I M Perfect lady

Category: Examples of an Imperfect woman

  • Whole

    "Life batters us whether we are rich or poor, public or private. The wound we suffer may be an open cut or a slow, silent hemorrhage of the soul."Sarah Ban Breathnach

    I love the "silent hemorrhage of the soul"…it is how we all die while alive, where the essence of who we are slowly fades, by all the little choices we make that don't reflect our true feelings; each false action we part-take in, is letting of the soul.

    It isn't that we sell our whole self all at once, but fragments of who we are slowly drain each time we keep silent our true feelings; we sell our souls lie by lie.

    Usually, to spare the feelings of others.  We don't want to make them feel bad, but are way okay destroying our own inner peace…and by silencing our soul's truth, we talk and act in discord of how we feel.

    "I did not lose myself all at once. I rubbed out my face over the years washing away my pain, the same way carvings on stone are worn down by water."  Amy Tan

    In the past few days, I have been in the presence of women from various walks of life and was struck by the jostling of inner voices and outer voices…

    How snatches of soul speaking, mingling with old patterns jostle to be heard and expressed. I can sense confusion or the pulling and tugging of the tug-o-war between wanting to fit in and wanting to be free; and its cost.

    There is a cost to the soul to follow and a greater cost to leave…and lead.

    There is wanting to fit in and the need to stand out.

    To be accepted for who you are while being different.

    Ladies who are wanting to define themselves, while at the same time repeating patterns long set in place…due to not wanting to disappoint or step out of bounds of what is acceptable.

    Living a life without a pattern is scary and free.

    It is to be unchained, but undefined…to be in a spacious place of no rules, but without the comfort of numbers of like minded souls.  

    It seems there are some differents that are unique and valued, while others are rejected and cast out.  

    Why is that?  What makes it acceptable different and rejectable different?

    Each segment of the population has its unwritten rules that will accept or reject others, depending upon their life choices…

    Categories are usually classified of how many things you have in common, not in the things you are opposed to.

    We continually pair off into likeness.

    How will we stand out if we gravitate to the sameness?

    How will stretch and grow if we continually stay safe in the environments and patterns of our parents?

    I was pleased with myself to be myself with ladies whose patterns were so different than mine.  And I loved seeing and hearing their self expressions.

    Our Self comes when we can be at peace with who we are, when we stop the bleeding of our souls to fit in, but rather bring our full self to all encounters, unabashedly…to stop dressing ourselves in order to fit in.

    There is such peace in me to arrive as me…to not try to match who they are or to quiet my truth in their presence…instead feel completely at ease as me.

    Not only at ease but happy, content, satisfied…whole.


     

  • The Fabric of My Being!

    Chapter 11 in "Hungry" by Robin Smith

    Living with the Hole

    "The naked truth is always better than the best-dressed lie." Ann Landers

    "Thousands of people connected with my term "hole in the soul." I think that's because deep down many of us know that there is also a hole in our souls. We make up our country as its citizens, so if there is a hole in the soul of the country then we must check out the individuals who comprise this body we call America. The same is true of parents and their children.  Parents want their children "fixed" and whole. But those same parents are often unwilling to look at their own brokenness and the holes that their children inherited from them."

    "Having a hole in your soul is nothing to feel ashamed about. It is something to attend to. The holes in our souls highlight the key elements that are missing in us, and become a trusted guide to find the root of what is broken and injured in ourselves. Holes don't just go away of their own accord.  Some remain empty, while others get filled with imitation fillers or inferior substances – which always cause bigger problems later. But they may just as easily be filled with life-giving materials. These life giving materials are the nourishment we need and crave."

    "We nourish ourselves by establishing and maintaining healthy, substantive relationships with self and others; by having boundaries that foster respect and allow authentic "yeses" and "nos" when necessary; and by practicing good self-care as we nourish and nurture ourselves.  Yet too often we go hungry."

