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Getting to Enough

April 9, 2016 //
1

I am sipping my coffee contentedly as the sun rise leaks through the partially opened blinds. I forget to dodge the orange sliver of light that momentarily blinds me. There is no aggravation in that moment. I am well-rested, and in no more than the usual amount of pain. I’ve seen new images of my spine…I’m no longer the slightest bit surprised by the amount of day-to-day pain I am in. What’s left now is managing it, and learning what else, if anything, can be done to ease it long-term. The morning begins pleasantly, and the pain – being a fairly unremarkable routine thing, generally – doesn’t change that.

I was stressed and tired yesterday, by the time I got home. I planted some tomato plants in my garden, and hung out with my traveling partner awhile. My anxiety coming and going in the background of our experience isn’t a comfortable thing for him. Eventually, I decided I’d try a very old-fashioned remedy indeed; I ‘laid down for a little while’. It turned into a night’s sleep, rather unexpectedly. I must have needed it. I slept 12 hours, waking only long enough to get up to pee once, and then later upon hearing the sound of someone moving through the house, and forgetting I am not living alone, I got up and crossed paths pleasantly enough with my partner, who was up during the night, himself. I definitely needed the sleep, and returning to slumber was fairly effortless. 12 hours, though? How tired was I? How fatiguing is stress?

This morning I sat quietly, meditating, for some while before I made coffee. The moment felt rich and fulfilling. How are some such simple moments so joyful and uplifting, where other more elaborate ploys to soothe or entertain oneself sometimes fall so short? Lasting contentment is not built on (and does not require) piles of money, or a 24-hour party atmosphere, or the satisfaction of every craving imagined…’enough’ seems quite ample, even ‘more than necessary’ some days (which seems almost nonsensical). What is “enough”? It matters too much [to me] to let it remain so poorly defined…although…maybe there is room in my experience for that, too. I sip my coffee and think about it; what is enough?

This morning, it is enough that I am safe, well-rested, clothed, fed, and have a good cup of coffee. The headphones my partner shared with me (“until you buy ones you like better” he says with a smile) are enough, too. I smile noticing how much more than ‘enough’ it feels, to me, that he reads my writing and hears me; it feels like the face of love smiling directly at me. It is enough to share some portion of life’s journey – with friends, with loved ones, with family  – and with a partner who returns that love, many times over. It is enough to have options, choices, and decision-making opportunities that offer me course corrections on life’s journey, in any direction I may choose.

Flowers and moments are enough.

Flowers and moments are enough.

It is spring. I am home. This is enough.

 

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Categories Anxiety, Brain Injury, Free Will, gardening, health, Healthy Living, Love, Mindfulness, pain, Perspective, Relationships, Spring, The Art of Being, Words

To Be Determined

April 4, 2016 //
0

This morning I begin writing without a title. Usually I start from the title and build from there. I only mention it because this morning I also begin without any particular thought on what to say or where to go. I listen to the rain awhile. I trim my cuticles. I meditate. I sip my coffee and scroll through my Facebook feed, noticing there is little to catch up on since the night before. I listen to the rain against the window pane awhile longer, aware of my arthritis pain, too. The weekend is over… I’m not sure I’m ready for that.

I enjoy these quiet hours I’ve set aside for me in the early morning. I smile thinking back on conversations with my traveling partner about ‘not being a morning person’ and how much I disliked the early rising hour of active duty life as a much younger woman. I would happily ‘sleep in’ every day, and wake without an alarm clock…knowing myself as I do, I’d still be up by 7:00 am most mornings. The choice to get up earlier than necessary in order to begin each day with time that is really my own was originally made with such reluctance and skepticism (it was my traveling partner’s suggestion); I expected it would not suit me to ‘deprive myself of sleep’ in that way ‘just to have some time to myself’. How many times in life have my assumptions been incorrect, or my expectations a poor fit for real life? (Let’s not count them all.) The idea of getting up very early to enjoy a leisurely morning each day didn’t seem to be an obvious win for me going into it, and I am still just a bit surprised when I consider how well it does work for me. Instead of ‘depriving me of sleep’ it became a practice that I can also rely on to help stabilize my sleep cycle; I now regularly crash out at about the same time every night, in part because I am up at the same early hour every morning. I sleep better, more often. I think a quiet thank you at the human being asleep in another room – uncountable “best practices” that I find to be practical, delightful, and useful have sourced with this partnership we share, and the exchange of good ideas in a context of openness and respect.

