This new moon is spring-cleaning heyday. It's not just about ridding the pantry of out-dated items; it's also about renewing your soul.
Are your expectations realistic? If you're frustrated, brainstorm until an adjustment, made on your part, fits the sweet spot where expectation meets reality, head on.
Your skills may seem arbitrary to you, and sometimes you think they don't matter to anyone outside of your little corner of the world. Not true!
Compliments are gifts you sometimes feel awkward accepting with grace, so shift the focus back to the graciousness of the one doing the complimenting.
Cultivating a content and thankful spirit can seem diametrically opposed to your ambitious quest. But it's really not, because your main goal is to graciously appreciate that which may have seemed imperfect at first glance.
It's weird how the smallest things can fill and expand your heart as big as a hot air balloon, which sets your spirit to sail across the cloudless sky of your mind. This all happens for one reason: You notice what others may miss.
When you lose your cellular connection to a loved one, it's not because the other person isn't there, wanting to talk to you. It's just outside interference clamoring inside your noggin. Clear your head and call again.
The old saying goes: Fall down seven times, stand up eight ...
2015
Speaking to myself:
When intuition whispers that you're losing connection with your deepest self—call again. And again. And again. Until deeper truth picks up the phone.
NGU (never give up) brainstorming toward deeper truth until your spirit feels so re-energized as to fly free of undeserved guilt incurred during childhood. Actually, that's what I'm doing, right now, while penning today's post—working to fully absolve myself. Declaring the child within free of undeserved guilt. So what's the catch? It's one thing to know myself innocent. Another to feel the innocence of the child I was, through and through.
You see, I awoke, today, feeling depleted of energy, which has been focused on monitering the host of raw emotions, long buried alive, which continue to reawaken and haunt my peace of mind, from time to time. As hard as I've worked to clear this manifestation of disruptive confusion, born of unprocessed memories, which fog my sense of clarity, I've awaken, recently, feeling a sense of pressured 'waiting' weighing heavy on my spirit—kind of like anticipating a sense of closure, which follows in the aftermath of a funeral.
If you ask what I'm waiting for, clarity would reply: Tuesday. Next Tuesday.
Why next Tuesday? Well, hopefully, during my next scheduled session of EMDR, my therapist and I will brainstorm until my conscious mind taps into a subconscious sense of guilt from which the vulnerable child within has been begging me for release of all sense of accountability. And while the knowledgable adult I've grown to be holds alternating buzzers in each hand, I will empower myself to grant the child I once was freedom from shame as every portion of my brain grows ever more aware of my need to create a new pathway for neurons to travel while listening to my therapist ask:
What's the bad feeling you have about yourself, Annie?
I feel my participation in shameful acts during my childhood was so unforgivably bad that I must have been unworthy of love!
What do you want to feel about yourself?
I was a terrified child. Confused. So eager to please, I was obedient to a fault. But not bad. I was innocent of wrong doing. The fault lays with the adult whose perverse sense of pleasure took advantage of my innocence, vulnerability and inexperience with life. I was, in fact, as good during childhood as I have grown to be a good woman. Imperfect, yes, but really good, all the same.
As our hour long session of EMDR continues, my therapist will guide my mind forward as I work at adjusting feelings of self perceived guilt until my new found sense of clarity relieves the child—held hostage within a 'bad' place—of wrong doing, once and for all.
Ever since my sister Janet's death when I was three, I did not feel free to reveal any word or emotion that might cause my parents' smiles to frown. In order to ensure that I did not threaten their sense of personal peace, my defense system elected me 'family peace keeper'. As keeper of the peace, I repressed any experience that felt painful or scared me out of my wits. And until recent years, that sense of repression remained captive within a suspended state of subconscious denial until a therapist suggested my need of EMDR therapy.
Over most of my life, I could not say no to anyone who expressed need of help. (Remember me? I brought strangers home from the coffee shop and airport.) If I had to say no, my empathetic response apologized profusely, and generally speaking, I gave myself a hard time. To a lesser extent, that's true to this very day. As I could not voice my problems, I could not ask for help, meaning that I was stuck with self-conceived misperceptions for most of my life. As to accepting compliments, my self-devaluation squirmed with discomfort. Hopefully, my next session of EMDR will rebalance my sense of wrong-doing when I choose to consider my personal needs over servicing the needs of others. As to growing graciously receptive to compliments, well, I'm working on that.
