Archives for posts with tag: OPD

Listening and Loving

September 7, 2015 //

I am sipping my coffee and staring at the text window; this morning words don’t come so easily. My thoughts are focused on painting (and love), even right at this moment, and I am finding it challenging to write. My writing is a helpful practice that tends to keep me centered, and certainly anchors me and provides me with perspective. I’m reluctant to move on without putting words in an order, and clicking ‘Publish’. Interesting side note: I have not yet written the title (usually it is the title that is the first thing, providing me with a notion, or a theme, or a bit of humor).

I found myself exploring thoughts that seemed relevant and suitable for sharing…but as I attempted to devise some titular foothold to begin the thing with, it all sort of unraveled and evaporated, losing any coherence. I’m not frustrated. I’m not even puzzled or disappointed. I am, however, back to staring at an empty text box…so I begin with that. I have the subtle suspicion that this is ‘cheating’… then remember that the rules are my own, and decide that it is not.

What matters most?

(Sometime later…)

My writing was interrupted by the unexpected arrival of my traveling partner. We enjoyed some hang out time over coffee, talking, and listening to music. I don’t really have the vocabulary or poetry to convey how precious the time we spend together is; we share a profound connection that has depth and strength well beyond what I understand how to communicate – or fully appreciate. This morning was chill and comfortable and close, and met a lot of needs for me (and some for him, based on his frank appreciation and gratitude). After we’d finished with our coffees, he headed home to continue his weekend projects, and I sat down to return to my writing and find myself in a very different emotional place, feeling well-loved, warmly regarded, emotionally nurtured, intellectually valued, and eager to continue my creative weekend. Totally worth taking a break from writing. 🙂

Today is a good day to listen deeply. Today is a good day for loving kindness and emotional intimacy. Today is a good day to appreciate and value love. Today is a good day to treat each other gently, and deliver on the promises we make to love.

Tags bitches be trippin', coffee in the morning, consider your words - but not while you're listening to someone else's, drama free zone, emotional intimacy, I love the way you love me, love and lovers, loving kindness, OPD, p.s. I love you, sharing the experience, The Art of Being, The Big 5

Categories Art, art and the artist, autumn, Free Will, Love, Metaphors, Mindfulness, Perspective, Relationships, The Art of Being, The Big 5, Uncategorized

Lingering After-Effects

July 16, 2015 //

I am fortunate that I slept last night. I wasn’t sure I would when I laid down to attempt it. An unexpected rise in the OPD [Other People’s Drama] levels in my life occurred on an order of magnitude sufficient to rouse my PTSD, and it hit me hard and derailed my pleasant evening.

I find myself making a funny face in response to calling it ‘unexpected’, when I consider the source; some people are OPD embodied, and once identified the only thing unexpected is that I found myself mired in it again. It’s morning, though, and I did sleep, and my coffee is hot and tasty… it’s very tempting to stand in the patio doorway and shout into the dawn “You have no power over me!!” It would feel good. It would feel affirming. It would feel powerful. It would be dishonest – because I sit here, even now, concerned for my traveling partner and how he is treated by an entirely other human being than myself, and struggling to let it go. Truly, it’s not my relationship, not my drama, not my experience, and realistically I know the healthiest thing for me is to trust my traveling partner to take care of himself and make the best possible choices that meet his needs over time, and simply be here for him if he turns to me for help.

It’s hard to stand by and watch someone I love being chronically mistreated. I sometimes find myself feeling guilty for leaving a bad situation, myself… I know what long-term abusive behavior can do to one’s heart, mind, and soul – and there’s nothing of value to be had from that experience, besides leaving it behind with lessons learned. It is, of course, my own perspective on things, and because I have been more severely abused in other prior relationships and bear witness quite personally to the damage done, my testimony itself may be suspect – I am damaged, and it colors my perception. This doesn’t make me ‘wrong’ or ‘incorrect’ or lacking in ability to share my experience then (or now) – but it gives people who want to doubt me quite a lot of basis to support their doubt if they choose to. That’s more OPD in the making right there; putting doubt in my path as a sort of mirror of damage reflecting into another mirror of damage, and me sandwiched between defending my perspective and wondering what’s real.