    "When families choose to mask their pain and suffer in silence, they are filling the hole with a temporary, inadequate substance.  They're busy applying spackle to a crater, hoping people on the outside won't notice their suffering. They're terrified that others – even perfect strangers – will see the truth of their sleepless nights, loveless marriages, addicted family members, angry parents, despised siblings, and internal conflict. They'd rather fill these holes in, cover them up, than let anyone know they are human, hungry and imperfect."  Dr. Robin Smith

    At times I had to wonder if my pointing out all the holes in my family of origins fabric was helpful or exploitive, if there was a way to heal and not reveal?

    The truth of my family is literally the hole in the soul of our family…which leads to holes in the souls of the individuals who all have started from there.  

    My soul's intention was to give my children a fabric that wasn't filled with holes and gaps and me pretending with artificial fillers and remain in the family for the ease….instead I hope to pass on my fabric. 

    My fabric in how I live my life.  

    There are no holes I try and cover up.

    There are no rips that I want to pretend are not there.

    I live out in the open in all things…often to their discomfort.  

    My history and life's past may not be filled with wonderful loving memories, but it is my fabric of truth…

    My fabric of truth has many dark tones and I am now doing my best to add life giving colors…

    I believe we can't truly be ourselves until we reveal our selves to our self. I know who I am and where I came from and how it affected my life.  I am now unwilling to settle for relationships that are not substantive and healthy.

    I will not willingly make holes in my soul…for your comfort and ease.

    I am too aware now of what rips holes in my soul and I will not willingly participate in in the shredding of me.

    I can live with the holes of my past and respectfully honor how they came to be…how I came to be.  

    And, I believe I now have the opportunity to weave a new cloth in what I pass on to the generations below me. At the very least, I will not be one to make the holes in their souls…by being dishonest…and covering up my legacy…or showing them an inauthentic way of being.

    Each choice we make and all we do, knits together the legacy we leave behind…

    I see mine as a very rich tapestry with swirling darkness and graceful brights…the years of blind unknowing, clashing with the mind blowing awareness and infused with my inner truths of who I am…the Fabric of My Being!


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  • A child’s mind

    I looked up the definition of Addiction and found this on Live Science.

    "Addiction is a chronic brain disorder and not simply a behavior problem involving alcohol, drugs, gambling or sex, experts contend in a new definition of addiction, one that is not solely related to problematic substance abuse.

    At its core, addiction isn't just a social problem or a moral problem or a criminal problem. It's a brain problem whose behaviors manifest in all these other areas," said Dr. Michael Miller, past president of ASAM who oversaw the development of the new definition.

    Many behaviors driven by addiction are real problems and sometimes criminal acts. But the disease is about brains, not drugs. It's about underlying neurology, not outward actions."   

    Research has shown the brain's reward circuitry is modified in addicts, making them crave "rewards," such as alcohol and other drugs."  Live Science

    I know this is right.  I know that the brain and our ingrained thoughts and beliefs and being left alone in our heads after abuse, is the cause of so many getting lost in addictions.  A brain disorder makes more sense than an overwhelming urge to do destructive behavior.   

    I had heard Don Miguel Ruiz say that psychology is so far behind…and I would agree.  

    My brother even coined the phrase, "My abused mind."

    And, I know in abuse, it is not the affects on the body that cause us so much grief, but rather how it plays with our minds…when left untreated.

    The sheer juxtaposition between some one you love and trust doing hurtful things to you, and you having to rationalize it IN your mind, causes the brain disorder.

    You are trying to make sense out of something that shouldn't match.  You are bending and twisting your mind to make sense of a reality that is way out of order.

    Instead of making reality and family and friend disorderly, we mess with our own minds.

    It is my humble belief, that the more you can right reality and see what truly is, the more you correct the abused mind, and relieve it of crossed wires.

    It makes the most sense to me, that a mind with wires so hideously crossed will make choices that are completely insane, and have the body and life of an individual follow along.

    The phrase, "who in their right mind would do such a thing…." comes to mind.  No one….only those who are living with an abused mind.

    Correcting how you see the reality of your life, will undo the damage of the mind.  

