disappeared.  (Which I did in August and September, just cut him off without warning to focus my attention and energy on my relationship with S, which was unraveling then.  I think even then, S was in touch with her, which was why we were unraveling.) Anyway A, answered about the truck saying it wasn’t his, but then said, “I’m so glad to have you back.  Don’t fucking disappear again!”  He went on to say “Fall madly in love, get married, but don’t disappear!”  I told him I wouldn’t, ever.  And that I didn’t want to get married either.  Just to have a loving, monogamous, extraordinary relationship with someone.

And so…I continue onward.  Feeling like S and I have unfinished business, business that will remain that way for the foreseeable future, at time nagging at me, at times I can just ignore it.  Hopeful that perhaps there is someone else out there that I can love as intensely as I loved him.  Someone who is also capable of that depth of emotion.  Clearly S, in his present state is not, nor wants to be.

Therapy, writing is therapy.

Gratitude and Connection

Posted on by learning to live like water

Morning of a new day.  Today I will try to get farther along my path of healing.  Today I will focus on the gifts that I have in the present moment.  Gratitude.

Gratitude, true gratitude, is really how I was able to make the turn from devastated to healing.  I changed my point of view from what I didn’t have, to what I do.  From what didn’t work out, to what did.  I let go of the things that caused me pain, and chose to remember those things that brought me joy.

I had questions, unanswered.  I stopped asking them.  To what purpose would I get the answers?  There would be no joy in the answers, only confirmation of things I “know” without asking.  I let the questions go.

I am grateful, there is always a lesson.  There is always something we can learn from a difficult, even devastating, lesson.  We can always become better people.  We can raise our vibration a bit, we can see more of the big picture than we saw before.  We can ask for help, and find out it’s available.

Our humanness may still grieve, but our spirits will lead us out of it if we can listen to it.  Joy is in living, not in regretting, not in pain.  We have to open the door that was set ajar by the pain, and walk through.  Trust…vulnerability….love and belonging….creativity…inspiration.  Open to something new, that will fill our soul more than what we left behind.

Appreciate, and love those we leave behind.  Love is easier than hate, at least for me.  As I look back on my life, I don’t want to have spent much time hating anyone.  Momentary, perhaps, to get through the first initial shock of pain and betrayal, but it very quickly dissipates.  How could I hate someone I loved so much, moments before?  Can’t, in reality.  In the end, love is all there is.

I don’t hate my ex, I don’t hate S.  I love them both, I hope both find happiness and joy.  My ex…shows no sign of having learned any lesson.  S…idk.  I think he feels safe, right now, comfortable in what he knows. I don’t think it’s joy.  He can’t believe in love, and while I find it sad, it’s not something I can change, it’s not my journey.  I think that unconditional love is something you have to experience over time, you have to see that someone loves you no matter what you have done or do, over time, to believe it.  The kind of love I was blessed to be born into.  No matter how angry my parents would get at me for stupid stuff I did or said, they always loved me. That was the baseline.  It was never crossed. So, just because I can’t invite the chaos that S caused my heart back into my life, I will always love him, and if he needs me, I will be there.  As I am for my ex.  The difference between them, is my ex doesn’t accept that, he believes I want to hurt him.  S, I think, knows I will be there.

A seems to have found joy in his new home, and he has a girlfriend there, and I am so happy for him.  We still talk every day, every night he tells me “Good morning sweetie.”, every morning, a good morning.  Often a nice conversation during the day. There are times when he tells me he wishes he could just lay down next to me and hold me.  I feel the same about him at times.  But we are both moving forward in our lives, knowing that our friendship is not definable, and that we will always be special to each other.  We didn’t have a soul connection, but we have a very close connection anyway.  Our purpose in each other’s lives has been to help each other heal, I am sure.  So maybe it is a soul connection.  Who knows?

Jim, I can’t speak about yet.  I don’t know him well enough.  I think he would like to go deeper than he is, he sent me a good morning text as I write.  Sweet, it was nice.

I am blessed by the people in my life, the ones who have been and have moved on, and the ones who have stayed.  I’m grateful for them all.

Just Some Random Thoughts

Posted on by learning to live like water

My lunch was nice.  We went to a deli run by a very upscale restaurant chain in the area.  Great NY style sandwiches, on bread that they make.  I don’t always get a sandwich when I go there, often I get their salads, maybe a feta cheese and spinach croissant.  It was Jim’s first time, I think he enjoyed it.

I explained to him about the freshness of the breakup.  How the relationship was done, but it was still fresh and I was being very cautious, and taking things slow.  He seemed ok with it, He said, “one day at a time.”  I feel better that he knows this about me.  He still wanted to make plans for Friday night.  🙂  He had a son who played hockey until about the same age as my son, so we exchanged some hockey stories, some stories of our youth. our lives. He had his new phone, I sent him his first text today, lol.  And I was the recipient of his first one, ever!!  LOL.

