Worthy

It's interesting to maintain a dialog with oneself, and I think very beneficial to a person. You find yourself noting changes in mood, patterns of thought, feelings and triggers.

I think the most obvious trigger for me is anger. If I become angry I am curious about that. Since it's an experience I loathe, I want to know what instigated that feeling in my body. The answer is that I was triggered - that the thing that was said or done or seen or experienced somehow stepped on a trigger point - a wound - that still sits there deep inside and out of sight.

To put a name to this trigger point, it would be 'unworthiness'. It could be a feeling that I am unworthy of love, or unworthy of attention, or affection, or care.

It's simply not the case that any old person could touch this trigger point. I am not expecting care, or affection from someone I meet casually in the street. Although, I offer that when someone in the street is caring that's a particularly lovely experience.

So, the experience of a difficult emotion such as anger comes hand in hand with expectation, I think. There's an expectation that a few chosen people in your life will take the time and make the effort to provide a sense of attention, affection, care and love.

It's this expectation, or perhaps hope, that one will be cared for by another person that can make some romantic liaisons so sticky. If things started out so beautifully, and then drift into only random moments of care, or words of affection, the memories of the beautiful experiences can lodge into the brain and body and not allow someone to see that the landscape has changed for the good. 

Even then, the body does throw up signals that all is not as it should be - that these are painful experiences that are remarkably like those already experienced in one's youth. Unworthy of love. Unworthy of care. Unworthy of affection. Unworthy of attention.

I used to think that I should fight against these triggers - be the better person, you know? I used to think that if I tried hard enough those triggers would evaporate.

But, I found a thought coming up lately...that maybe those triggers, the anger, was there for a reason, alerting me to the fact that whatever had brought up that trigger need not be tolerated; that the emotion need not be vanquished. Maybe there were just some experiences that should be sidestepped.

So, as an experiment, I tried this side stepping of a situation that led to trigger points for me; a lot of unworthiness; a lot of wishing it was different; a lot of longing involved for something that was out of range. In summary, I took a reality check of what I could control and what I could not control, and I decided to control that which I could - to avoid the triggers.

The result has been, so far anyway, a greater sense of quiet in the body and in the mind, which I like very much.

And...an acknowledgement lodged deep in my mind...that, aside from these trigger points from childhood, there isn't really anything wrong with me at all. 

I am worthy. 

I'm just going to sit and let that thought soak in.

Thoughts on the Depp/Heard case

 Like millions of other people, I got swept up in the Depp:Heard legal case where Depp sued Heard for defamation in an newspaper article she co-wrote saying that she was a victim of domestic abuse. I very much wanted to believe her. Even now, I don't know and I don't think the court case made especially clear what actually took place in their relationship.

For sure, they said mean and ugly things to each other. For sure, they both found the union to be sufficiently disturbing that, ultimately, there was no alternative but to split.

Whether he caused those bruises on her face, kicked her, slapped her in the face over and over, (as a witness testified), I don't know. 

What we can know is that the jury and the world, generally speaking, was of the opinion, that none of these things happened, because if even one of those things happened on any given day, the jury was obliged to find for Heard. 

If she suffered not physically but emotionally, then that too would count as an acknowledgement of Heard's vindication for writing the article. The jury determined that she was not emotionally abused.

Or, maybe the jury felt that they were both emotionally abused by one another and so it sort of amounted to a cancellation of abuse.

There was very troubling testimony and had I been on the jury, I would have wanted to explore that fully. A young man who became close to Johnny testified that right after their wedding ceremony he made a statement that went something like, 'Now I can legally knock her around.' I found that chilling.

I also would have wanted to explore the fact that victims of domestic abuse often want to protect their abuser and that this was in line with Heard not wanting to talk to the police after they were called, and I think they were called after a friend heard a very troubling encounter between Depp and Heard on the telephone. (I didn't see the whole trial so that may not be entirely accurate)

My point is that there was evidence that domestic abuse of one kind or another appears to have taken place and has been corroborated by other people. Maybe the jury thought these people were lying too.

It's strange, because I am of the understanding that it is a crime to give false testimony and it seems odd that so many people who gave testimony have been accused of lying on both sides. It throws into  question the judicial system and the willingness of people to lie.

