Archives for posts with tag: love
« Older Entries
Newer Entries »

A Hearty Helping of Love

June 13, 2015 //
0

I am sipping my coffee and enjoying thoughts of love, Love, and lovers. I am smiling and thinking about my exceptionally pleasant day, yesterday. My traveling partner came around after work to take me to dinner. We walked to a nearby restaurant and enjoyed an excellent meal. We talked, laughed, hung out… it was an excellent day, generally, full of well-wishes from faraway friends, sunshine, and a sense of good-natured camaraderie in the office, and joy at home. It was, in all respects, quite an excellent birthday.

A beautiful day for a birthday.

A beautiful day for a birthday.

No huge party? Nope. No lavish frivolities wrapped in colorful paper? Nope. No exotic destination vacation or ludicrous expenditures of some sort? Nope, none of that either. I got exactly what I wanted for my birthday; a great day, filled with love and affection, and connected intimate time with my traveling partner. Love is wonderful stuff. I made sure to give generously in my own direction, too. Staying on top of small details of self-care, investing throughout the day in the evening that had not yet arrived (nothing messes with romance like being cranky over some bullshit that could have been skillfully managed earlier in the day). Indeed, generally speaking I treated myself quite well and with great affection all day – a practice I am working to maintain as a habit. 🙂

A day full of choices, walking my own path.

A day full of choices, walking my own path.

The air-conditioner sitting in my living space this morning will be installed later today. Quite an excellent birthday present – and an investment in longer term quality of life and well-being. My traveling partner really looks out for me, and managed to stay in the spirit of my birthday wish for “something for my home” – and taking that in a direction I hadn’t even contemplated. It is an extraordinary gesture of love and understanding of my needs; this little apartment is very near perfect for me in most respects, but it does get quite uncomfortably hot on a warm day when the sun is beating down on the roof in the afternoon, and the open windows let in spiders as well as breezes…and quite possible more of the spiders than the cooling breezes, honestly.

The delights of the day are as flowers in the garden of my heart.

The delights of the day are as flowers in the garden of my heart.

Practical love. Romantic love. Passionate love. Platonic love. Familial love. I check off all the sorts of love I have known, myself, smiling because every sort of love I know how to feel (having felt them), I feel in the context of my relationship with my traveling partner. Every milestone I hit in life I find myself grateful to share so much of it with him. Lovers of such wit, tenderness, consideration and depth of character are not common in my experience… I find myself wondering where I fit, myself, on the spectrum of love and lovers; what will I do to return such skilled and extraordinary love in full measure? Learning to treat myself similarly well seems a good starting point – how better to understand treating someone else well, than to treat myself very well, without compromising kindness to others, consideration, respect, compassion or reciprocity? My traveling partner makes it look easy – I know better than to assume it is. There are verbs involved. Will. Choices. Commitment. Patience. Practice. Love, like life, is a journey – and it turns out that Love is one journey I can share – once I started down the path on my own.  Learning that I can’t love another any more skillfully than I love myself was a very big deal. There’s still so much to learn about Love.

Small moments of kindness, pleasure, and delight fill my heart when I allow them to fill my experience.

Small moments of kindness, pleasure, and delight fill my heart when I allow them to fill my experience.

Love? Yeah, that’s one amazing birthday present right there. I’ll have more please… 🙂

Tags , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , ,
Categories Free Will, gardening, Healthy Living, Love, Metaphors, Mindfulness, Perspective, Relationships, Roses, solo hiking, Summer, The Art of Being, The Big 5, Words

Shuffling the Deck

April 29, 2015 //
0

I slept well and deeply last night. I woke feeling stiff, and in pain, but in a generally positive place emotionally. It’s an ordinary enough Wednesday. I sip my coffee and consider how meaningless the sentence “It’s an ordinary enough Wednesday” actually is, if one does not know the meaning of the word ‘Wednesday’. It’s quite difficult to have a good quality discussion on a topic, if the participants don’t share a similar understanding of how the words being used are defined. It’s a huge part of the ‘each having our own experience’ puzzle; the way we understand the world, ourselves, and the way we use language have the potential to be misunderstood.

We are each having our own experience.

As with the definitions of words in the spoken and written language we use, our assumptions ‘about’ things and people going on around us define other characteristics of the world, and our experience; our assumptions are quite individual and personal, and may not be shared by others. The assumptions we each make may not even be ‘accurate’ when compared to what can be shown empirically, tested, or verified.

