Archives for category: Relationships
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72 Minutes

February 25, 2015 //
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I had an amazing evening with my traveling partner, last night. It didn’t end as well as it started, and I went to bed feeling off-balance and a little sad. I wrapped myself in my blankets and wept for a few minutes, even tolerantly allowing myself a few ‘it’s not fair!’ and ‘it isn’t me!’ moments. I didn’t notice, but at some point I realized I had moved on; my tears had dried, my breathing was deep, relaxed, and even, and my heart felt calm. 72 minutes. Tears became meditation pretty quickly, and very naturally, and I don’t know quite when, but it was 72 minutes from when they began to fall, to when I began to fall asleep, and realized that I was actually entirely okay in that moment – and that moments being what they are, the earlier one that caused the heartache was long over.

Moments are not a big deal; they are moments.

Any one moment, utterly unique, and filled with potential.

Any one moment, utterly unique, and filled with potential.

Moments do not define me. I define me.

We really, truly, are each having our own experience, moment to moment, day-to-day, and it any one such moment we may each – or all – be at odds with one another, because those individual subjective experiences are our world, and we view the rest through those filters, on the backs of our assumptions, and doing our best to find our way through our very own chaos and damage. “Being right” doesn’t really enter into it, for me at least, because “being right” is just as subjective as our experiences, themselves. The challenge for me, last night, was in figuring out how to stay aware and engaged with my hurting partner, and make room – compassionate, tender, understanding, supportive emotional space – for him to have his own experience right along side me having my own.

I have room for improvement. This is a very general statement I believe to be universally true of my experience.

So often things seem more complicated than 'this versus that'. Perspective matters. Relevance matters. Compassion matters.

So often things seem more complicated than ‘this versus that’. Perspective matters. Relevance matters. Compassion matters.

I found my way last night with the awareness that the moment didn’t define me. The challenge we were having communicating and loving wasn’t a characteristic of ‘who I am’ – it was a moment. A challenge. Sure, it’s pretty easy to take that challenge and turn it on myself as a weapon, but where is the value in that? Growing as a person is more easily fostered in gentle conversation, shared insights, connecting and discussing needs, limits, boundaries with compassion for each other, and present with each other even when/if we are hurting. (It sounds easier than it seems in the moment, at my current skill/awareness level.) Remembering that I define me, and that my experience of myself is 100% reliably true to the self that I am when I allow it to be was powerful.  However hurt a lovers feelings may be, those are their feelings, about a moment (their moment); their feelings do not define me, (and considering how little tie to objective reality emotions may truly have, it seems a very poor practice to internalize someone else’s feelings, or taking them on as characteristics that define me, for myself).

xxx

We each make our way using the perspective we have, and the tools we develop. 

I woke feeling pretty awesome this morning, and very centered. It’s a lovely way to start a day. Today is a good day to be reminded we are each having our own experience, and that they co-exist with equal validity. It’s a good day to reread The Four Agreements. It’s a good day for love.

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Categories Brain Injury, Healthy Living, Love, Mindfulness, Perspective, Post Traumatic Stress, Relationships, The Big 5, Words

Sifting Through Thoughts

February 21, 2015 //
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The evening ends quietly, after a pleasantly productive day that felt more recreational than not. I spent much of it gardening…well…on such tasks as gardening offers at the tail end of winter, preparing for planting to come. Things will turn to spring seemingly overnight; I take advantage of pleasantly sunny or dry days getting ready for it. I share my love of gardening and growing things with my traveling partner, and we pass a lot of time talking about plants, gardening, techniques, yield… It’s strangely intimate, which I attribute to the undercurrent of love that is so palpable when we are together.

I’m not ready for sleep, but I am no longer feeling like companionship. These last few minutes of evening are my own; I sift through the events, interactions, and thoughts of the day, and consider them more thoroughly. I take time to savor the most pleasant moments. I make a disciplined practice of pausing ever so briefly on moments that troubled me, taking only such time as needed to observe, non-judgmentally, and moving on to other moments. It doesn’t feel natural to linger so willfully on all the things that felt the best, and delighted me most, nonetheless, it is a practice that tends to create a more positive experience overall, day-to-day, and finding and maintaining balance seems easier, generally. It most certainly counts as treating myself well.

Today wasn’t fancy, and that doesn’t matter at all; today was enough.

Some of the very best moments are the simplest of pleasures. Few things are more wonderful than love and coffee shared on a relaxed morning.

Some of the very best moments are the simplest of pleasures. Few things are more wonderful than love and coffee shared on a relaxed morning.