I had a spell where I missed S today, like crazy.  I managed to work through it.  I got back to the place where unconditional love for him is the only emotion I am comfortable with, it is who I am, it is what I believe.

We talked a bit tonight at book club about soul journeys, and contracts, and agreements.  There is a well known surgeon who has written books (or a book) about this. His name escapes me at the moment, I’ll have to find out from my friend who has been to one of his workshops.  But he says, he is sure that in a past life he murdered someone with a knife.  So in this life, he is saving people with a knife.  So, perhaps if we were abused in this life, we are learning the other side by asking to have a life in which we are abused, because we were an abuser in a past life, so that we can know the light and the dark, and grow and evolve.It’s an interesting concept to think about, and we only touched on it.  It leaves a lot of unanswered questions though.

Dr. Brian Weiss, head of Psychology at University of Miami, and author of Many Lives, Many Masters, (and many other books about past lives) found that often the same group of people agree to incarnate over and over again, to work out karmic differences, or to help each other achieve a goal, a lesson that one of them wants to learn.  I think this explains how there are some people with whom we have an instant and enduring connection, against the odds.

I was at a meditation group one night, when  new girl came in.  She sat her chair down next to me.  Instantly, really, within minutes we were in a deep conversation, about crystals, and meditation, and a whole host of other things.  We were on a high speed information exchange.  She and I have remained friends since then, she put me in touch with her reiki teacher when I wanted to become certified.  I used to see a lot of her, but we don’t connect much anymore, because the group has been disbanded, and really people’s lives just run in different directions, intersecting for awhile.  But we always both said we felt like we had known each other forever, immediately.

I’ll be honest here, I felt like I knew S, and loved him,  before I ever met him.  I guess I won’t find out in this lifetime, but it was similar to my friend above.  I don’t know if he ever felt that or not, but really that kind of connection is really on a level I have worked at for a long time, as did my girlfriend above.   And really S and I are so different, such different experiences, there was nothing really to bond us, except a love of the sea, which was strong in both of us.  I always loved that I didn’t have to try to explain it to him, I just knew he felt the same way about it. I’ll always appreciate all the places he took me to along the shoreline.  Though, I’d liked to have gone in the summer too, lol.   Night and day.   But we did….for awhile.  Daybreak and sunset.

Just kind of ruminating on it, because of the discussions we had at book club.

Small Steps

Posted on by learning to live like water

I tried sleeping without an Ambien last night.  Fell right to sleep, woke up 2 hours later and was up 2 hours.  So, I’m a little tired today.  I’m good though, I’m really ok emotionally today.  I have been doing the Ho’oponopono a lot, and it really helps me to stay centered and grounded.  Just say it while I’m walking around the plant at work, or driving.

A friend at work said to me yesterday, “You still care for him don’t you.”  I admitted that yes,I did,but it’s the only way I can let go, is with love.  She said, “Its that connection isn’t it.”.  Yes.  I told her that right at that moment, I could tell her what he was feeling and it’s really hard to ignore that.  She has been married 40 years, and adores her husband.  She said, “I’ve never had a relationship like that.”  I told her “Me neither.  I don’t even know what to do about it, but to try to just learn to deal with it, and go on.”  So that’s what I do.  If I get an intense “knowing” of what he’s feeling, I have to remember it’s not my deal now, I can’t let it affect me, and I go on.  I have to consciously make an effort to change my thoughts when it happens, and get engrossed in something else.

I’m learning to do that.  When I woke in the middle of the night, I thought of him for a moment, but then much more about Jim, the man I’m meeting for lunch today.  And that was not purposeful thinking, it’s just where my mind drifted.  I’m looking forward to seeing him today.

So onward.  Small steps every day toward healing.  Toward a healthier life.

It Will Beat Again

Posted on by learning to live like water

If I met you today

I would love you all over again.

I would set myself up for the heartbreak

all over again.

I would see you

And feel you

I would lavish your body with love

All over again.

But I know you already.

I see you.

You have reached into my heart.

I know your fingers

I know your breath.

You pull out my heart and squeeze it

Between your fingers

Until it stops beating.

Someone else will come along

And breathe life back into it

While you still hold it in your hand,

my life blood on your hands.

Someone else will come along,

Gently take my still heart from you.

Nourish and nurture it

Until it forgets the feel of your fingers,

The smell of your breath,

The cold gleam in your eyes

As you watched me struggle.

It will beat again.

Maybe Today is the Day

Posted on by learning to live like water

Starting today.