Since mum was the word for every emotional reaction that swallowed my smile, today's train of thought—concerning emotional repression—allows us to connect the dots between my subconscious need to 'stuff' fear, fury and a host of personal needs from the time of Janet's death right up until a dozen years ago when every one of those unidentified needs and unprocessed wounds began to filter into my conscious mind after my father had been laid to rest at which time a series of confounding events caused PTSD, which had not yet been diagnosed to errupt.
You see, it was during the decade separating my parents' deaths that my powers of intuition began to whisper of subconscious secrets, which had pressured my conscious mind to acknowledge the rawness of emotional wounds and unmet needs, buried alive behind my wall of denial. And once these secrets proceeded to hammer at my wall of denial, I had a pounding headache that just wouldn't quit.
Soon after Dad's death, I felt an intuitive need to ask my mom lots of questions. And so, at the age of 87 years young, Mom divulged that which had transpired with her mother after our family had suffered Janet's traumatic loss. (More about that in a paragraph, below) If you ask if there was any particular reason that led me to ask question after question while Mom and I swayed back and forth on my patio swing, I'd reply: Yes. Each time I said Janet's name aloud—I cried. And that had never happened throughout my entire life.
As deeply buried wounds, fears and needs persisted in filtering, ever so determinedly, through holes in my wall of denial, my conscious need to comprehend much that felt confounding inspired me to seek out a therapist, who encouraged me to pay mind to my need to strengthen my sense of clarity—most especially when he considered the fact that life's harshest realities had influenced my decision-making process—in that I could not say no—and that's what kick started my search for knowledge, concerning the complex nature of the brain's interrelated parts.
As knowledge is power, I garnered my connection to courage and readied myself to absorb deeper truths, which harvested a host of self conceived misperceptions. And as time passed, I came to see that a good little girl deserved to feel free of self-imposed guilt, and resultant of creating this new path for neurons to travel, my self-assessment will rebalance, at long last. WHEW!
Having written this portion of today's stream of consciousness, we can see why my brain's repetitive refrain of certain words has felt such a compelling need to express my growing sense of clarity in post after post until my perception of that which has ached inside my deepest self felt crystal clear to my conscious mind. If you ask: Annie, what has come clear? The answer to that which had riddled me with fear will be revealed in several posts, penned last week, which, feeling ultra personal, have not yet been published for public consumption. When will they be published? Once my comfort zone expands.
See how complex the interactive functions of our brains prove to be? With patience, curiosity, determination, resilience, positive focus, courage and time, everything that did not seem even remotely connected, at first, has come together, creating today's bigger picture, which—offering my sense of clarity a rebalanced vision that clears the child within of every vestige of self inflicted guilt—replaces the foggy sense of wrong doing that weighed so heavy on my spirit as to have influenced decisions that hindsight suggests were not in my best interests, at all. And having clarified how fear 'chose' to deny me access to grieving, openly, about deeply personal needs that fell to the wayside as a foggy sense of undeserved guilt carved my path, everything intuition compelled me to write, repeatedly, in posts, over these past five years, makes sense. Big Sigh!
The study of psychology agrees that there is no pain worse than
Losing your child except for being blamed for your child's death
When my mother's pain, confusion and fury concerning
The most brutal aspects of reality grew too overwhelming for
Her sanity to contain, her spirit collapsed under
The insurmountable weight of the secret she'd hidden from my dad—forever
As you may remember:
My father's beloved wife chose not to reveal the pronouncement of
Guilt with which my grandma had pierced her daughter's heart, because
My Mom knew that Dad would have tossed his mother-in-law and
Her baggage out the door—
However, I was present when hot tempered fights between
My mother and her mother had reason to escalate, and
As my deeply confounded, terrified
Three year old mind witnessed wounding nature of grief exacerbated by
Unexpected stabs of undeserved guilt, which compounded
Emotional turmoil, which confounded my unprocessed sense of
Irretrievable loss as senseless blame, repressed fury, clinical depression
Denial, unconditional love and the rebirth of new life (Lauren)
Came together within the space of one year, between
My third and fourth birthdays ... I remember
Hiding in the front hall closet until doors slammed and
Shouting transformed into muffled crying, and though
I could not fathom the meaning of whatever had been said—
I couldn't stand to see my mother so distraught as to
Take to her bed, and most likely, that's when
The depth of my empathy for the pain of others developed
Into a sensitivity that overwhelmed my sense of balance, because
Over most of my life, I've had trouble distinguishing
The pain of others from my own
And though my father's home coming, each night
Embraced me within the safety net of his love, saving me from
That which had felt like a burning inferno, and
Though a child's spirit is thought to be resilient—
The egocentric nature of a child's mind is known to assume
A personal sense of guilt for anything that causes pain to
The adults we love—sooo feeling that I must have
Done 'something' so bad as to have lost
A severely depressed parent's love devastated
The budding development of my self esteem ...