    Even when I saw my father for who he was and his supportive wife, I still had years of work ahead.  My life was based and set up to fit perfectly to match my abused mind.

    I made choices that reflected my crossed wires.

    As I uncrossed each wire, It had a ripple affect in my life.  Where I was righteously right, I was now very wrong.  I had to re-work my life to match reality and not my mind.

    When psychology gets this, that reality is where our minds will find relief, even if we have to see horror and terrifying relationships, we will get a firm grip on addictions.

    I love that addictions are a brain disorder, it is the only definition I have read that feels true for me.  It explains the suffering of so many.

    Once I knew how off I was in reality, I also understood how off my mind was.  How completely mental I truly was.  It was a mental break down.  To break down all the constructs of an abused mind. 

    If only people would get the damage abuse causes a mind, IF you try and make the abusive relationship into one of family. To keep the family and protect its integrity and include abuse.

    This inclusion is the distortion that creates a brain disorder.  It is going against truth and reality, leaving us living in complete and utter chaos in our minds.

    My mind is now calmer and more at peace; in order and yet my life outside within my family is a total mess…where it should be.

    Not allowing reality to shine in its horrific reality as abuse…is where the damage begins…it isn't the physical act of hurting the body or invading privacy or the sheer strength of adult to child, but it is the corruption of the innocent mind…when you make it live outside of reality.

    Going against reality is the most damaging part of the abuse.  I believe that we could heal from the physical pain easily and quickly, if we had someone who was able to see reality and call it like it is….regardless of the consequences.

    But, it is the consequences to the adults dictate how they see our abuse….and as a child, we have no choice but to follow along.

    What would my father's abuse on his daughters mean to my mother?  What would it do to her marriage?  What would it do on her life? She made choices about my abuse for her comfort….she distorted things to keep her life going on undamaged. She continued to stay married to him for 49 years.  

    I had to make my mind match her reality.

    When I started walking with reality all hell broke lose in my life…reality came crashing in and I was horrified of what my mind had done.  It had created a completely different dad than the one I had, and mom….etc.  I could no longer believe my mind.  I had to start from scratch defining things via reality.

    I paid attention to actions and left the words of confused minds…fade away.  It didn't matter why they did what they did, just what they did.

    A brain disorder is when it is unable to be with reality…when you discount actions and value their words.  

    Life is simpler for me now, even if often shocking in its revelations, I see what the birds and trees see.  I no longer try and make things better than they appear. I now live in a simple mind.  A child's mind.  




  • Surrounded by blackness.

    I had a restless night.  I was awake in dreams out of control, where my body was overtaken by emotions of incapacitated movements…but I rode them out, awake while dreaming.

    I heard and felt the rumble and pulse of being overcome and withstood the roaring and muscle freezing energy and then felt it weaken and fall away.  

    The quarter moon was out my window and if I saw the moon, I knew I was awake in being awake and not awake in the dream of being awake.

    I know this will not make sense to many, but it was empowering to not be over run by a terror dream, but witness to it.

    I fell back into this terror emotion dream a few times…and tried to stay awake long enough to not fall back into the same state again, but failed.

    I recall the pulse and fast flow of my blood as it surged…ready to take flight or fight…it was like getting an inner body view of terror.  And, the train like sound as it roared at me, coming unbidden and unwelcome, yet blasting into my restfulness and completely overtaking my body, BUT not my awareness.  I was awake and did not succumb to the roiling blood flow. I remained a witness.

    I awoke to wonder what was the significance of that dream?  

    It was weird to see these terror feelings come from nowhere and to disappear and for me to be affected by it, for I felt it all, but also to remain detached.

    I also had dreams where I was shown how I was mistreating others unintentionally and then how others were aware.  Like I had misplaced a child and adults were waiting with her, reluctant to give her back, like I was the unfit mother…and I wasn't aware, aware that I was the one who lost her, and not she who lost me.

    It was an odd night.