My thoughts move on. It’s that sort of morning. There are other practices to practice this morning, other opportunities to experience a moment, to grow, to enjoy the woman in the mirror. I sip my coffee, make choices, and organize my thoughts regarding the day and week to come. I try to do so without investing in untested assumptions, or building a plan on a foundation of implicit expectations.

And still (again?) my thoughts move on. It’s a less than ideal morning for this sort of writing. I smile as I recognize it, and I move on, too, thoughts and all. 🙂 Today is a good day for more practice, and fewer words.

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Categories Brain Injury, Free Will, Love, Mindfulness, Perspective, Relationships, The Art of Being, The Big 5, Words

Self-Sufficient and Connected

March 20, 2016 //
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In some moments I feel as if I am walking some invisible slack line high above sharp rocks or dangerous obstacles, no safety net, with an armload of squirming cats that don’t get along with each other, and haven’t eaten in days. The sensation is not improved by upheaval in my day-to-day routine, disarray in my environment, or the challenges of experiencing emotional intimacy and connection, while also developing emotional self-sufficiency. Sometimes it’s hard. Difficult. Complicated. Emotional.

Well, sure, you say that, but...

Well, sure, you say that, but…

My traveling partner does his courteous, considerate best to ease the strain, to minimize the challenges. He is, however, having his own experience. I practice deep listening, while also recognizing I have both a need and obligation to my own emotional wellness to set boundaries; this is by intent and respecting my ‘OPD free zone’; my partner is welcome here any time, but relationship drama is not. I continue to invest in my own emotional self-sufficiency, while also recognizing that the skills and tools required are not yet forged of unbreakable materials, and require continued practice, and more good boundary setting. I actually suck rather a lot at the setting of clear reasonable boundaries and maintaining them skillfully. An ongoing challenge requires ongoing attention, and the work involved is on me; there are verbs involved, choices, and mindful attention to the needs of the woman in the mirror, while also being compassionate, present, supportive, and aware – considerate – of the needs of the person so dear to me, now sharing this space.

partnership

Partnerships endure and overcome challenges with shared effort, support, consideration, and awareness.

It has been very tough to relax entirely this week, or to find a feeling of being grounded, centered, balanced, and hold on to it; the symptoms of OPD are present in many moments. I set all that aside and listen to the rain fall. I could contentedly spend the day listening to the rain fall; it’s not a comfortable fit for shared living. At least, for now, I don’t yet know how to say ‘I need more quiet time than I am getting’, without causing hurt feelings, or heaping more experiences of feeling rejected on someone who urgently needs very much to feel welcomed – somewhere. This is home. My home. His home whenever he is here. A safe place to be at home with oneself, and with love. I remind myself that healing takes time, and that hurt creatures need comfort and care, and that change is. Human beings don’t tend to remain ‘in crisis’ indefinitely (unless repeatedly subjected to an insane cycle of empty promises, baiting, and torment). Healing happens in a safe nurturing environment. It still takes the time it takes. I ask myself an important question or two about what matters most to me, and find myself feeling soothed, content, and comforted. At least for a while, it will be on me to provide much of the positivity and comfort here, and to be the builder of an emotionally healthy environment that meets needs for two, and to do rather a lot of ‘adulting’ – maybe more than I feel ready for. I remind myself I’ve been providing these things for myself successfully for a year, and that love is not an adversary, or a drain on resources, or an inconvenience, but may require some tweaks and changes to the way space is used, and the timing of various practices, tasks, and activities.

partnership

Partnerships don’t alleviate the requirement we each have to take care of ourselves, while we also care for each other.