I know some things from experience. I know leaving an abusive relationship behind doesn’t result in immediate cessation of suffering, nor guarantee healing – there are verbs upon verbs, and much practicing to be done to return to a state of wholeness and wellness. I know living in the context of abuse and mistreatment has literally no positive qualities to be had – and that people who are abusive may or may not ever change their behavior (or their intent), and whether they do or not, the damage is done. I know that I alone have the power to choose to walk away from being abused – and no one, however close to me, can make that happen, or ‘fix’ what doesn’t work on my behalf – and I know this truth is quite true for everyone who chooses to love someone who mistreats them. However much I love my traveling partner – I can’t rescue him from being mistreated in a relationship with someone else. That frustrates me, and the process of ‘being there’ for him when he needs emotional support re-exposes my own wounds, and my PTSD symptoms flare up with all the potential to wreck my experience – in spite of having walked away from the most recent direct source of that particular sort of chaos and damage. I know that my first order of business is taking care of me; I can’t be there to provide support to those I love without putting my own oxygen mask on first.

The lingering after-effects of emotional or physical abuse are quite lasting for me, reaching out from the distant past to strike me in my present, taking me by surprise when I think I am safe. “You have no power over me!” is what I want to shout to the demons in the darkness – if I do, they will titter in the background, amused by my presumption; they are as powerful as ever, and every single day of joy I experience is taken from them by force: force of will, force of good practices, force of good choices, and the utter necessity to choose to turn away from them (whoever embodies them in my ‘now’) willfully again and again. The power they don’t have, though, is huge; they do not have the power to choose my response to their existence, and they do not have the power to determine my actions. I am free to continue to choose to walk away from OPD, and to decline to be mistreated; that’s always mine.

I don’t say much about the other person involved in all this, and with good reason; that person is not here to speak up in their own behalf, to offer mitigating information, to clear up misconceptions, or offer perspective – and we are each having our own experience. Most of us wander around fairly cluelessly hurting others, not by intent, but generally out of inattention, lack of skill in relationships, bad habits learned in childhood, or because we understood things differently after filtering reality through our own chaos and damage. I’m not sitting in judgement on someone else’s shitty behavior; I am entirely focused on taking care of me, learning from life’s curriculum, and distancing myself from people who mistreat me. I am distracted from those tasks by my concern for my traveling partner, and his experience…and I got sucked into the OPD by mistake last night, in the process of supporting my partner with kindness, compassion, and a ready ear, that’s all.

Enough.

It’s morning, now, and I got the rest I needed last night, and woke feeling comfortable, rational, and content. It’s hard to want more than that, and it is more than I expected when I laid down to sleep last night. It’s enough.

Please take care of you, today, people – you are worthy of your very best care, your best treatment, your best manners, your greatest kindness. Please treat others well today, too; we are each having our own experience and you do not know what demons someone else may be dancing with in the darkness. (If your only way to treat yourself well is to treat others poorly, you’re not getting how this works – just saying.) Treat the people you love as if you love them; they deserve 100% of the best you have to offer the world, always. It’s never too late to stop mistreating people, applying Wheaton’s Law is a good start.

Tags choices, chronic mistreatment, controlling bullshit, don't be mean, emotional game playing, experience, I don't fuck mean people, if you can't be nice be somewhere else, it's not okay to treat loved ones poorly, love and lovers, love is not indentured servitude, mindful loving, OPD, OPD free zone, partnership is a thing, perspective, ptsd, put your own oxygen mask on first, stress and drama, taking care of me, TBI, The Big 5 all over again, use the buddy system, you have no power over me

Categories Anxiety, Brain Injury, Free Will, Healthy Living, Love, Metaphors, Mindfulness, pain, Perspective, Post Traumatic Stress, Relationships, Summer, The Art of Being, The Big 5, Uncategorized, War and News of War, women, Words

Just Do? Just Be.

June 11, 2015 //

There are some powerful metaphors out there that seem intended to point me in the direction of being, versus simply doing, and they crop up all over in movies, animation, the words of celebrity athletes…”Be the ball.” “Be the target.” Be like water.” There are a lot of suggestions to be. The Art of Being isn’t so simply expressed – there really are a lot of verbs involved. An entire iconic ad campaign was built around the idea that the notion of being is, perhaps, not enough. “Just Do It” (Which can also be applied to being.)

I am 52 tomorrow. Two years, and a bit more, practicing practices with a commitment to one particular quality that may matter more than most – authenticity. I fail. I own it. I fall down. I pick myself back up and get back to the journey at hand. I have bad moments. I move past them. I hurt someone. I say I am sorry – I even throw in some verbs to make amends and use the moment to leverage personal growth. Sometimes it seems there are a lot of verbs involved. It is not a coincidence that ‘to live’ and ‘to be’ are also verbs.

