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Filters and Lenses

March 31, 2015 //
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Do I see what I see through honest eyes, or is it filtered through my experience, and my own limited awareness and understanding?

Do I see what I see through honest eyes, or is it filtered through my experience, and my own limited awareness and understanding?

I woke this morning to the sound of an audible ‘click’. I often do, but don’t know what the sound is caused by. Perhaps a door elsewhere, or the timer on my aquarium, or some other commonplace occurrence that I simply haven’t placed or clearly identified – because I am asleep when I hear it. This particular morning, when I woke, my emotional world careened around within myself in an almost dizzying way; residual emotions from dreams colliding with in-the-moment reactions to sensations and awaking, leftover random moments of emotion from earlier hours – or days – left piled up in the unswept corners of my consciousness, stirred together, mixed and shaken, as I wake up. It is far too easy to take this bit of ’emotional seasickness’ personally, first thing in the morning, and more than one otherwise lovely morning has been wrecked by emotions that got the best of me – even though I had no idea why I actually felt the way I did.

This morning I am playing a quiet game of ‘being my own best friend’ and sipping my coffee and hanging out with me, unconcerned that my emotions feel unsettled, uninterested in exploring them further, and choosing instead to relax with me for a while, and enjoy some of the very cool things about this woman who I am.

I find myself thinking about a very fancy camera I had once had – long before the age of the digital camera, and back when analog film drove the decisions about how many pictures I could reasonably afford to take, and to get interesting effects, or special shots, I lugged around a camera bag full of filters and lenses. It’s an interesting metaphor. Even in our thinking, we use ‘filters’ and ‘lenses’ to sort through what we see, and to determine how we understand it. More than once I’ve messed with my own head, and caused myself a lot of needless suffering, because my perspective (a filter, right?) or awareness (a lens?) were not well-suited to the experience of the moment.

I don’t really know where it takes this metaphor, but when I take pictures these days, they are most often available light shots, free of effects or ‘fun’ filters; I want most to capture the quality of light – of life – in a moment, just as it is. This, I find, is also a very nice way to treat my own heart – although less simple, once I have stepped from metaphor to action, sometimes. This morning the time taken to get my balance, and my bearings, and secure emotional footing before rushing off to face the day seems like a nice way to start a new day.

Today is a good day to view things through a different filter, and through a cleaner lens. Today is a good day to enjoy who I already am, in this moment right now, and see where the day takes me. Today is a good day for love and lovers – and a bigger picture.

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Categories Brain Injury, Logic & Reason, Metaphors, Mindfulness, Perspective, Post Traumatic Stress, Relationships, Spring, The Big 5, Words

Homecoming

March 30, 2015 //
0

I’ve been ‘homesick’ for a long time, decades, actually. It’s not exactly ‘homesick’ as in missing some place I once was, or still call home… it’s homesick for a specific sense of ‘home’ that I’ve experienced only rarely. I have moments when I feel this particular feeling of ‘home’, and it fills me up and nourishes my soul in a way I don’t have quite the right words for. I don’t yearn for it continuously, or seek it with any regular method or pace. The feeling comes and goes. When the homesick feeling arrives it feels as if it were there in the background, already. When it dissipates I am relieved, and continue on as if it never were, and I go on enjoying the moments that feel like home.

I sometimes feel a sense of being at home when I am sitting quietly, watching the fish in my aquarium.

I sometimes feel a sense of being at home when I am sitting quietly, watching the fish in my aquarium.

During my lunch walk I considered thoughts of ‘home’ and what ‘feels like home’ to me, as an individual. I walked, smiling, feeling the fresh spring breezes tickle my skin with the fringe of over-grown bangs I chronically tuck behind my ears. I felt the sun warm my face, and enjoy the way it glows through the new spring leaves along my way. My way. That feels like home, too. I stopped to swing on the swings in the park for a few minutes before walking on.

Is being at home a feeling I take with me?

Simple pleasures feel like home...

Simple pleasures feel like home…

Is being at home something one practices?

There's more than one perspective on 'home'...

There’s more than one perspective on ‘home’…

Do we ‘find our way home’, or do we ‘build the home of our dreams’?

Life's curriculum wrapped in spring breezes and blue skies - I'm okay with that.

Life’s curriculum wrapped in spring breezes and blue skies – I’m okay with that.

Is home ‘where the heart is’? What does that actually mean? An interesting thought to finish the evening; a meditation on home and heart.

Today is just about finished, here. Where will tomorrow take me? What will I learn? Will I wake and find the day as gentle and amenable to growth as I have found the evening? Tonight I close my eyes, smiling, wishing the world well, and hoping everyone gets home safely.

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Categories Healthy Living, Metaphors, Mindfulness, Perspective, Words

Today Is Unlike Any Other

March 30, 2015 //
0
Moments lack permanence.