And since most of that which I'd heard made no sense to
The self absorbed state of a young child's mind, my
Thought processor absorbed misperceptions that deemed me
Guilty of causing my mom pain, and as misshapen mind sets
Solidify to stone, over time, each self-invoked misperception
Had need to be identified, re-evaluated, straightened out, re-channeled and
Reprocessed before my personal sense of safety could begin to undergo
Change for the better—and thus have I've worked, single-mindedly to
Redevelop a wholly rebalanced sense of myself as
A good little girl, who deserves an enduring place of endearment within
My adult memory bank—free of subconscious ghosts that had
Haunted my well-being, causing my sense of self to bow my head in shame
*With my sister Lauren's birth, Mom's spirit revived and so did mine ...
However PTSD can lay as dormant as a fully cocked loaded gun until
Another harsh reality aims that gun at your sense of sanity, and
Anything feeling remotely similar to the self degradation, which
My defense system had 'successfully' repressed during that horrendous year
Triggered subconscious waves of PTSD, which, being unprocessed
Shot holes into my conscious mind's ability to
Comprehend those times when repressed fear of yesteryear's shame
Compromised the clarity of my adult intelligence ...
And not until a therapist coaxed me to work with a colleague trained in
EMDR therapy could my adult intelligence begin to reprocess
Deeper truth into the true nature of memories, which had
Overwhelmed a terrified child, whose vulnerable mind had been unable
To process emotional complexity, resultant in my absorbing
A confounded sense of myself during one of life's most
Crucial stages of personality development
Over these past five years, you and I have watched
The intuitive portion of my brain backtrack, repeatedly, over
Terrifying situations, which derailed the natural development of
My self esteem, and not until I engaged in EMDR therapy
Could I give voice to my need of help
With EMDR therapy, I've learned to focus my
Adult intelligence upon creating new pathways for neurons to
Transport the injured portion of my self esteem from
One station to the next, and in order to unpack each raw wound, which
Had been buried alive, you and I have traversed
Back and forth across the time line until
My comprehension of confounding events, which had
Stunted the development of my self respect, made
Crystal clear sense of situations, which had heaped
Undeserved guilt upon my head—most especially
During these past dozen years
And having worked, single-mindedly, to iron out
Wrinkles in time in hopes of recreating
A straight line that connects the dots conjoining
The undeveloped thought processor of a three year old tot with
The insight-driven sensitives of the woman I've chosen to grow up to be
Common sense (and a new wave of psychological thought) suggests
That no one, inclusive of wounded warriors returning from
Gruesome battlefields can fully recover on their own from PTSD without
Consciously choosing to accept astutely attentive, professional help, trained in EMDR
And with that said, if you feel inclined to ask:
Annie, doesn't your spirit ever get sick of analyzing your reactions to death?
I'd REPLY—YES! YES! YES! A thousand times— YES!
In fact, I'm sick and tired of it, right now!
However, just as with accepting the aging process, graciouslyThe alternative (of watching my spirit get sucked repeatedly, into a 'bad' place)
Suggests that relieving my memory of undeserved guilt by
Focusing my conscious mind toward becoming
An accomplished deep sea diver has been worth every minute of
Time, energy and effort expended upon excavating
Repressed pain and fury in order to watch myself surface with gains in
Inner peace, which proves too precious a treasure to measure
Once my adult comprehension has completed constructing a new pathway for neurons to transport my inner child's (bad) memories away from that unprocessed path where undeserved guilt snarls at my self esteem, she and I will conjoin. And once conjoined, she and I will have sound reason to rejoice as one in celebration of our hard won sense of freedom.
As each negatively focused, outdated, subconscious mind set adjusts to match my newly rebalanced sense of self awareness, my connection to reality will clearly redirect my mind, body and spirit to sail free of yesteryear's emotional fog toward the shoreline where the white flag of recovery has been waving in the warm breeze, beckoning all sides of me to reconnect more openly than had been possible (when repression of fear of rejection had falsely felt like my refuge from suffering emotional pain) with everyone whose love and support has been waiting, eagerly, to welcome my sense of personal safety home. Quadruple WHEW!
Ultimately, as reprocessed depths of self awareness remain fully engaged with my newly absorbed sense of self-induced mental release, my whole brain will finally feel ready to refocus on functioning with a lasting sense of balance (between logic and emotion) intact. And with balance intact, I'll enjoy each day as it unfolds—imperfect as life may be—without feeling fearsomely haunted by ghosts of years past. For heavens sake! I've just tossed my crutch aside, while summing up my own Tiny Tim tale!