The year I turned 50, I cut my hair short – cutting off years and years, layers and layers, of dye, of product, of damage. I chose to express a desire to live a more authentic life through the action and metaphor of cutting my hair. It was pretty powerful. I still invest every day in that more authentic experience. Sometimes it uses a lot of verbs, and all of my will and intention. I got my aquarium that year, too. It continues to delight me, calm me, and contribute to a solitary space that feels like home to me. I enjoy every detail of caring for my aquarium; each task reminds me that my quality of life is based on my choices, and also that I am connected and interdependent on other beings (just as my fish are on me). I have spent two years learning to treat myself well – and along the way I have learned so much about treating others well, too. It is, of course, a journey. There is more to learn, and a continued and ongoing commitment to self is required.

Tomorrow I turn 52. I moved into my own place in time to look around this humble wonderful space that is mine and observe that this move is one of the nicest, kindest things I have ever done for myself, and a hell of a grand birthday present on a scale unmatched by any – except perhaps love. Love is the sort of thing that makes everything else ‘the next best thing’ no matter what. What I hadn’t understood for most of my life is that treating myself to a hearty helping of my own affection is quite as important as loving someone else…may even be a prerequisite for loving another with any depth or skill.

Yesterday, I took the day to observe my birthday, because I need to be in the office tomorrow. I had quite the exceptional day doing some fairly ordinary things. I went to the dentist. I got a hair cut. I visited a new shop. I saw my therapist. That all sounds quite ordinary phrased that way. It doesn’t capture the splendid day I had. Hell, the day was not even marred by a hearty helping of OPD later in the day – it probably didn’t hurt that it wasn’t truly ‘unexpected’, for me. (Like most things, even drama has patterns that tend to make it rather predictable.) It wasn’t my drama. The launch of Weapons of Mass Distraction elsewhere caused some emotional casualties. I provided what support and comfort for the wounded that I could. We enjoyed pizza, hung out, talked about life and generally enjoyed each other’s very good company. It wasn’t at all the evening I had planned, myself, but no matter; my very dear friend, and my traveling partner, are extraordinary men of good character, and it was a delight to enjoy them, regardless. I am further quite pleased that I have managed to create this comfortable, safe, and largely drama free space, where I – or those few I welcome to my home – can take refuge from WMDs or basic bullshit.

Why stand down range?

It is very quiet here in the morning. I hear birds outside the window observing that morning is well underway. It is a lovely summer morning, and the weather forecast suggests that it will be merely pleasantly hot, rather than “Fresno”. Lacking A/C, those days when it seems Fresno has moved north to catch up on old times are not comfortable.

I choose my path.

Two years ago, I made an explicit personal commitment to authenticity. It was a powerful choice to swim upstream, and I am far stronger for it. I also feel more loved – because the love I receive really is for me. I am more able to love well, because my feelings are quite genuinely my own, no bullshit or charades or going through the motions, and the recipients quite worthy – and well-chosen.

I am a big fan of living an authentic life. Even if I were a truly dreadful and vile human being, starting the journey to a better self, a better place, and becoming the woman I most want to be is surely simplified by being wholly myself to start with? Authenticity requires that I recognize my flaws in an accepting and self-compassionate way – how else can I choose change? Well…this has been my experience. My own choices begin with the recognition that there exists some quality worth changing – worth it to me, myself, because I am humbly able to recognize my utter humanity, and see that improvements I value exist as choices. Choosing change requires a next step; there are verbs involved.

I don’t know what tomorrow holds. I mean…other than ’52’. Crap, 52 sounds old sometimes. It doesn’t actually feel old, generally. I am sometimes taken by surprise to see the face in the mirror looking back at me; she isn’t a child, or a fit hot lusty young woman – and I don’t expect to see those things – but she is definitely…older. lol. I wear my years relatively well, I think, but yeah. I see my years on my face, now. I look into my eyes, curiously. Does my joy – and my pain – look back at me, or are those just eyes? I don’t find myself unpleasant to look at, and I am often surprised that I am more beautiful in some hard to express way than I was at 25…but I am not an astonishing beauty. My gray eyes and brunette-hint-of-auburn-streaked-with-gray hair are rather ordinary. My features are not quite symmetrical, but not distractingly so. I find myself rather plain in most moments – and I like my smile; it transforms me, and for an instant I am lovely. 52 isn’t particularly scary or depressing. It’s also not any sort of obvious benchmark in life – only – it is. I am precisely where I am choosing to be. That’s a very big deal, even at 52. 🙂

I will tend the garden of my heart with great care.