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Categories Brain Injury, Free Will, gardening, Healthy Living, Love, Mindfulness, Perspective, Relationships, Spring, The Big 5, winter, Words

The Happily Ever After Myth

February 20, 2015 //
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I love fairy tales, and stories with a strong heroine, who faces a challenge, learns a lesson, and grows to become someone wonderful. I like a happy ending. I read a lot of ‘happily ever after’ endings over the years, and at some point ‘happily ever after’ became an implicit goal. That’s especially maddening because that is basically the least attainable goal ever imagined. I enjoy feeling happy. I find ‘joy’, ‘delight’, and all manner of pleasant happiness-related, happiness-producing quite wonderful and worth experiencing. I didn’t have much success making the whole point of existence getting to some difficult to define ‘happily ever after’ place. Quite the contrary, I think making ‘happily ever after’ something to chase resulted in a lot of personal unhappiness.

I don’t actually understand why happiness seems so much more common now that I’m not chasing it…but it does tend to be the experience I am having.

Unfolding like spring flowers.

The loveliness of simply being.

I am okay right now. It wasn’t my best evening. I enjoyed the day in relative physical comfort. By the time I arrived home, after a chilly drizzly commute, I was in pain and irritable. If I could fold time, I would put this moment, here, adjacent to my arrival, and perhaps enjoy myself and my family more, being in a better mood, and less pain. I’m not complaining, and I don’t recall being unpleasant, just in pain and perhaps too tired to be more considerate with my phrasing; I know it takes a lot to hurt my traveling partner’s feelings, and I know I succeeded. I will make amends in the morning, learn from the experience and move on. It’s okay to treat myself with great care, even though I feel badly about the evening going a bit sideways, and I have spent the evening gently, managing my pain, watching South Park, and writing. It was my intention to do these things when I arrived home hurting so much, and it’s pretty satisfying to find that good self-care has indeed helped a lot, although I am still in too much pain to be able to sleep just yet; yoga will help with that a lot, and meditation afterward is a nice way to finish the day.

Every time something works out just a bit better, I take time to really appreciate it, notice it, and hold onto the experience for some minutes. I ‘let it soak in’. I make a point of continuing those practices, and even investing more time in those that are regularly part of some new moment of personal success. In the most difficult moments, I am sometimes very briefly so bitter and hurt that I am unsure these things really matter, or that I am actually making progress day-to-day. The doubts are incredibly painful, and I am very relieved each time I get past that moment, to this place when ‘I am okay right now’, and able to enjoy the moment of progress, or resilience, or emotional safety – successes, all.

Stormy sky, quiet evening.

Stormy sky, quiet evening.

I feel more vulnerable sharing successes, than I do ‘failures’, or learning experiences. Vulnerable is okay, too. It’s a nice evening.

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Categories Brain Injury, Love, Mindfulness, pain, Perspective, Post Traumatic Stress, Relationships, The Big 5

Silhouettes

February 20, 2015 //
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Yesterday was a pretty good day. The evening, too, was gentle and pleasant. My overall level of pain felt manageable, and by the end of the day my anxiety had almost entirely dissipated. I enjoyed the walk between the office and the train station, taking time to appreciate the subtle colors of the cloudy sky.

Evening sky on a strangely warm winter evening.

Evening sky on a strangely warm winter evening.

Initially, it seemed quite nice to hear from a faraway old friend on such a mellow evening. Life’s curriculum isn’t always an obvious lesson at the outset. My boundaries were quickly tested with OPD (Other People’s Drama), and firmly reinforcing those boundaries resulted in conversational strategies I find objectionable: manipulation, wild assumptions used as ‘proof’, personal attacks, assertions regarding the thoughts or intentions of others unsupported by confirmation, and even deceit – followed up by a demand that I involve myself in this friend’s personal drama by taking actions on their behalf, in the context of circumstances I am not part of, have no exposure to, and do not care to participate in, regardless. I ended the conversation when it was clear it was not a frank one; hidden agendas irritate me.

Like a tree silhouetted against the sky, I see that I am no longer who I once was.

Like a tree silhouetted against the sky, I see who I am now.

I found it relatively easy not to become involved. Setting those boundaries didn’t feel as difficult as it once might have. I didn’t get sucked in – although I am contemplating the conversation, itself, even now (learning from it matters that much). Considering the potential end of a friendship doesn’t feel very comfortable – but I am not to be used, taken advantage of, or made into a tool or weapon for someone else’s gain, without my explicit consent and willingness to participate. I would have thought that was an obvious thing – but to be fair, it wasn’t obvious ‘before’, so why assume it is now?

I didn’t go on the offensive with my friend in conversation, but I did ask clarifying questions about the assumptions being made, and point out where life experience (my own) suggested specific assumptions must be verified, rather than acted upon, because they didn’t seem rational, or likely to be correct. Admittedly, pointing out logical fallacies isn’t always the most tactful choice in conversation, but it can be done gently and with reasonable good-nature and a positive approach, to further the conversation with greater clarity – and a disinhibiting TBI makes it damned difficult not to point an obvious logical fallacy, at least for me. When clarifying questions result in personal attacks, I know it’s time to set a firm boundary and walk away.