I take some time this morning to meditate on boundaries, ground rules, The Big 5 on which I personally seek to build all my relationships (respect, consideration, compassion, reciprocity, and openness), and what I can do to deliver on those characteristics well, and not simply assume they are my due. A partnership requires equanimity, and shared effort. We can only each do our best, as we understand our best to be in the moment, and even at that, sometimes our best is literally not enough to cause change. I can choose not to take small hurts personally, and be a supportive presence in the midst of my partner’s emotional chaos and suffering; it will require me to learn to juggle my own needs and theirs with considerable efficiency, and to learn to set boundaries more firmly, but also with great tenderness and compassion. Fuck – I hope I am up to the challenge. A year ago – almost exactly – the best I could do was simply remove myself from the problematic environment, because the difficultly level far exceeded my competency, or ability to care for myself while enduring it.

Having both complex PTSD and  a TBI, trust me when I say I don’t find living with people easy; however lonely solitary living may sometimes feel, it is nearly effortless in comparison to cohabitation!

Today's sunrise wasn't this colorful. I am reminded that change is.

Today’s sunrise wasn’t this colorful. I am reminded that change is.

Every day is a new opportunity to begin again. I spend the time over my first coffee revisiting my budget. There is change to account for. I account for it. I accept how uncomfortable I feel having to do so, so soon after moving. I take a moment to recognize the simmering anger and resentment lurking beneath the discomfort, directed toward someone who is literally no part of my life in any direct way. I resent that there is even an implied presence, or any agency affecting my routine that I have not invited into my experience. I breathe and let it go. I’m okay with the anger, and the resentment too, they seem a reasonable emotional response to being shoved from the slow moving-in process I had embraced so deliberately, to being in circumstances that feel rushed by need and urgency. I dislike the unpleasant negative emotions that come with the lurking ‘OPD’ now a constant threat in the background.  It is part of my partner’s experience, and as unpleasant as I find it, it’s no doubt worse for him. I’d like most to ease his suffering. How do I set and reinforce boundaries about this OPD free zone I have created for myself without encroaching on the free will of a respected adult now in my household? (I mean, seriously? I entirely don’t care to deal with it, don’t see that it must be dealt with at all, and don’t want to encourage it; it has no place here.)

...and listen deeply.

…and listen deeply.

The day is barely begun, and holds so much promise. Perhaps a second coffee, and another chance to begin again? Perhaps a different selection of verbs with that? 🙂

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

Relaxing

February 28, 2016 //
0

Stormy sky. Garden planted with cool weather greens. Patio tidied up, sorted out, and rearranged. A container of tiny alpine strawberries planted, too, for summer delight – or for the birds; it’s hard to be sure from this vantage point, on a rainy Sunday morning, air filled with the scents of rain and mown grass, and the sound of birdsong.

I woke early, considering I wanted very much to sleep later, and was a bit surprised to find it raining, although rain was in the forecast. It’s just that I usually sleep quite well on rainy mornings. This morning I woke, groggy, struggling to focus and really be awake. I lazed in bed awhile longer, pointlessly as it turned out; my stuffy head resulted in my own snoring waking me, each time I started to return to sleep. Bummer. I got up.

My first cup of coffee was enjoyed as I chatted with my traveling partner across the internet. It’s now hard to imagine life being any different, although it was well after 1997 before the internet, or even email, really featured heavily in my experience. The two of us agree that we each need a break from our devices; I’ve been staying off the computer, generally, for most of the weekend. We postpone tentative plans made earlier; it’s inconsiderate to share sniffles deliberately, and we prefer to invest in our mutual and individual wellness quite differently. It’s likely to be a day of ease, watching the rain fall, perhaps spent in the studio, but it will be spent in a solitary way, today. I don’t much feel like going out today. It seems like a very good day to read, to meditate, and perhaps to send note cards here and there, to far away friends. 🙂

I contemplate coffee #2, not yet made, and remind myself that on a Sunday the caffeinated coffee cut-off is noon, otherwise my sleep may be disturbed. I choose for myself, based on my own experiences, and recognize that it wasn’t always an issue. Certainly, when I was much younger, it was as if my coffee cup was affixed permanently to my hand, and I drank coffee without regard to time of day. I have changed as I have aged – I’m pretty sure we all do, in some way or another.  I give thought to the week’s meals-to-come, and double-check the pantry. Sunday is a good day for practical things; it is a good indicator that I’m a bit under the weather that I have no energy or will for actual housekeeping today.