Moments lack permanence.

Today is unlike any other day, because it is uniquely always ‘now’; it is today. Yesterday is among so many other past days.  They queue up in an orderly fashion, following rules of time and the passage of time; yesterday has become memory, lacking in substance. Tomorrow, too, is without substance, stretching infinitely ahead with the rest of future events, lacking even the ‘reality’ of memory, of having once been… Tomorrow is only a thought of things to come, and perhaps a bit of planning built on what isn’t yet happening at all, and may not, ever.

Really, we’ve only got ‘now’, ‘today’, to work with in any practical way. We can apologize for past events – there’s a lot of that going on, day-to-day, among well-meaning people. We can make promises or plans for the future – some of us crave more of that than others. Some of us see-saw between past hurts and a future more distant from those. Some of us balance delicately between past joys and a future that feels more uncertain. Perhaps we all do some of both?

I find it easy to look past today without intending to. The outcome is generally that I have less ability to affect my future willfully, and less perspective on a past I can’t change.

Today tends always to have the potential for action, for change, for the moment to bring will and choice together with a verb or two…neither yesterday nor tomorrow afford us that chance. I guess the puzzle is how best to learn from all those yesterdays, to plan a tomorrow in which I thrive – and to do so in a way that provides me an opportunity to take action today to bring me closer to where I most want to be…but to also do so without striving, or attachment.

Life’s lessons about attachment, specifically, are brutally difficult – at least for me, at least today. Oh, there are easy moments of clear vision and contentment, confident that the path ahead of me is paved, mapped, and free of obstacles. That, too, is an illusion. It is as illusory as the more difficult moments when it feels like I am wading knee deep in chaos and damage, in the darkness, with my eyes closed, banging my shins and stubbing my toes on a real life that is only to happy to keep moving the fucking furniture around or changing the rules.

This too will pass. Change, unavoidably, is. What will become of me? Whatever I make of me. And what of love? Well…love will attend to its own affairs if I attend skillfully to mine. Love, too, simply is. The challenge there is holding love’s flame within, trusting that the heart’s pilot light can’t really be blown out so easily. A friend recently wrote some beautiful words about love I am still finding relevant in this moment.

Today is a good day for perspective. Today is a good day to practice good practices, and good processes, and to trust incremental change over time. Today is a good day to take care of my heart with the same tenderness I would give to anyone else. Change is. Change always is – and it is always ‘today’. Today I’ll make the most of that.

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Categories Anxiety, Brain Injury, Free Will, Love, Mindfulness, Perspective, Relationships, Spring, The Big 5, Words

Breathe

March 28, 2015 //
0

I am okay right now. Easy or hard doesn’t matter in this moment.

It's a journey.

It’s a journey.

I’ve spent the day on my own. It’s not what I needed for myself, but my needs are not the only needs worthy of consideration. It’s not as if I don’t want more time for my own agenda, and I took the day as an opportunity, convenient to enjoying some things that aren’t always so easy to fit into the day-to-day routine. I traveled across town to a favorite shop, and contemplated other fish, other aquariums, and made pleasant conversation with the people there.

A quiet place to sit, in the back, becomes another moment of stillness and contemplation.

A quiet place to sit, in the back, becomes another moment of stillness and contemplation.

I walked the 4 miles from the shop, across the river, across the downtown area, and enjoyed the sites along the way. “Walking it off” is another good practice for me; the longer and farther I walk, the calmer and more regular my breathing becomes, and I gain perspective, and my thinking shifts toward increased compassion, empathy, even – sometimes – real wisdom. That’s a lovely feeling.

Open eyes, open mind, and engaged in simple presence in the moment, a worthy choice any day.

Open eyes, open mind, and engaged in simple presence in the moment, a worthy choice any day.

Sitting quietly, just breathing, I spent much of the afternoon and evening meditating. I have a lovely view for the purpose; my aquarium sits in front of my favorite place to sit while I meditate. Is it the aquarium itself that makes the location so pleasant? It could be that, it could be that this is the place I associate with calm, and safety, and stillness just generally, in my every day life. It’s been a good day for stillness. In truth, in every practical respect it has simply been a good day. Emotions foul the waters of calm perspective and loving joy, now and then, a harsh reality of shared living among other humans. We are each having our own experience, and quite rightly the experience we are each having, ourselves, is the one upon which we are most focused, and the one of which we are most aware. Our own pain hurts worse than any other. That can really mess with a good connection.

Emotion and reason; it's a complicated balance.

Emotion and reason; it’s a complicated balance.

There’s always love, though, and words about love, and the inspiration that words about love can provide…and the soul-healing reminder that love is.