Perspective matters; we are each having our own experience.

Perspective matters; we are each having our own experience.

Now what? Well, now I have more information than I wanted to about this friend’s circumstances, behavior, and thinking on some sensitive topics – about which we clearly have very different values and understanding. Now I am aware that this friend may be more interested in how I can be useful, than how I’m doing these days. I found the conversation so off-putting in both content and outcome, that I am wondering what the state of this friendship really is…and whether it is actually a friendship, at all.  When we change and grow our friends don’t always come along on the journey; I still find that very hard to take, sometimes.

Sometimes there's more to it than circumstances; we choose much of our experience.

There’s more to it than circumstances; we choose so much of our experience.

It’s a lovely morning, and a new day. I slept pretty well, and woke feeling rested. No anxiety this morning, which is always a nice thing. Always. My coffee cup is hot in my hands, a pleasant sensation in the morning chill. The house is quiet. The weekend is only hours away. Today is a good day to accept change, and turn the page on life’s text-book to the next lesson.

 

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Categories Anxiety, Brain Injury, Free Will, Healthy Living, Logic & Reason, Metaphors, Mindfulness, Perspective, Post Traumatic Stress, Relationships, The Big 5, women, Words

Quite Deliberate and Willful

February 19, 2015 //
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This morning I woke with anxiety riding shotgun. I woke early, and abruptly, feeling unable to take a breath. In the face of imminent panic, I managed to grab hold of the nearest practice – in this case, simply breathing – and focused on that, instead of the anxiety.

“Anxiety” 10″ x 14″ acrylic on canvas w/ceramic 2011

“Anxiety” 10″ x 14″ acrylic on canvas w/ceramic 2011

With the first deep breath, in and then slowly out, I observed the quiet environment, and the lack of immediate threats to my safety or wellness.

With the second, I observed my own body and state of being, finding and gently letting go of tension, then self-soothing by improving my posture, and comforting myself with reminders to be present, now, and letting the safety and comfort of the moment soak into my awareness more fully.

With the third breath I acknowledged Anxiety traveling with me this morning, and instead of panic, I gave myself a mental pat on the back for dealing with her – and my PTSD – so well these past couple days.  I took a moment to refresh my understanding that my TBI sometimes prevents my chemistry from appropriately returning to baseline because the inhibition/disinhibition circuitry – and other executive functions – are impaired; this too will pass, but it may take longer than I’d like, and I’ll probably have to help it along.

By the time I complete 5 deep cleansing breaths, my heart stopped pounding, and the surreal terror eased. Was it something in my dreams that woke me so badly? It hardly matters. I am okay, and a new day is beginning. I anticipate the anxiety may come and go today, as it eases over hours without new stimuli. I smile realizing that it feels almost natural… almost easy… to take care of me in the face of my anxiety. It is quite deliberate, very structured, almost ritualistic, extremely practiced, and in no way ‘natural’ or ‘easy’ – but it is lovely that it feels that it easy, and that’s more than enough to bring a smile to my face, this morning as I sit with my coffee, quite alone, and recognizing anxiety as merely an emotion, rather than envisioning it as some powerful super-being capable of destroying worlds.

The tools and practices I have invested so much time and study in really do make a difference. Using SuperBetter regularly helps me stay focused on practicing good self-care practices, and reminds me of all the variety there is in self-care tools and skills, and in creative ways to break problem patterns of thinking and behavior. Directing entertainment consumption towards the educational (TED Talks, SciShow…) has proven helpful, too; the brain is a sort of ‘use it or lose it’ tool, itself, and the sharpest elders I know are people who continue learning well into their elder years as a lifelong passion.

…And then there’s love.  I don’t want to overlook or underestimate the value of supportive relationships, emotional nurturing by loved ones, the comfort in someone listening, or the emotional safety in being accepted and loved – exactly as I am.  Being loved is a bit like buried pirate treasure, though; even though I suspected it might be ‘out there’, and even with a map that had a spot marked ‘X’ to point the way, it took some searching and some persistence, mostly because I did not understand that the love I most yearned for above all others needed to come from me, and until I found my way to that safe haven, no searching would ever turn up the pirate treasure of romantic love in the arms of another (because, even if someone loved me that much, in that way, I would struggle to recognize and feel it, having no similar feeling about myself).

It’s a lovely morning, and a good day to tell anxiety to take a hike – I will choose, instead, to walk with love, deliberately and willfully. Today is a good day to practice good practices, and to take care of me. Today is a good day to enjoy what works, and improve on what doesn’t work so well. Today is a good day to change the way I deal with my world.

 

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Categories Anxiety, Brain Injury, Free Will, Healthy Living, Love, Metaphors, Mindfulness, Perspective, Post Traumatic Stress, Relationships, The Big 5, women
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