A rainy day relaxing, today it is enough.

A rainy day relaxing, today it is enough.

Some days ‘doing my best’ means taking care of myself, this fragile vessel, and little more. It’s okay for this to be the case. I listen to the rain, now pounding the roof, and rumbling down through the downspout to the french drain at the corner of the building. It somehow manages to be a lovely day, in spite of the rain, in spite of feeling a bit stuffy, in spite of feeling disinclined for go, or do. Today is a good day to spend it relaxing with the woman in the mirror, and listening to what she has to say.

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

Investing the Best

January 20, 2016 //
0

There was a time in my life when I was pretty certain that I was so entirely broken, in some fashion or another, that any contribution I could possibly make in my relationships would be a material one – or sex. That was the limit of what I thought I had to offer the world, or a partner; if I couldn’t buy it, or provide the manual labor, or do the sex thing, what else was there, really? Well, art. There was art. I am hopeful that I don’t have to point out what an incredibly limiting – and self-fulfilling – perspective that was.

Be love.

Be love.

I say “be love” as though what I mean is obvious. Perhaps it isn’t, and maybe a gentle morning over a good coffee is a nice time to clarify? It isn’t as if “be love” is something I came up with – because, if  it were…first, what a tragic state for the world to discover love so late, and second… well, damn, what about all those love songs? So, yeah, not my original thoughts, and surely there are other people who have written more better words with greater clarity on the subject of love, generally. So…if you’re after more better words with great clarity about love, I suggest Thich Nhat Hanh, Leo Buscaglia, or, if you’re ‘not there yet’ any of a number of books on loving the person in the mirror, which does have to come first, as it turns out, to love another with any real skill…have you checked out my reading list? 😉

The love thing is a big deal. It drives a lot of marketing, and therefore a great deal of profit-making goes on associated with love (I’m looking your way Valentine’s Day!). It’s clearly something human primates favor. Are you ‘getting your share’? Are you still thinking of it in those terms? I spent a lot of years stuck on the idea that if love were ‘real’ – and I wasn’t convinced it might be until well past 30, and couldn’t seem to figure out ‘how to have it’ until I was well past 40 – if love were real at all, why wasn’t I ‘getting my share’?? Ouch. Well, in fairness, there’s so much media pressure on us all regarding love we easily succumb to the visions of love we see in advertising, on television and in movies – how can what we see at home compete or compare? We are each so human – and no one is providing us handy re-writes of our script; our best moments are at risk of going unnoticed because we are so busy looking for something very different. How suck is that? You see where this is headed, right?

Mindful love. Yep. I couldn’t fathom it for a while. Mindfulness… check. Meditation… check. Awareness… check. Present in the moment… check. Treating myself well… check. Each concept falling into place, building on each other, and more than once I returned to my therapists office with this question “how does mindful love work?” It sounds like a simple enough question, and I couldn’t quite answer it in words – however many books I read. I didn’t understand that it wasn’t the part about mindfulness that I wasn’t fully grasping… it was love. 🙂

Now we’re getting somewhere! Is this the hot sexy part? With the tips for pleasing a lover? W00t!! Go sex!!

Oh… wait… nope. Sex is sex. Love is…

Love.

Love.

By moving into my own place, while also maintaining a romantic loving relationship with my traveling partner, I did something wonderful for me; I opened my eyes to some experiences about love that I hadn’t been able to understand so simply before. Some of the lessons have been complicated. Some of them have been so simple that they tripped me up while I sought to understand them as something more complicated than they were. Love matters so much that I figured I’d share some of the things I am learning – I expect that as with really first-rate self-care, learning to love well is likely a lifetime of practice, and similarly many of the practices themselves are so simple they mislead one into thinking they are also effortless – nope, in loving too there are verbs involved. Here come some verbs now…

Invest the best in your relationships that you have to offer. This is so simple and fundamental on the surface, but it is a rich deep practice that has kept me on my toes for months now, and until this past weekend, I didn’t have simple words to describe what I might mean by it. So here it is – invest the best in love. Kindness, a welcoming approach, listening deeply, and ensuring that the assumptions in my day-to-day thinking regarding my loving relationships are positive ones have nothing at all to do with money, with sex, or with material goods – without these things, though, no amount of money will buy me love.