    Yet not so odd.  I have been tossing around in my head my walking away, my estrangement and my lack of reconnection, my setting boundaries and standing firm. The life after walking away from abuse and how it impacts and echoes…

    It appears that my line in the sand is cement and others are free to dabble in old relationships seemingly 'more' loving than I.

    There is no rule book for estrangement, or at least none that I have found…and yet the family rule book appears large and rule-less…

    Family rule trumps and supercedes all actions of reality, it seems to have a separated life and view of reality where plausible will overtake rational thought.

    I get confused as to where I am standing and why, when others have leaky boundaries and step over and under them from time to time…and I, like a stubborn mule, remain behind my line.

    Perhaps the emotions of the dream are the emotions I would feel if a leak sprung in my line; where all the abuse in its distortion will come rushing in and overtake my life.

    I have no desire to go into the swirling waters of distortion…it is the undertow that lies beneath "Family" in abusive homes.  Underneathe the label brother/sister/mother/father lies a vortex… 

    A vortex of energies that carries no markers of love.  It is the terror grip of no control…a prison void of awareness.

    It is this sinkhole of blackness that keeps me away…where reality and clarity are not welcome… only the distorted feel at home here.

    In the bright light of morning…I feel assured.  I would rather be alone, than to be plunged back into that sea…where I would lose my self, my awareness, my peace, my love, my life…and the freedom to be me.


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    This is a small piece I worked on yesterday, inspired by the border in Fran Passerello's quilt.  I love the idea of bring creative inspiration to the borders.  It ironically or not depicts great motion and color surrounded by blackness.


     

     

  • Let life be…

    Chapter 10, in "Hungry" by Dr. Robin Smith.

    "We wear the mask that grins and lies."  Paul Laurence Dunbar

    "I was sitting in the parking lot at the grocery store talking with my assistant Kim on the telephone.  It was a beautiful, clear, and warm afternoon, and we were discussing the exhaustive to-do list still in front of me. There was so much that remained on my schedule before my day could officially be called "over".  I felt overwhelmed and I knew I would be working late into the evening. All I really wanted to do was to be out and about enjoying the beauty of nature and the day with Kalle."

    "I said to Kim, "I just realized something. I am a mortician."

    "She said, "Excuse me, what did you say?"

    "I replied, "I am a mortician, the best anywhere.  I see dead people."

    "Kim was silent.  I knew she was waiting for me to say something clever that would put into context what I had just said. The words themselves seemed totally ridiculous. Actually, touched might be a more accurate description." 

    "I realized something today," I explained. "I have spent a lot of my life trying to make dead people and dead things alive." I went on to explain that I had spent years with dead people, in dead relationships, in dead places playing the role of the most skilled mortician. By the time I am finished with them, my handiwork had been so convincing that I believed – as did everyone else- that the dead person or thing had come back to life. But in reality they were merely embalmed in a mixture of make-believe, pretend and false hope. Fear of reality was my partner in this booming mortuary business. How frightening and how dangerous to be dealing with dead things and acting like they were alive!"

    "Kim got it, as did others with whom I shared the metaphor later. Many People are in the business of trying to make dead things alive again."  Dr. Robin

    An interesting metaphor for a life that isn't being fully lived or one in truth.

    I wonder how many therapist and well intentioned friends will try and breathe life into dead relationships and dead individual lives?

    I am not even sure most people are aware of the struggle they are engaged in while trying to keep relationships appearing alive, when they clearly are not working.

    When my sister had coined the phrase, "I am not willing to pretend to pretend," she was speaking of no longer wanting to be a mortician…of making dead people look alive.  Of living a life of pretending all is well, when it clearly is not.

    It oddly seems like you will die and life will end, when you give up trying to make dead relationships live, but instead you actually come alive.

    Live and breathe and find deep passion and interest and aliveness in the simple things, for you are not forcing that which is not, to be.

    Living among the ruins pretending you have still have a relationship home.

    The contortion it requires sucks the life blood out of you…trying to make something from nothing….leaves you with mask overlaid on nothing…and tired.