I meditate, and meditate more. I don’t worry that it isn’t ‘fancy’ or that it isn’t following some specific guided meditation of some sort; I am awake, aware, and breathing. I am here. Now. I am okay.

They live, each moment what it is, safe in their private world.

They live, each moment what it is, safe in their private world.

I breathe, and become still and calm. Fish swim.

I often wonder at the content of their consciousness; they are aware of me.

I often wonder at the content of their consciousness; they are aware of me.

I breathe, and let the stillness fill me, and wrap me in contentment. Life doesn’t have any requirement to be more perfect than it is. There is value in ‘learning to swim’ the powerful tides of heartfelt emotion, and to float on the currents of change, buoyant even in stormy weather.

What I see has so much to do with what I look for.

What I see has so much to do with what I look for.

It’s a still and quiet evening, and rather different than I had expected it might be, from the vantage point of days before; hanging on to expectations creates discontent and struggle, where none need be. I breathe. I let it go. If ‘enough’ truly is enough, then this moment is complete, just as it is. I am safe. It is a quiet still moment. I live. I love. I am loved in return.

I need space, too, and time for stillness.

I need space, too, and time for stillness.

I am okay right now. It’s enough.

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Categories Anxiety, art and the artist, Brain Injury, Free Will, Logic & Reason, Love, Metaphors, Mindfulness, Oregon Trails, pain, Perspective, Post Traumatic Stress, Relationships, The Big 5, Uncategorized, Words

Some Days the Nightmares Win

March 27, 2015 //
1

Disclaimer: This post is about emotions. I sometimes work through them more easily with words, in text, that I can see reflecting the experience back at me. It is a way of getting perspective. This post, though, may be a downer – I say that before I even write it, because I am having my own experience, and I feel what I feel in this moment. I am so very human. So…do yourself a huge favor, take a moment for ‘informed consent’; if you are in a place emotionally where someone else’s pain and struggling may wound you, throw off a good vibe you are enjoying, or change your experience for the worse, I recommend skipping this one. Hey, if nothing else, the writing is likely to be of poor quality, and angst-y, and rife with spelling errors and weird grammar fails – who needs that on a Friday morning? I’ll understand, I promise.

Still here? Okay…

Some other morning, a coffee.

Some other morning, a coffee.

I woke crying this morning. I fell asleep crying last night. In between, I found myself ambushed by Demons in The Nightmare City. This is not an emotional space I want to occupy. I am frustrated by my lack of resilience, my lack of emotional regulation, and my lack of perspective. I feel sad. I feel angry. I feel resentful and let down. I feel. Yeah. I definitely feel. I feel mistreated, and mislead. I feel set up and I feel sabotaged. I feel hurt.

“That’s a whole lot of feelings there, lady, what gives?” I’m a human primate. I am an emotional being more than a rational one – it’s a balance. Today it isn’t balancing as well as I’d like. Stress kicks my ass, being hurt kicks my ass, abrupt change kicks my ass – and it takes me a little time to recover, even with some support. Emotions are not criminal actions. Assaulting people with them is, I hear, avoidable. That sounds like fine thing to me, and I turned the little sign on my door this morning to ‘do not disturb’, meditated a while, had a shower, meditated some more… I still don’t want to be as disturbed as I feel, right now. The sign didn’t do much to help with the feelings, but by design it may prevent anyone else from walking through the mess I woke to, within, this morning.

Meditation, mindfulness practices, good basic self-care are all going a long way to improve my experience of me, very nicely. I feel a momentary hurt, recalling with sadness how quickly encouragement turned to criticism, a few months after I began this journey. I was taking a moment to feel proud of my progress, and I was feeling pretty impressed with new tools and practices being effective at helping me on a level nothing else ever had… I got called ‘smug’. I was incredibly hurt. Admittedly, I had been foolishly trying to explain or share the experience with someone else… maybe they hadn’t asked? (I suck at that – put a person in front of me and I will probably just start talking. Are you aware that your executive function manages that for you?) It hurt, nonetheless, and since then I am self-conscious about feeling encouraged by progress, and reluctant to share positive feelings about it in conversations. (Sticks and stones? Fuck right off; words matter.)

I feel confused. “Emptied out”. I feel overburdened by unmet emotional needs piling up over time. I feel like I am not making the progress I could be, right now. It’ll be okay, I think – I hold on to that tightly. I’ve got the hotline number in my pocket, just in case it gets too hard.  I lost a beautiful niece to suicide this year, and I see how it hurts my cousin every day she is without her daughter; I won’t put my traveling partner through that, and I can take the steps to avoid it. Despair is a motherfucker – it is part of our human experience.

...and another...