We are each having our own experience – and it may not be ‘real’… or to be more reasonable, it may not be anything at all like the experience a large percentage of other people are having, seem to be having, say they are having – or is being held out as some sort of defining ‘norm’. It’s our own. Exclusively and entirely ours – and mostly chosen, and often based on our assumptions. To be clear, I’m not attempting to say that we are ‘at fault’, ourselves, when someone else acts against us violently, or when we must endure non-consensual experiences inflicted upon us. We can make use of our free will to take action, and some of the actions taken in the world are inflicted on someone, by another, causing pain, injury, or assorted other negative outcomes.

Some of the most horrible things that occur in the world are defended, and often by a great many people, using assumptions and definitions to support them, while the suffering is decried by others, also based on assumptions and definitions. It’s messy. Who is ‘right’? Does the injured party define the circumstances because they are injured by them? Does an aggressor define the circumstances, free to do so based on ‘intent’ versus ‘outcome’? We each have our opportunity in life to examine this puzzle closely; we will each hurt someone, sometime, and we are each at some point hurt, ourselves. When we are hurt, does the intent of the one who hurt us matter more than our pain? When we have injured someone else, which thing is more significant to us: explaining why we didn’t mean our actions to cause injury, why our actions ‘shouldn’t have’ caused injury, or that someone is hurt? Is being ‘right’ more important than treating each other well?

We are each  having our own experience – and I can’t answer my questions for anyone but me, really. I am thinking these things over, myself, because ‘reciprocity’ is on my mind; it’s one of my Big 5 relationship values. Reciprocity, from my perspective, might mean everyone takes turns on a household task, or it might mean that one person does a specific thing routinely because they don’t mind or have unique skill at it, while others also take on tasks similarly suited to their nature in equal measure, thus distributing the work in a way that is balanced and fair to all. Reciprocity can mean ‘taking turns’. Reciprocity, emotionally, means I give support in equal measure to receiving it, and that I back my partners goals and growth equally with my own. “Equal”, “balanced”, “fair” and “reciprocal” are all words, and because we are individuals, we define them for ourselves, quite individually. My need for reciprocity is not necessarily shared by others; it is my own choice to value this quality in my relationships, and to foster it in my own experience. I choose whether to build relationships with individuals, and can’t force my values on them. Sitting here sipping my coffee and considering reciprocity as a relationship value I realize that one thing I think is utterly urgent to be reciprocal with is consideration, itself. Reciprocity is hard to achieve if I don’t take time to consider what has value to others, what their needs may be… Oh, damn. Another definition would be needed… “need” versus “want”.

Each having our own experience…and it hits me hard, as I down my last gulp of now cold coffee; if I am engaged and present in my own experience, awake, aware, and observing the experiences of others while doing so…making the wisest choices I can to take care of me, and meet my own needs over time…listening deeply when others interact with me…practicing non-harm, compassion, and self-compassion…treating myself truly well, and living beautifully…it sounds rather as if on those terms, reciprocity happens, consideration is, and The Big 5 dovetails quite seamlessly with The Art of Being. So…this tells me living my own experience fully, and mindfully walking my path each day is ‘all’ that is required to live a life that is generally contented and joyful. There’s definitely a lesson about attachment sneaking in there, too. My definitions, my values, my goals…your results may vary.

I am a flower, blooming in my own time.

I am a flower, blooming in my own time.

Today is a good day to enjoy the person in the mirror. Today is a good day to do my best. Today is a good day to build emotional resilience and self-sufficiency, appreciating how far I’ve come, and what a lovely journey it generally is. Today is a good day to listen deeply, to love well, and to savor being okay right now.

Tags , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , ,
Categories Brain Injury, Free Will, Healthy Living, Logic & Reason, Love, Mindfulness, Perspective, Post Traumatic Stress, Relationships, Spring, The Art of Being, The Big 5, Words

Forward Momentum

April 21, 2015 //
0

I slept rather poorly and feel a little groggy, and less sharp than usual. The morning is quiet and gentle on my consciousness. The house is still. I feel generally content, calm, and if not delighted, certainly I feel decently well and whole. My coffee tastes very good, and the heat of the cup warms my hands. I feel rather stiff, and movement is more awkward than I’d like it to be – and this will likely ease with a bit more yoga, some walking, and getting the day going. My pain is ‘managed’, and simply exists in the background in a less noteworthy way than it often does. Spring is here, summer on its way, and for a few weeks I will likely get some measure of relief from the worst of my pain, before autumn returns.