    I wonder if many people call living, the task of turning the dead into a living thing that isn't real?

    How many would dare and live without airbrushing their lives?

     How many would drop the role of mortician, and let the dead lie?

    Perhaps this is what actually made my estrangement easier, was that the dead did not rise and revolt and fight to be in a relationship with me, but rather they continued to act as they had; dead.

    The dead waiting for me to make them alive. Make them a sister, a mother, a brother, it was up to me to paint them into a relationship with me.

    I dropped all my pretend brushes and have let life be…

     



  • You will be in the Art.

    "Sometime in your life you will go on a journey.  It will be the longest journey you have ever taken. It is the journey to find yourself."  Katherine Sharp

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    "Learn to get in touch with the silence within yourself and know that everything in this life has a purpose."  Elisabeth Kubler-Ross

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    Creating Art is an experience without a known destination…I love how it takes me where it wants to go…

    I loved these colors together and had no idea what would be the center.  I had thought a silouhette perhaps, a tree….a bench, a woman.  But, much to my surprise…


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    A sunrise or sunset…and another windy lady.  I loved the challenge of the scarf, and I was limited by its length….(that was all I had)  


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    I even love that her skirt and the sun rays are the same fabric….

    She will be holding something in her hand, I am thinking flowers, we will see… or a hat maybe….

    Doing art is lots like living; it is done by feelings and the choices we make based upon feelings.  We design our lives by the choices we make or the choices we don't change.  And, by either honoring our feelings or neglecting them. 

    I believe that the more freer I am in my choice making in life, the more access I have of being daring in my art.  Not that I am doing anything earth shattering, but my colors can be bold and work in harmony even when they don't match.  

    And match. Who decided what matches and what does not.  If I feel they are a match, they match.  

    And, the quote…"Maybe being oneself is always an aquired taste" by Patricia Hampl, is true for art creation as well.  

    Being an artist you have to be comfortable doing that which others are not doing, to be different, to stand out, to let your feelings and personality come forth in the medium you are working in.  

    Doing by feelings…by what excites you and brings you joy.  If you create like that, you will be in the Art.
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  • Failing in Seeing Reality

    Is life lived in the intentions, with the actions or in their outcome?  Where does reality bloom or how can we discern the value of the intentions from their literal outcome?

    What I am noticing is that in abusive families, the intentions more often than not, do not deliver the favored outcome or an outcome aligned with their intentions.

    And, I also believe that most who come from the distorted reality of abuse, believe that IF their intentions were wholly, then regardless of the outcome, they themselves cannot be held accountable.  They see themselves only by their intentions and not by the consequences of them.

    (I did go and look up the word Wholly. "Wholly – Entirely; fully.")

    Reality seems to change depending whether you are focusing on the intentions rather than the outcome.

    To me, IF my intentions are to be loving, but you feel hurt, than I am not loving you, regardless of my intent.

    There is no doubt, that in my life, I have lived with wholly intentions that had terrible outcomes…and yet, I felt righteously right, for I knew my intentions. Yet, I was blind to the affects my active intentions had on others…let alone on me.

    If you view the intentions of abusive families, their intentions are to love.  They are not trying to hurt or deliver pain…or to annihilate individual feelings, yet they do.

    In fact, I bet that most families mired in abuse, are totally unaware that their love hurts.  And, they will fight and holler and scream and profess deeply and ardently their love.  What they fail to appreciate is how their intentions fail to deliver their intended feelings of love.

    This has to be the fine line of contention between a loving family and an abusive one, the lack of actually delivering love.

    My mother will claim her undying love for me, yet her actions failed to match her intentions.  Her letters always state how much she loved/loves me.  And yet, she was not able to do what love would do.

    So again, if her intentions were wholly; fully love, does it really matter the outcome?

    I say yes.  

    For her intentions were to be loving, yet she failed in doing the hardest thing love does.  

    What does love do when someone abuses your child?

    Does love forgive the abuser?

    Is it possible to have loving feelings for both the abuser and the abused?