…and another…

I can’t be certain that the intensity of my emotions this morning reflects something ‘real’ or necessary; they are only emotions. For all I know, this is a 100% bio-chemical experience with no grounding in events or experience. Does that matter in the moment? Well, sure. It matters the way anything true ‘matters’. One true thing is that my emotions are this intense, and unpredictably so. Another true thing is that my emotions, and lack of top-down control, are incredibly uncomfortable for some people to live with. (I don’t get a choice, myself; this is my experience and I live it.) Unfortunately, in a live and unscripted real-life environment, I also don’t get much compassion specific to the ‘invisible’ issues associated with my TBI or PTSD. I rarely fight for it; if it isn’t there to be offered, begging for it, pleading for it or wishing it were there will not make it appear. Compassion can be taught – but that phenomenon also requires an active learner. Change is, but forcing it on someone isn’t appropriate – and generally isn’t effective.

My traveling partner encourages and supports me – he frankly provides a level of emotional support that I can only describe as ‘super human’ – but the environment in the household, generally, is unhealthy for me. I feel aggravated and moody about looking for a place of my own, because I’d honestly prefer to continue living with my traveling partner – he’s wonderful to live with [for me]. I am painfully aware, though, that living with me can be hard on him. Right now so much of what I am working through touches on sexuality, gender, individual identity, boundary setting/management, and relationships with others that it’s harder to treat each other gently in moments when we need it most from each other. So…yeah. I need to be on my own a while – not a break up, not even a separation, just a different living arrangement. It still sucks to hurt over it. I hope by day’s end I am embracing it in good spirits.

I leave other household members out of this, generally; I am writing about my own experience and the other people in it are entitled to be free of public scrutiny of their values and choices filtered through my chaos and damage. But…I am not willing to continue to over-compromise my needs, or undercut my values to keep peace, and the time I spend in the arms of my loves is too precious to taint it with OPD, or games. As a population of individuals, we don’t want or need the same things, and at 52 I have no time to waste on fighting to get the most basic emotional needs met; we are not all equally committed to that endeavor. I don’t yet have the emotional resilience to hold enough in reserve to continue to take care of me when common place bullshit goes sideways, and often find myself without any emotional reserves left to care for me, myself, by the time I have a moment to do so. I feel positive about the choice to get my own place…and for the moment, sad that it is necessary at all.

You know what I don’t feel? I don’t feel guilt or shame over the choice to move out, it needs to happen; I don’t thrive in an environment in which my emotional quality of life is poor. Hell, right now in this moment… I’m okay. (Thanks, Dearheart!) My tears have dried. I’m not feeling social, but I’m not enthralled by Demons in The Nightmare City.  (If I knew that I would have the kind of nightmares that I had last night, in nights to come, I’d never sleep again.) I don’t have the headache that followed me around all day yesterday, which is a huge improvement.  My coffee tastes good – I feel a pang of sadness sweep over me when I realize I won’t have an espresso machine in my kitchen for some time to come after I move; it will be a frugal lifestyle, focused on painting, meditation, and love. Wow. Suddenly that sounds fucking amazing – and all over again I wonder why this hurts at all. I enjoy solitude. I dislike drama. I have musical and culinary tastes that are not shared in the household at large… and I miss a good French press in the morning; it’s a lovely ritual to prepare coffee that way, time it carefully, enjoy the outcome at leisure… I miss living a gentle life. (The most humorous thing about that is how little time I have ever spent living that kind of exceptional quality of life – across years and relationships, I can’t really pin down more than a total of about 18 months that qualify as ‘gentle living’ in 52 years!

I’ve already found my way to a better place. It’s nice. No rushing, either; I’ve made changes to my schedule, effective this week, intended to dial down some of the fatigue-related stress, and don’t have to rush off so soon on Friday mornings. Have you actually read this far? Are you okay? Thank you for being interested, curious, or concerned enough to come all this way with me – whether just this morning, or over these past couple years. I appreciate it. You help me feel heard.

Yeah. Some days, the nightmares win. Today they didn’t. 🙂

Because love matters more. "Emotion and Reason" 24″ x 36″ acrylic on canvas w/ceramic details and glow 2012

Because love matters more.
“Emotion and Reason” 24″ x 36″ acrylic on canvas w/ceramic details and glow 2012

Today is a good day to put down some baggage. Today is a good day to practice good self-care. Today is a good day for self-compassion – first, not last. Today is a good day to enjoy this amazing woman I am becoming without competition, dread, or games. Today is a good day to treat others well, and understand that they are walking their own path; their story, and experience, are not mine to endure, to manage, or to criticize – and participation is a choice.

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Categories Anxiety, art and the artist, Brain Injury, Free Will, grief, Healthy Living, Logic & Reason, Love, Metaphors, Mindfulness, more than a little bit of bitching, pain, Perspective, Post Traumatic Stress, Rape, Relationships, Sleepless Nights, Spring, The Big 5, women, Words
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