I was a young woman in the days of the trial of Lindy Chamberlain who woke one night whilst on a family camping trip in the Northern Territory of Australia to find her baby gone. It was a similar situation to the Depp:Heard case from the point of view that the judicial system and people at large got involved, with nearly everyone having an opinion one way or the other. (You may recall that Streep played Lindy.) Most people, and the courts, came down on the side that Lindy must have killed her baby.

I found that proposition absolutely ludicrous from the moment I heard about it. I held onto that position for years until that joyous day when baby Azaria's jacket was found, corroborating the fact that a dingo had taken her baby.

In the meantime, Lindy's life was destroyed. The (innocent) woman was in jail when she had her second baby. Can you imagine how devastating it could be for a human who loved her baby dearly to be accused and convicted of killing her? A witch hunt, indeed.

So, I wanted to believe Amber. If those awful things happened, and she made it out of there in one whole piece, then I wanted to support that strength.

But, things niggled me. For one, I would never write a public article that would destroy the life of the man I proclaim to still love. She supported him, she says, by not wanting to talk to the police, and yet she wrote the article. There's a problem there.

The 'malicious intent' that the jury believed in was a surprise. Really? She maliciously intended to hurt him? Well, yes, thinking more on this, I suppose she did write it with either the intent to inflict harm on him or else she was naive as to the repercussions of the article. 

One article I read shed some light on the power dynamic of the couple. Sure, Depp was richer and more famous, but Depp came across as a codependent who couldn't navigate such deep (narcissistic) waters.

Who knows?

I do know that this trial in some way struck a cord with the world at large much like the Chamberlain tragedy which took place long before social media was a thing.

When a relationship begins wonderfully; when a person is provided with much affection that they so sorely need, and then things start to become a bit emotionally abusive - intermittent validation/affection; tactics that confuse the other person but keep them enmeshed in a relationship that is troubling - it's hard for the brain to figure out what has happened. Wasn't it once a great relationship? Wasn't he or she once so loving? Maybe, if he or she tries hard enough, they can get back to that?

I don't know what happened in that relationship exactly and I am not sure if the participants fully understand the dynamic themselves. To be sure, they were both right to go their separate ways.  Unfortunately, that was not done quietly.

Honesty

 It occurred to me earlier today that we are almost forced in life to be actors in a play. There is the student hat and the teacher hat, the therapist hat and the client hat; one person being in a hierarchy higher than the other. I noted twice earlier today mention of seeking wisdom, from one person further along the path of life or of growth than the other. It's all normal; all good.

But, what happens when we are forced to hold in thoughts just because the other doesn't want to hear them; or gets mad about hearing them?

It's all done for best practice a lot of the time - we don't want to offend or to pry or to overstep the mark. So, we keep our thoughts to ourselves.

Our thoughts, of course, aren't necessarily right or wrong. They are just thoughts and some aren't worthy of being shared. 

Some thoughts need to be corrected; modified; adapted. We are just learning. I think we try on thoughts to learn; to learn what is in our head.

Some people are like a wack a mole game; remember that? You say something and they wack you down without a thought. If you are lucky , they politely explain that that's a tender subject and they are a bit precious about it right now. Of course, you back off immediately.

I have spent a lifetime holding onto the vast number of my thoughts. You probably have too. We have thousands of thoughts every day and we couldn't express them all if we tried.

The problem for me is that my internal definition of intimacy is that I would be able to express nearly all my thoughts. I am not necessarily referring to a sexual relationship but rather to a relationship where we are safe enough with one another to share practically any thought.

Sometimes in my marriage we do share a thought where it gets close to the bone - could, in another moment, cause some upset - but it's said and shared and we respectfully register an intimacy of the mind and heart. We've tread close to a landmine and neither of us blew up.

We are not always so lucky.

So, here I sit with a trillion thoughts that I have held onto; unshared thoughts.

At times, I come into contact with people who work in odd spaces - past lives, for example. They say that that's my story, my lives - my keeping my thoughts to myself. If it was history, some period of time even more gender defined than now, chances are I had no choice.

I kept a lot of thoughts away from my parents too, especially my mother. 

As soon as you know it is not safe to share your thoughts, well, naturally enough, you safeguard them in a spot that is safe - deep inside.

I shared with someone recently that I sometimes write down my thoughts. I don't read them back. I tear them up and throw them away.

Why? Because, they aren't  sometimes that nice and not meant for the consumption of others. I might be registering anger; contempt; frustration. I could sit in meditation and let them pass through. That would be fine. But sometimes, writing them down very fast and furiously is very freeing.