    Her intentions of loving everyone, had consequences….dire ones.

    What is the cornerstone of abuse, is the lack of being a responsible lover, of failing to carryout actions of love.  Instead, no boundaries are erected, no relationships are severed, nothing changes.  Abuse has no consequences in a dysfunctional home.

    Even the wide variety of helping actions towards my father are not seen as being supportive of an abuser. They will each tell you of their honorable intentions, failing to see the consequences to themselves and others.

    My goal in the past 8 years is to see how, what I do, DOES  affect others and how am I contributing to or not promoting abuse.

    Isn't the road to hell paved with good intentions?

    Perhaps the abusive family lives in intentions and bases their confidence there, rather than in the collateral damage in its wake.

    It is like there are two drastically different viewpoints of our family….intentions and outcomes.

    And, I believe that many feel, that if their intentions were not cruel or harmful, then they are not 'bad' people.  They want to see gleeful enthusiasm of ill intent…which is absent in many abusive homes.  

    It is like Patrick Carnes writes about in The Betrayal Bond, "There is always something kind, noble or redeeming about someone who has betrayed you. Victims of betrayal will hold on those good things even while the world crashes around them. By holding on they stay stuck…"

    What most in my family are doing is holding on the to the good…which is normal in betrayal bonds. Seeing the bad, but giving it logical reasons and justifications.

    My father's history lends itself to laying the foundation for my father's actions.  Just because I understand them doesn't mean he is guilt free.

    Most in my family are acting out according to the bonds of betrayal. I don't feel betrayed by them, although I used to.  Now, I understand that coming from whence they came, they are behaving perfectly.

    They will continue to reap what they sow…not their intentions but the consequences of their actions.  Failing to see the consequences of their actions is to fail in seeing reality.

    "We must always hold truth, as we can best determine it, to be more important, more vital to our self-interest than our comfort.  Conversely, we must always consider our personal discomfort relatively unimportant, and indeed, even welcome it in the service for truth. Mental health is an ongoing process of dedication to reality at all costs."    M. Scott Peck, The Road Less Traveled…

     

     

  • Relieved From Being Grounded

    I am reading Pema Chodron's book, "Taking a Leap: Freeing Ourselves from Old Habits and Fears.

    She writes,

    "There are many ways to discuss ego, but in essence it's what I've been talking about.  It's the experience of never being present.  There is a deep-seated tendency, it's almost a compulsion, to distract ourselves, even when we're not consciously feeling uncomfortable. There's a background hum of edginess, boredom, restlessness. As I've said, during my time in retreat where there were almost no distractions, even there I experienced this deep uneasiness."

    "The Buddhist explanation is that we feel this uneasiness because we're always trying to get ground under our feet and it never quite works.  We're always looking for a permanent reference point, and it doesn't exist. Everything is impermanent. Everything is always changing – fluid, unfixed, and open.  Nothing is pin-down-able the way we'd like it to be. This is not actually bad news, but we all seem to be programmed for denial.  We have absolutely no tolerance for uncertainty."

    "It seems that insecurity is ego's reaction to the shifting nature of reality. We tend to find the groundlessness of our fundamental situation extremely uncomfortable. Virtually everybody knows this basic insecurity, and often we experience it as horrible. With me in that  same three-year retreat was a woman with whom I'd once been close friends. Something had happened between us, though, and I felt now that she hated me.  We were in a very small building together, we had to pass each other in the narrow corridors, and there was no way to get away from each other.  She was very angry and wouldn't talk to me, and that brought up feelings of profound helplessness. My usual strategies were not working.  I was continually feeling pain of no reference point, no confirmation. The ways I had always used to feel secure and in control had fallen apart.  I tried all the techniques I had been teaching for years, but nothing worked."

    "So one night, since I couldn't sleep, I went up to the meditation hall, and sat all through the night.  I was just sitting with raw pain with almost no thoughts about it. Then something happened: I had a completely clear insight that my whole personality, my whole ego-structure, was based on not wanting to go to this groundless place.  Everything I did, the way I smiled, the way I talked to people, the way I tried to please everybody – it was all to avoid feeling this way.  I realized our whole facade, the little song and dance we all do, is all based on trying to avoid the groundlessness that permeates our lives."