An easy example, and common, if I am short-tempered with a loved one in a brief moment, surely it can be understood as part of being human, and an appropriate apology and making it right allows everyone to move on. If, however, my short-temperedness is a character trait that is recognizably ‘who I am’ it will likely undermine love over time. Other things work that way too; sarcasm, mockery, meanness, and cruelty have no role to play in love – defending their use by saying “it’s just who I am”, or by calling it a joke, may not be enough to stop love’s erosion over time, particularly if the user of such behaviors is unaware of the hurtful effect. (If the user is entirely aware of the hurtful effect of such things, and uses them for amusement or in anger without regard to the hurt they cause – that’s not love.)

This weekend, I mused with regret at some point that I don’t have money laying about in capital amounts with which to support my traveling partners endeavors – how wonderful it would be to be able to invest heavily in a solid business proposal, see it get off the ground, and watch his success and independence grow! I felt, ever so briefly, that I ‘don’t have enough to offer’. In material terms, that may be true (it also may not be true; ‘enough’ is a slippery concept). I realized as we talked through that particular conversation that what love asks of me has nothing whatever to do with money, and it’s never been money that was the strength of this relationship; emotions don’t work that way. Love is an emotion. Suddenly, I felt unsteady in my understanding of the world – I awoke to the vast riches I have to offer my relationships (and they are vast indeed).

If love isn’t looking for a cash investment, what is it looking for that I do have plentifully? How about – are you ready for this, because we’re all a lot wealthier than we realize, if we choose to be so – kindness. Yep. Day-to-day kindness and gentle words. Patience. Deep listening – really put myself on pause to hear what my partner is saying without ‘waiting for my turn to talk’. Hearing – really hearing my partner, the words, the intent, the meaning, the emotion – really ‘getting it’, because they matter, and it doesn’t cost a thing besides my good intentions, and a verb or two. Isn’t the basic willingness to do these things sort of implied when I say “I love you”? Making room in my experience to share the journey with another – graciously, generously, merrily – and making the good moments of greater value by savoring them, sharing them, exploring them, and giving them more of my precious mortal time, than I spend ruminating over some momentary misunderstanding, or hurt feelings over thoughtless words. How about vulnerability, too? Sharing life from the perspective that we are each very human, and being open to sharing our selves and experience in a raw and honest way – still being kind, still speaking gently, still listening deeply… it sounds easy. It’s worth practicing. It takes practice – invested, willful, engaged practice. And more of that, again and again.

Yelling, irritability, contentious disagreeable conversation, argument, fussing, insults, anger – not a bit of this is love. The love is in the quiet spaces in between, and in the laughter – and if we don’t invest the best we have to offer in the love we wish to enjoy, the love will slowly be squeezed out by thoughtlessness, negativity, anger, attachment to expectations, and disappointment when our assumption that love ‘should’ overlook our nastiness and bullshit doesn’t turn out to be true. Love isn’t a tantrum; it’s the long-term investment in what is best within ourselves.

Before we go too far, I want to be clear about one small detail – I don’t know of any way to actually ‘fake love’. This isn’t a ‘fake it until you make it’ sort of area of life, and a saccharine smile and a terse insincere “I’m fine” when that is clearly not the case isn’t love, either; it’s a lie. It is possible to speak honestly and sincerely – and also gently. (Listening helps with that.) Seriously. It is. Try it out sometime. It’s quite a lovely experience, I find. Yep. It does take practice. 🙂

Love is in the small things - strange for such a big deal.

Love is in the small things – strange for such a big deal.

Today is a good day to be love. Today is a good day to invest the best of what I have to offer in the relationships that matter most to me. Today is a good day to practice loving well. I’ll start with the woman in the mirror. Love can change the world.

 

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Categories art and the artist, Brain Injury, Free Will, Healthy Living, Logic & Reason, Love, Mindfulness, Perspective, Post Traumatic Stress, Relationships, The Art of Being, The Big 5, women, Words
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