Once upon a time, if I had these not nice feelings about my husband, on occasion I expressed them. It seemed honest. And, it seemed fair because it was his behaviour that led to those thoughts.

But I came to see that he saw them for what they were: passing through. It didn't alter him or make him do something at all. He dances to his own drum whether I speak my truth or not. So, often I don't bother. I don't need the whole 'fight or flight' circumstance for my body that would ensue.

The man in prison that I write to...I came to see that he is happy to speak his truth and I am a safe place (as safe as you can be knowing someone probably reads all our letters). That's a great honour to me; to be able to be that person for him.

When death might come knocking on your door by way of a court ruling, it really does focus the mind. There's so much less allowing one part of the mind to cover over another part of the mind, so that so many thoughts can't be thought, felt, shared, or heard. I love the honesty of the exchange.

I noticed in the last letter I wrote which I am about to walk up to the Post Office that I responded to his thoughts and at the last moment noted that all was well on my end. I can't imagine anyone really buys such a broad statement but in comparison, of course, of course I am fine. My job is to be fine: to be the vessel in which he pours his thoughts. At least, that's the way I see it.

Here on the blog? Well, I do monitor myself, yes, it's true. You know I have been at times that person who said of someone on the street, 'She would be so much prettier if she were a little thinner.' It's a true thought but one that my family felt I shouldn't say. So, I stopped sharing those thoughts.

In the Johnny Depp trial it was claimed that certain tests can pick up when someone is adjusting answers to make themselves look good. I wouldn't be surprised. Isn't that what we do on a daily basis ourselves?

Personally speaking, I find, more and more, complete honesty so refreshing. Maybe one day, it will be a thing.

Self Help

 I have mentioned a couple of times in the past that I attended a 14 day Ayurveda retreat a couple of years ago. I loved it and did what they told me to do for the period of time I was there. I felt great! 

When I came home the effects lasted for a period, much like a good holiday has a lasting effect for a few days or weeks. But, it wears off. Life takes over.

When I began to see a chiropractor a month ago, based on a glowing recommendation, I noticed the charts around the wall and it didn't take much effort to connect the beliefs of a chiropractor with the beliefs of Ayurveda.

It was this experience that led me back to the notes given to me on discharge. I am Vata Kapha in terms of the energy systems, with a Vata imbalance. This could be described in many ways but to use my own words, I tend to be on the go, a bit scattered in my approach at times, in my head. I am capable of being grounded, spiritual, able to be still (that's the kapha in me) but there's this tendency to have an imbalance of too much Vata.

In Ayurveda terms much of this imbalance can be sorted out through food choices. I recall they were a bit dismayed at my tendency to eat salad at lunch. This was all cold food (adding to vata). I think I ignored/rejected their warnings because in the West eating salads is seen as such a good thing that I felt they had to be wrong about this. Besides, I love salad.

I now know, and in my defense they didn't explain much at the Retreat but rather just told you what to do, that much better choices for someone with a Vata balance is the nourishing choices of soups, dhals, curries, soft fruits like berries. Eating three meals a day is also encouraged along with warm drinks like tea. I've reverted to this way of eating and I have to agree with them that I do feel better nourished and thus more grounded.

The chiropractor, after taking x rays and photos and feeling all around my body, prescribed at least half an hour walking a day - am loving that. When I come home I do my exercises and after a month he took more photos and said I had made a great deal of improvement and now had upper strength to work on.

Living the day in alignment with the sun and the moon is considered the right way to live and in one week I have had six great nights of sleep and one night where movement and noise awoke me in the middle of night. There was that Vata imbalance showing up...lots of active thought that I had to calm down with oceanic breath to get back to sleep.

It's taken quite some time but what I have come to see is that it is vital that I go my own way in terms of a daily practice. I am meant to rise before 6 am, before the sun, but I am definitely not close to that yet. Still, I rise earlier than usual and go walking. I get to bed earlier too but there is still improvement to be made. I am meant to be in bed by 10 pm and I want to get there because it is the right thing for me.

All this, by the way, is in line too with the self-love notion of daily caring for oneself. When one has nourishing foods, meditates, does some yoga, walks, self massages, this is a way of providing oneself with self care; love.