Today is a good day for love. Today is a good day to make choices that build on what works, and to step away from bad practices in favor of positive change. Today is a good day to transform something plain into something lovely with a smile; there are verbs involved. (Your results may vary.)

Tags 52, beautiful like a summer day, I don't feel old, loving myself, mindfulness matters, not my circus not my monkey, not that kind of self love, OPD, ptsd, taking care of me, TBI, the woman in the mirror, welcome home, when is old?, Yesterday Today and Tomorrow

Categories Brain Injury, Free Will, gardening, Healthy Living, Love, Metaphors, Mindfulness, Perspective, Post Traumatic Stress, Relationships, Summer, The Art of Being, The Big 5, Words

Walk It Off

April 19, 2015 //

I’ve got my gear ready, and I’m up early for a Sunday, ready to hit the trail. I’m hiking Eagle Creek Trail with a friend today. I’m excited about it. First, it’s just wonderful to take these long hikes among the trees, a pack filled with snacks, water, and safety gear (because…safety). I haven’t done this hike since I walked the nearest 1/2 mile portion of it with my grandparents some 30+ years ago as a teenager, and haven’t done more of it, ever. I love walking a new path! The magic of a living metaphor can’t be understated [for me – your results may vary]. Instead of solo hiking, I am hiking this one with a dear friend, and not just because there are some treacherous bits where having a someone along is simply the safer choice, but also simply to enjoy the company of someone dear to me, whose compassionate perspective on life, love, and the world just blows me away. I enjoy her as much as I enjoy a solo hike, and it’s been too long – so off we go, picnic lunch packed and ready for adventure!

Where does this path lead?

Yesterday, my yesterday, was generally quite lovely. I chose not to write yesterday, in favor of walking in the sunshine and a romantic evening out with my traveling partner, and preparing for the day ahead. There were some moments worthy of serious concern that weren’t really ‘about’ me, and while those definitely tested new skills, they also kept me committed to being present and engaged in the moment in order to provide whatever support I could to ill family members. Getting through yesterday with some skill definitely finds me eager to embrace the wholesome peace and contentment hiking Eagle Creek Trail, to be ready for the work week ahead.

Can it be that practicing good self-care practices, investing in my own needs, and treating myself truly well is really making a difference in my day-to-day experience? Why, yes it can. 🙂 It isn’t ‘easy’ sometimes. ‘Success’ is a very individual thing, and definitely not guaranteed no matter how I define it. Incremental change over time, however, is a very real thing; there are still verbs involved, still choices to make, still practices to practice – I still make mistakes, I still fall short of my own expectations, I still find myself attached to an outcome, or emotionally invested in a perspective built on assumptions, now and then. Practice matters. Mindfulness isn’t an intuitive thing for me – practice definitely matters.

Yesterday was instructive, and I count it a success for myself; I’ve grown a lot. Today is a fun day, out in the trees, with a good friend – and a lovely way to celebrate being. Today is a good day to explore The Art of Being.

Tags are you going my way?, Eagle Creek Trail, emotion and reason, good self-care, investing in me, love and lovers, mindfulness, OPD, perspective, practicing the practices, ptsd, TBI, The Art of Being, The Big 5, walk it off, walk on

Categories Brain Injury, Free Will, Healthy Living, Love, Metaphors, Mindfulness, Oregon Trails, Perspective, Post Traumatic Stress, Relationships, Summer, The Art of Being, The Big 5, women, Words

Some Days the Nightmares Win

March 27, 2015 //

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.

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…

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

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 a few deep breaths, and lovers, anxiety, are you going my way?, be kind, be kinder, cooking for one, emotion and reason, good self-care, I make my rules, I'm okay, let it go, love, OPD, ptsd, putting my needs on my agenda, SuperBetter, TBI, there's a hotline for a reason, try a little tenderness, use your words, what matters most?, words matter, you're not my supervisor

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

Listening and Loving

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Lingering After-Effects

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Just Do? Just Be.

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Walk It Off

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Some Days the Nightmares Win

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