Gosh—I've never written those words before:
'THE END of my quest' ...
I've visualized my life-long quest for clarity in terms of endless trains of thought tunneling toward endless strings of insight spotlighting tidal waves of repressed emotion crashing against my wall of denial, necessitating my mind to build life rafts of common sense upon which to climb after ocean dives surface with buried treasure once my mind has mined successfully toward deeper truths, which—though proving spiritually enriching—are actually, utterly exhausting—OMG—I believe this is the first time I've actually visualized THE END of my quest—not for deeper truth, but rather for personal safety, which had been lost when I was a tot. And it's been said that that which we can picture ourselves accomplishing, we can achieve ... and Amen to that!
It's a good thing that I have lots of juicy stories waiting to be written, concerning the development of five brainstorming tools, which provided our family with solutions that resolved conflicts, effectively, all around—otherwise this next series of posts—recently written though not yet published—might lead us straight toward THE END of my blog just as this last season of MAD MEN closed up Don Draper's creative shop, earlier in the week—and if you ask what I think the main message—which had been brilliantly strung through each season of writing that series has attempted to clarify for viewers throughout the world, I'll bow to Robert Bianco, a newspaper columnist, who wrote:
"Only mad men think they can control the universe."
And to that brilliant, one sentence wrap up, I'd like to add:
Only mad men and women think we can control—our own little corner of the world—it's task enough to figure out what takes place inside our own brains before our time on earth runs out.
Quoting Bianco, again:
"As frustrating as (life can be) there's also a freedom if you're willing to embrace it. Let go of demands and expectations. Stop trying to guess how the show will end and just ... sit back, relax and cede control. It's the only sane thing to do."
My God—it's been so hard to retire The Fixer when so many rely on my intelligence to solve problems that stymie their sense of logic. In truth, I had no clue that my adoption of the role of fixer created the life raft upon which an abundance of my personal sense of safety relied. I mean, as long as my presence kept everyone's head above water, I'd not be rejected or unloved—right?
Then came the time when storms blew in from all sides at once, and as steering myself through 'the perfect storm' caused this fixer's mind and spirit to feel worn to the bone (and you can take that literally, because my muscles grew so tense while working through confusion and fear as to choke my throat and being unable to swallow, I dropped 15 pounds, which I did not have to spare, in no time flat), and guess what happened, after that? Once I couldn't 'fix' this or that—or anything for that matter, other than myself—I was rejected just as I'd feared by those who'd thought to know me well but couldn't know me any more deeply than I had known myself. (Did you sense the spirit of Socrates, swooshing down from on high to perch on my shoulder and give me a thumbs up while whispering—Know Thyself, Annie—just now?)
As for today—those who do not fear looking into themselves know me full well. Those whose mind sets remain stonily ensconced behind their own walls of denial perceive badly of me to this very day, because their perception is their reality—so let's change that to: their misperception is their reality.
And so, just as with Don Draper, who actually never left Dick behind—I, too, had need of figuring out how to grow every more inquisitive, introspective and finally receptive to accepting love's heaven-sent purity as well as life's brutal realities that make us feel as though we've somehow stumbled into the burning flames of hell.
In short, I can fix a lot about myself. But when it comes to fixing a problem 'owned' by you, here's what I'll do: I'll do my best to cheer you up when you feel down and support you as you adventure forward as well as I'm able, but I'll not work my mind and spirit to the bone in hopes of freeing anyone's mind from denial but my own. Been there, done that to no avail.
Thank goodness, the teacher in me feels a compelling need to share success stories with you, suggesting that we can expect a detailed series of true tales to pop up, one after another, once the pathways of my mind have been cleared of yesteryear's emotional debris, which has caused my processor to detour away from describing my quest toward insight into the creation of five brainstorming tools that saved each person in my family from fighting (defensively and disrespectfully) for domination and control ... and when I tell these stories, my sentences will not be made of stream of consciousness that run on forever—and you can count on that.
Since today's post has offered the intuitive portion of my brain reason to brainstorm toward changing my mind set from pulling boxcars, filled with endless strings of insights, into endless stations in favor of steering my shipshape mind into the dock where personal safety awaits to welcome me ashore, I don't feel nearly as emotionally drained and mentally exhausted as was true when this post began to write itself, several hours ago ... and
As it's Tuesday, I'm inclined to check on line to find a light-hearted movie, because intelligence tells me that absorbing a mind provoking period drama will not be in keeping with buoying my spirit, today ... (For clarity's sake, please note that this post was written, yesterday, published, today :)
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