I struggled yesterday wanting to contact him.  I almost sent him some music, Silver Spring by Fleetwood Mac, and later, Laughing by Crosby Stills and Nash. Both times I typed them and deleted them but came close to sending them.  Then late last night I almost sent him a short message, “Are you bored with her yet?” But realized that would open the door to him, and lead him to thinking I wanted him back, and I don’t.  I’m not used to him being gone yet, but there’s no way back to where we were.  So there’s no point in engaging.  Instead I sent a good night message to A, and got back, “Good night sweetie.”  What a difference in men.  One hell bent to destroy me, one heaven sent to make me happy.

Today I have a chance to begin again.  Today I have another chance to put him in the past.  I loved and lost, but I gained a better sense of who I am, and what I want, and deserve.  A better sense that I am worthy of love and belonging, not some dysfunctional relationship.

I have a meet and greet date today with the man I’ve been talking to all week.  We both seem to be excited about it. Maybe today is the day.  Going to Sam’s Club with my son to stock up the house.  Going to Home Depot at some point this week to get the stuff I need to get my deck painted/stained.  Have to upload my pics of the wedding and get them off to family. Oh, and clean the house, lol.

I have to get a lot more of my book for my spiritual book club read, since we meet on Tuesday!  I have been engrossed with Brene Brown’s Rising Strong, which has helped me to stand back up after S.  The book for book club seems good too, It’s Awaken the Spirit Within by Rebecca Rosen.  So far I like it.  She’s a spiritual psychic, and has a great perspective.

So my weekend will be busy and productive.  I will keep my crown on, and remember that I am worthy.  My rejection by a man who is so dysfunctional is no reflection on me, but on him.  I have taken his crown back, and will hold it in safe-keeping for a man who deserves to be my partner.

Onward….

Who Knows?

Posted on by learning to live like water

Autumn in full glow

The leaves in day glow colors

Love in bloom

Vibrant

Full

Expectant with color

Emotion.

Life, full and rich.

Until the bitter cold wind blows through

Ripping the leaves off their tenuous hinge.

Throwing them to the ground,

To wither, and die.

The leaves, still full colored,

Lay on the ground

Blind-sided by that cold bitter wind.

Their luster already fading.

They disintegrate into the earth.

The devastation is complete, thinks the cold wind.

What was, will never be again.

But love never dies.

Transformation begins.

With transformation comes something new

And maybe more beautiful.

Who knows?

Friday Morning Musings

Posted on by learning to live like water

Yesterday was a kind of rough day.  I guess I’m not off the roller-coaster completely yet, but the rides are becoming less and less often.  I found myself missing who he was months ago.  It’s painful, it can become so intense.  I am able to get off the ride though, by remembering who he has become. Remembering the incomprehensible choices he made and the cruelty with which he was able to dismiss me.  And because A is always there, reminding me without even trying that I deserve to be loved in return.  Plus, I am excited to meet this new guy this weekend.  We have talked every night this week, we have really hit it off on the phone.

So these things help me crawl out of the slump.  If he hadn’t been so deceitful it would have been easier.  Seeing her and not telling me, pretending for weeks it was still only he and I.  The flirting, the innuendo.  And then his inability to truly let me go after.  But I haven’t heard from him since his voice mail Tuesday, so maybe he has, finally, let me go.  Maybe he realizes I meant it when I said it, I would never trust my heart to him again.  No matter if he keeps her or sends her packing, (which would be his smart choice, but he’s not known for making those), he destroyed what we had with his actions. There isn’t even a friendship there.

So today it’s onward, I am ok today, not missing him.  In full recognition of who he is this morning.  I’m excited about the future for myself.

I was pleased last night that the man I’m going to meet this weekend showed an interest in Reiki and energy work when we talked last night.  He has no knowledge of it, but had a lot of good questions, and seemed genuinely to want to know.  That was refreshing, to know he was open to alternative practices and beliefs, a little out of the mainstream.  I also like that he loves the outdoors, loves the beach and the water.  Like S, this man seems to know and love the Rhode Island beaches.  Maybe I can reclaim them, and make new memories there, instead of always having to think of S when I am there.  I would like that.

When my ex and I divorced, I went to our favorite beach with a couple girlfriends.  We had to walk in 2 miles from the state park, it’s a beach only really accessible by boat.  But I went, and gave myself a few moments alone.  I didn’t want the memories I had there with my son and my ex to keep me from a place I loved.  I reclaimed it, for myself.  Ii will do that with the other places S took me.  He once asked me not to take another man to these places.  It is an unfair request.  I’m not going to lose these beautiful places.  I am going to make new memories.

A was asking me about him, in the interest of wanting to see me with someone capable of loving me.  He said to me, “No more bums, Deb, ok?”  LOL.  Nope.  I’ll be more careful.  I will guard my heart more closely. This man will have to earn my trust, and the right to hear my story.  I already know he can make me laugh and put me at ease.  I just hope there is chemistry when we meet. I feel like there will be, but you never know.

Onward.