It’s been a year since I put anything here. A very eventful year. I don’t know why I quit writing, but that maybe I was tired. I’ve been tired a lot in the last few years. Mostly tired, actually. I’m tired now. I just don’t know what all to do about it.
I’m not going to go into detail about what has happened over the last year but to say that I got promoted, started a relationship, lost the relationship, failed an interview for a new job, had some success with the work band, and got down to a reliable size 8. Reliable.
The relationship was a huge learning experience. I learned that if someone talks about the way they have treated other people in a way that makes you cringe, that is a warning – they are one bad experience away from talking to you the exact same way. I learned that I do not have commitment issues – that when I am in, I am all in. I learned that I can fall in love. I learned that living in good faith means accepting responsibility for my actions – past and present – and all of the consequences even when it wasn’t my fault or choice or desire or intent. I learned that being right does not exempt me from my oath to live in good faith. Just because I didn’t ruin something doesn’t mean I get off scott free for being careless.
I was careless. Or I think I was. I’ve been trying to find out for sure, but I’ve had the hardest time of it. I think the universe doesn’t want me to know. But that is another story for another time.
I’ve forgiven myself for my role in the dissolution of this relationship. I’ve forgiven him too – it wasn’t just one party’s fault. I don’t know if I can be friends though. I struggle with that part. There are aspects to him that I would overlook as a lover but that I find difficult to tolerate as a friend. Funny how that works.
I will be re-engaging with the rest of the world however. I will not stay knocked down by this one. I will get back on the metaphorical horse. There is a little bit of work I need to do first though.
Last week I went to a week long continuing education session at a monastery in Santa Barbara. It was intense. Part of the curriculum involved regular journaling. I haven’t journaled regularly in many years. I’d forgotten how helpful it is in working through the nonsense stories I’ve created in my head. Tonight I want to write a little about one of those stories.
One of the exercises in one of the sessions involved sitting across from another person – an acquaintance at best – and telling them what I deserve out of life. To most people this would probably seem like an easy enough task. They deserve to be loved and to have a happy life and to have a good job and a secure future and a family and a partner and all that jazz. But for me this exercise was so difficult that I almost broke down. I almost started crying in front of this veritable acquaintance – blubbering about how I don’t deserve anything. Which is bullshit. I know it is bullshit, but it doesn’t change the way I feel.
So I started trying to analyze why I feel this way about myself. Why is it so difficult for me to believe that I deserve to have a good and happy life? Why only me? I easily accept and frequently remind my friends of all the good things they deserve, what makes me unique? During the session we talked about the way we react to the “lessons” or “mores” passed on by family and friends, through music and TV and movies, in school, and through books. I’m talking about the rules we create around our realities – where we decide, based on whatever feedback we’ve received, whether or not we are pretty or smart or clever or funny. The rules that tell us what we can and can’t accomplish, what we are good at and what we fail at, and why we shouldn’t try. These are internal rules that may or may not (usually not) have any basis in reality. But we abide by them as though they are gospel. So that when somebody says something that challenges those rules (“You’re really pretty!”) our response is to reject the challenging statement outright (“no I’m not”) and then deflect the speaker in order to avoid any other challenges to our reality. I was thinking about my rules – the ones I’d inherited from the church and my family and my peer group. I’ve already rejected all of the church oriented rules. I’ve also written over most of my family inspired rules. The one where my ideas never work? Gone. The one where I’m only pretty if I have long blonde hair that coil in neat ringlets? Gone. The one where I’m fat? Gone. The one where I’m lazy? Eh, mostly gone. Still working on that one. As for my peer group, I don’t know that they ever had all that much influence over me. I’ve spent most of my life abstaining from whatever celebration or social event or holiday that my peer group was focusing on for that week. I’m used to being something of an outcast – which means that now, that I’m not really an outcast at all – it is easy for me to take the solo road. Natural even.
This left me wondering where my rules come from. What is it that has shaped my world so that I don’t feel like I deserve anything good in my life? Then it occurred to me – the Shit. All of the Shit that has happened to me – from my abusive marriage to my familial abandonment to my stalker to my car accidents to my rape to the death of my mentor – even the loss of my most recent relationship – all of that Shit that has happened to me with no real reason or direct cause. I have had all of these fairly terrible things happen to me – many of them absolutely randomly, with no input or causation from me – that have had a very noticeable impact on my self image. I joke all the time that with my mis-fortune I must have been Hitler’s Gardner in a previous life. Even people who have a much more self-determined concept of life tend to agree. It is almost comical the way that I attract bad mojo – even and especially when I am trying my hardest to be positive and strong. So much of it rolls off my back (the mouse in the house, the furnace that caught on fire, the flooding in the garage – a small fraction of February’s adventures) that it isn’t until I start keeping track that the sheer weight of the Shit becomes apparent.
Generally speaking I don’t whine about the Shit. I don’t call my friends and complain. I don’t go asking for other people to handle my Shit for me. I don’t blame anyone. I just deal with it as best I can. But I internalize it too. I wonder what kind of person must I be to have so many bad things happen. Just how terrible I am as a person to deserve all of this Shit. Because I must deserve it, right? That is what our parents and our religions and our schools and our friends teach us – that bad things happen to us as a result of us being bad – doing things wrong – treating others poorly – just not being a good person. Therefore the mere existence of “the Shit” means that I must be a bad person. And bad people don’t deserve to have good things in their lives. Bad people don’t deserve anything but bad things. This was my struggle. I know I am not a bad person. I work really hard to help people and do right by the environment and live my life in good faith. I cannot both live in Good Faith and be a bad person. But the Shit keeps happening. So I reject the part where I know I am a good person and I accept the part where I deserve the Shit and round and round we go.
The thing is that I don’t deserve the Shit. It just happens. It will probably continue to happen. And I still won’t deserve it. The question is whether or not I can believe that I don’t deserve it. If I can actually believe that I deserve good things. Not know – knowing is easy. Believe. Believing is something far more difficult than knowing.
I think this warrants another trip to the therapist. I’ve come so far in the last ten years – I like myself these days. I feel like I have a lot of positive things happening for me, and I’m in a generally stable place emotionally. Generally. But I still don’t believe I deserve to be happy. And that is a problem, because it isn’t going to happen until I believe it can.
I want to enter my next relationship with the belief that I deserve to be happy, that I deserve to not be lonely, that I deserve to be loved. I think that was the piece that was missing for me this last time. I hid it well, but that lack of faith in my own deserving-ness is what caused me to be careless – to (even if it was in my own mind) put another person at risk.
Another day I’ll write about the sameness of belief and reality – even if the belief is not reality. Not tonight. Tonight I want to think about finding a counselor. And a dance class. Time for this girl to find her groove.
SecondHand Saint 