BIG Surprise!
My 9th week of Finding 52, exploring Being Sensitive with ME, took a completely different turn than what I was expecting. I set myself to focus on who I WAS, not who I wasn’t, and anticipated a large dump of sensitivity to come barreling down from opening skies of enlightenment and universal awesomeness…..(similar to how it felt with previous topics, HA!)….but the universe had alternate ideas….
Here is what happened:
Nothing.
At least nothing significantly impactful, or out of character with the routinely bumpy circumstances life’s road has had me stumbling, leaping, dodging, face-planting, and dancing down, over its twisty-turvy corners, peaks and dips. Maybe life’s road has already ‘rocked’ so hard, that tiny ruts and potholes no longer seem tricky to navigate….obstacles being the norm, choices automatically being made, not noticing the tougher bits….maybe.
So far, I have shared about things that were either in my past and mostly dealt with, or stuff that was currently happening, but not too personally challenging. I am about to shake that up.
For the past 6 months, I have been struggling to recover from a head concussion that I received in a random fall that should not have knocked me off my stable feet…. but did. Not only did I have to stop working for a time, I also had to enter into intense therapy and rehabilitation to gain back the mental ability and physical strength, I once took for granted. I am almost recovered, feeling more capable and ready to do most work and tasks, but there is a lingering emotional barrier that is proving difficult to breach .
My therapy….or recovery, seems to have various levels to complete. The surface level is just understanding what it is I need to know or do. The second level is acting in a way that suits the knowledge I have gained. Thirdly, I must analyze and master the action, making it part of my norm for it to be meaningful at all. And lastly, I must be okay with the change, and not judge myself for it.
I think all these levels have their snags, and I can easily get caught simmering at one stage or another, without realizing I am not moving on, am not shifting gears, am not finding results for which I search, and am just as likely to boil over, as I am to scorch my bottom with a burnout after all the energy has been sucked out of me.
Emotionally, this concussion and the symptoms that accompanied it, were a real drag! It looked like a severe depression, it felt like a severe depression, and I know this because I have had a severe depression. It is not easy to talk about, and it is even harder to explain. Society does not yet see brain or mental illnesses as valid or acceptable conditions, although public health advertisements and celebrity spokespersons are trying to alter that.
Here is what stops me from soaring over that hurdle….fear.
I could fall again.
People might see that I am not quite myself.
I will be weaker than before.
I cannot trust my brain to make good decision quickly.
I look like a failure.
People will label me.
I… will label me.
The list could go on. And on, and on. Fear trumps my motivation, my creative vision, my raunchy theme songs, and triumphant life statements….for a while. But I get tired of fear.
It is boring. Like spending the whole summer at the beach and not dipping your toes into the ocean, not even for a wade. At a certain point, I have to decide to get my hair wet, plunge down into the uncomfortable cold that will only last for a few seconds, and have some ripped up fun in the waves, letting myself be tossed about, with a smile on my face.
Yes, big waves make me a little nervous. Eating sand is not my favorite snack. But no waves have overcome me yet, in fact I am getting quite good at body surfing. Sandy mouth is temporary, the trick is not to chew. So why fear?
Because it sounds good. I cannot tell you how many conversations I have had where the foundation of what is being exchanged is the imagination of a million unfounded fears in any particular circumstance. I think I talk about the worst things that could happen endlessly….I just don’t want to anymore.
I am searching my memories to recall if any of the worries, doubts, freak outs, rants, or break downs have affected outcomes and I come up empty. My emotionally charged responses are not an effective indicator of future events. I am hugely questioning my previously believed philosophy, that this kind of ‘output’, is therapeutic.
So what is the BIG surprise?
At the start of this week, I anticipated getting more internalized, more in tune with my emotions, more discerning with whatever stimulus was driving my awareness, more sensitive, period. It did not work.
Like I said, nothing was happening this week other than my regular life, regular triggers and annoyances. Intensifying my efforts to be sensitive, tipped the scales in the opposite direction that I wanted.
Instead of finding resolution in baby-sized triggers, having more sensitivity to my feelings increased the conflict. Instead of finding humour in little upsets or mistakes, I got offended and wanted the other person to realize how much they had wronged me. But it did not stop there. When I only considered myself, my own happiness, my own comfort, my own sense of wellness, not only did I want people to know they hurt me, I also wanted them to suffer for it!
OUCH!
Lesson for Week 9…. Be LESS sensitive with yourself….
Puuuuu-llllease!
I will do the rest of the world a favour, and quit moping about stuff that goes wrong, will stop acting like “y’all did that on purpose”, and stop talking about every bump and curve like it is a tragedy.
Here is another, quite beautiful concept to accompany seeing myself less sensitively….it is not always about ME. And maybe you have to go to the ‘ME’ place, to find that out….maybe.
Fear, anger, worry, doubt, regret, all lose their grip on me, when I am less sensitive about ME.
AJ