    "By learning to stay, we become very familiar with this place, and gradually, gradually, it loses its threat.  Instead of scratching, we stay present. We're no longer invested in constantly trying to move away from insecurity. We think that facing our demons is reliving some traumatic event or discovering for sure that we're worthless. But, in fact, it is just abiding with the uneasy, disquieting sensation of nowhere-to-run and finding that – guess what?- we don't die; we don't collapse.  In fact, we feel profound relief and freedom."  Pema

    Isn't it interesting to see her view point of ego, of not wanting to feel the unease of living groundless and changing.  The part of us that wants to ground your life in a certain feeling is the only one with the trouble, for feelings are moving….and changing, and life is not stuck in one spot….even though often it seems like our lives are stuck, we only imagine they are.

    I was lucky to have experienced the free falling, feeling of no ground, and panic…only to find that that is the true nature of living.  

    "This too shall pass…" is the state of being.  Being present is to get used to feeling the static uneasy and not find a permanent reference point.  We want to hold onto something that will NEVER change!  And that alone, is impossible.  Somehow, we have grabbed onto addictions and habits that we believe will bring us permanence, when the only thing permanent is our habitual actions…while life hums along groundlessly changing beneath us.

    We grow old, people die, fall out of love, into love, feel sad, feel happy, it moves and ebbs and flows and we pile layers of habit on top…focusing only on that, believing life lives there….it is only a camouflage over life.  Ego I guess lives in habit, while our souls thrive in ever changing uncertainty….free and relieved from being grounded.



  • 100% Your Self

    Happy Valentine's Day is over and I have to say it was like any other day…except for a few cards.  What is great about this, is that my husband and I share many moments of love, so yesterday wasn't special, it was just another day…yet another special day.  A day of easy love…not a love that had to try and be something special.

    I recall past Valentine's Days, where I believed that it needed to be special, that it had to be loaded with tons of romance or whatever the culture called love.  Maybe it is my age or wisdom, but I see things so much differently.

    I see him differently, Me for sure differently and life absolutely differently…and Love.

    Love isn't about showboating, or getting the biggest bunch of flowers, it is about living life in truth, honor and respect…on just an ordinary day, as well as on special days.

    As we were out to dinner, I noticed something wonderful, it was just like any other dinner.  So, for me, I have many Valentine's dinners a month…in our weekly dates.

    Valentine's day is not the one special day a month, where you try and put aside the discords and troubles, and 'be' loving, but rather it is everyday.

    Our life is lived in gentle harmony, and has moments of high anxiety when trouble arrives, but we swim into the center of turmoil and find our peace with it.

    I know love isn't found in the cards, flowers and candy, but it is found when you face together all of life's challenges and honor each other's opinions and viewpoints while maintaining your own individuality.

    It isn't an easy dance…to be a together and apart, to be one and two…but it is achievable with the right amount of vulnerability and humility and trust…using empowerment, voice and choice.

    It is complicated to form…and the more trouble that comes your way, and you survive, the deeper the connection grows.  

    We can't know how long it will last, what bends are up ahead, but we can always know each of us will be ourselves…fully and honestly.  It is because each of us are not willing to let our integrity slide.

    What attracted me to him, was his sense of self.  His not caring what others thought or whether he fit into his peer group, or if he was in style or said and did the 'right' things, he was always impossibly himself.

    When I learned to do the same, our love grew deeper. For, you can only love someone with the same depth and breath that you love your self and be your self.

    I don't even know that my husband knows how much he loves himself…but what he has always been the most faithful to…is himself.  He rarely cheats and does something he doesn't want to do.  He fearlessly says no.  The only time, I have seen him jepordize his values is to be kind.  He is kinder than I.  He will give kindness to be civil.