In general, this morning is quite lovely, relaxed, and quiet. This leisurely stillness and these few relaxed moments in the morning, are a favorite feature of life, for me.

In contrast with the stillness and calm of the morning, itself, I notice my bed is in a total state of disarray. Odd, because I often sleep in a very still way, without overturning or disturbing the covers  much at all – often enough, that it is quite characteristic of my sleep. Nights like last night look almost as if someone else slept in my bed, or perhaps a very small tornado hit just right there, in the middle of the bed. With the restless night behind me, I don’t stop to wonder ‘why’ or to probe the remnants of my dreams for answers. It isn’t truly relevant to my waking experience of ‘now’, and pursuing idle curiosity about forgotten dreams sometimes leads into darkness. I have no time for darkness, today.

Sometimes the path I walk seems well lit.

Sometimes the path I walk seems bathed in light.

There are quiet a few opportunities along my journey to choose to continue on, rather than taking the time to become mired in something painful, awkward, or unpleasant. Like any solo hike, I’m sort of ‘on my own’ in life, making my own choices, pursuing my own goals, learning the life lessons most relevant to me in the moment, and finding my own way out of the darkness. Solo hiking is good metaphor, here, especially because even solo hiking is rarely entirely utterly solitary throughout; we pass by each other on the trail, sometimes we walk alongside a friend and our journey is less solitary for some while, we have chance encounters with strangers on their own journeys, we reach out to others for connection, contact, or help. It’s still our own journey. We are each having our own experience. Life is a long solo hike through moments, hours, days, years…I am fortunate that, in spite of the chaos and damage, I know love.

Sometimes the path seems more challenging; it's helpful to have something to hold on to.

Sometimes the path seems more challenging; it’s helpful to have something to hold on to.

Knowing love, sometimes I find myself suffering; I occasionally blame love, itself, for my choice to suffer. It’s not actually the fault of love that I am capable of suffering over, or for, or about love; it’s a very human thing, tending to indicate I am unskilled at love and loving, more than saying anything about love’s own qualities.

Since we’re human beings, we make mistakes. We cause others to suffer. We hurt our loved ones, and we feel regret. But without making mistakes, there is no way to learn. If you can learn from your mistakes, then you have already transformed garbage into flowers. Very often, our mistakes come from our unskillfulness, and not because we want to harm one another.”

from “How to Love” by Thich Nhat Hanh

I continue to practice, to be a student of love, and to take to heart such wisdom as I find in the world that speaks to me. I continue to walk on, to walk it off, to walk away from what doesn’t work well for me, to continue toward practices and choices that work well for me, and tend to strengthen my ability to love, and to love well. I’m not seeking an achievement, a goal, an award, or any recognition on this one; it is the journey that matters, and the choices I make along the way. I regularly stumble on missed ‘take care of me, first’ moments, as if not noticing a snag along a trail; I learn from each miss how important good self-care is, whether it is taking my Rx medication on time, keeping an eye on my blood sugar, getting enough rest, or simply showing myself some kindness in the face of some mistake or another. I am only able to love well when I am also very high on my list of people I love…really high on my list. Like… first. Sure, sometimes I do find it hard to put me at the top of my list; the effort to do so, and to treat myself truly well, pays off in how much more easily I am able to love others when I am well-cared for from within. Experience suggests that when I care for myself well, and treat myself with kindness and affection, I am also easier to love. So…no down side to treating myself well, then. 🙂

One moment of many; an opportunity to breathe, to observe, and to be.

One moment of many; an opportunity to breathe, to observe, and to be.

It’s a lovely day for forward momentum, and a lovely day to walk my own path. Today is a good day to enjoy my experience of myself, and to embrace and nurture the qualities of heart and mind that I value in myself.  Today is a good day to smile at strangers and wish them well; they are each walking a path of their own choosing, toward an unknown destination, and worthy of well-wishes wishes, consideration, and good-natured regard. Today is a good day to look ahead with gratitude and appreciation. Today is a good day to change the world.

I am the hiker. I am the flower along the trail.

I am the hiker. I am the flower along the trail.

Tags , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , ,
Categories Brain Injury, Free Will, Healthy Living, Love, Metaphors, Mindfulness, Oregon Trails, Perspective, Post Traumatic Stress, Relationships, Sleepless Nights, solo hiking, Spring, The Art of Being, 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.

Tags , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , ,
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.

Tags , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , ,
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
« Older Entries
Newer Entries »