    I am grateful to have experienced this wonderful journey of Love with him…learning how to be imperfectly Me.  To me, there is no greater love than being able to be 100% your self.  


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  • Language of the Betrayal Bond

    There is one more part of this book (The Betrayal Bond, by Patrick Carnes) that I want to share…


    "To Take Responsibility for Yourself"

    "This risk reminds me of how monkeys are captured in africa. Tribal peoples put out slotted cages filled with fresh fruit. The cages are anchored securely to the ground. Monkeys discover the cages, reach in and grab the fruit. Of course, they cannot retrieve the fruit because as long as the hand holds the fruit, it will not fit through the bars of the cage. The monkeys are then trapped. They could always let go of the fruit and escape, but they refuse to let go. Even as their human captors pick them up, they hold on."


    "Trauma bonds are similar. There is always something kind, noble or redeeming about someone who has betrayed you. Victims of betrayal will hold on to those good things even while the world crashes around them. By holding on they stay stuck, just like the moneys. We do make our own prisons."


    "That is exactly how it was with Jack. He sat in my office, admitted for an addiction relapse and treatment because he was absolutely suicidal about a woman he had broken up with four months earlier. He was a very high profile sports figure. He spent over a half-hour telling me how she was his dream woman. The sex was fabulous. She was his best friend. they each had children the same ages who really got along well with one another. They had been together for two years. All of which was well and good, except that she had stolen thirty thousand dollars from him, embarrassed him countless times with violent outbursts at highly visible public events, alienated all of his friends, and kept him in constant turmoil with her dramatic exits. After their last breakup she became involved with on of his closest colleagues and slept with him within a week. Jack was sad she would no longer take his calls. I told him he was lucky, and the therapy began."


    "The scenarios of abuse in Jack's history and her history were there. He admitted that she terrified him most of the time. And he acknowledged that the relationship was over. Yet he had a thread of hope he could get her to therapy and retrieve the relationship. Like a monkey with fruit, Jack was holding on to the dream."


    "The bottom line is: Your life is up to you. Take charge of it, or somebody else will." Patrick

     

    This scenario is extremely popular with abused people, to never let go…for the hope of retrieving the relationship, no matter what.
    The sentiment is carried out in many ways in my family, whether it is in how they see my parents to how it is in their own personal relationships. They are not willing to let go of the 'good', no matter how much other junk is floating nearby. For they believe that family is family no matter what…and that healing is NOT in letting go…but in being there at all costs.

    This ideology alone shows their past histories of abuse…and in how it imprisons their lives.
    And another chain on the prison door is the forgiveness of sins, that washes many deeds whiter than snow, eliminating them from their reality, so only the good remains.

    This fallacy keeps them in relationships that are blended with good and evil. Where the evil is never dealt with…as evil, but is shoved aside in hope it changes or dies or they go to therapy or something….meanwhile the person keeps chanting and focusing on the good. Going forward with ONLY the positive. Not looking backwards and 'judging' others, but keeping the family a unit, no matter what.
    I am seen as the worst of the worst for dragging up the 'negative' and bad sins and awkward situations, while they righteously look kinder by forgiving the bad and keeping the good.
    As they hold on to the good, their lives are littered with filth 'unseen'.

    They are willing and able to have relationships with anyone, for all they see are the good things.


    Oh, except me. The one who is responsible for myself.
    I then hold others accountable for their actions.

    This is a foreign concept in abusive homes…where actions are not seen due to the distortion, where the improbable becomes probable…the hopeless filled with hope.
    I feel that the biggest wrong I have done was to take off my distortion glasses…and to see what is and not blink it away.


    This is a harsh stare to live under when you are used to people disregarding your bad behavior, your lacks of integrity and the false promises you fail to deliver, your lazy relationships of zero effort, the one way street of help, etc.


    My family is picture perfect through the lens of distortion.
    Sadly, when you take the lenses off, you are left with a ragtag bunch suffering acutely from the ravages of living in an abusive home, untreated…who exhibit word perfect the language of the betrayal bond.