I think the stars aligned somehow with all this self care. I received an email alerting me to a volunteer position (and maybe funding to pay later) with a woman whose organization is providing care to people with a new cancer diagnosis, getting them  meditating, and I instantly sent an offer for my time. This really excites me.

I can't deny that I would have loved a marriage where my husband and I were aligned: awoke together, for example. But, he insists on being up very, very late and I can't do that and nor is it right for me. So, I have reconciled myself to doing what works best for me and seeing the benefits.

At the Retreat it was groundhog day. Every day was the same. I reveled in that. I reveled in living my life in a villa on my own, dancing to the beat of my own drum; receiving the touch I so needed, every day for 14 days. Yet, I also need variety. 

I think that's where the Vata Kapha comes into it. I need to be grounded in daily practices but not so grounded that there is inertness. I need the daily practice of walking and yoga; achievement for the day of one sort or another, but not tiring myself to exhaustion. It's feeling into the body and getting the cues of what the body needs.

One final thought: My chiropractor is a committed, honorable, knowledgeable and experienced practitioner who talks a lot. I only have to ask a question and I get a whole lot of information about the human body in evolutionary terms. Remember we used to be animals and then became upstanding humans? Well, there is research being done right now to try to figure it out but it seems we might be evolving back into animals. All this looking at screens, particularly phones is bending us forward and creating mayhem for our bodies down the track. Why not get outside and take a good look around you, the way people used to do? Your body will thank you.

No more 'trauma' study

For a couple of years now, I have been drawn to material - books, articles, podcasts and videos - about overcoming trauma. I wanted to know everything about the topic; what made for trauma, what trauma looked like and most importantly how to overcome trauma. 

This material is out there in abundance and I inhaled my share of it. I didn't want to leave any stone unturned. It felt to me that I had to keep reading and watching because what if the gem that I was searching for was forever lost in material left unseen and unread?

One day not so long ago, I noticed that I had no interest in reading any more of it. If an email had the word 'trauma' in it, I deleted it. I had lost all interest in the subject material. I remember once reading that if this day came, that was a very good thing.

This is not to say that I in any way turned away from the need for trauma recovery in the lives of many people. That's a journey many people must make.

It is to say that the good news is that there is an ending point for the journey of trauma healing.

When things happen quite suddenly as this happened to me, the wish is to go back and write down the recipe and then print it for all to have. 'Recipe for ending the need for any further trauma recovery'

Alas, I don't know why I reached this point, except to say that I got bored. It felt like the material was on repeat and that everything was saying the same thing, just another well meaning person giving the material their own unique flavor.

Maybe I just reached a point where I knew what I knew and I didn't need to know any more.

For what it is worth to you, I offer this:

- At some point I came to see that the narrative I had built around my life was a bit of a fabrication. I had a lot of unprocessed feelings to unearth and investigate.

- On investigation I came to see that the nurturing and care I needed as a child, I didn't get.

- The lack of nurture led me unconsciously to seek out nurturing as an adult.

- At the same time, as so many people in my situation do, I chose a partner in life who sought out success (like both my parents), which meant he wasn't nearly as available for nurturing experiences as I would have liked/needed.

- This situation led to suffering which led me to explore myself and to ask how I could help myself.

- Exploring my nature led to a consciousness that I hadn't really had a childhood and that my 'inner child' or younger self was stuck. I befriended the smaller part of me and this process started to make a shift in how I was feeling. In order words, I starting nurturing myself.

- I befriended myself through bodywork - yoga, especially yin yoga and restore yoga were especially beneficial, but so too were other modalities. Shaking is a great way to start the day!

- I acknowledged that my situation was as it was. My husband has no foreseeable plan to give up working hard at his desk. Regular holidays, now that that is possible, is a requirement. He is as he is.

 I think it was an understanding too that I must recover; must make my peace with the circumstances. My body was showing signs of distress such that I found myself at a chiropractor and week by week, I am getting strong again.

For some time there, maybe a year, it was very noisy in my head. It took a while to realize that I had a vicious internal critic who was blaming me for everything. Once I realized what was happening, and the craziness of accepting that blame, she completely settled. I think you have to talk back to internal critics.

Now, I see it all as I see the way the planet has come to this moment in time. It's not the doing of one person or three people but the unfolding of a long history that spans back generations. It's many, many decisions, each one leading to another decision, leading to this.

This makes acceptance entirely achievable.

Did I ever tell you about my psychiatrist acquaintance? We met in retreat and she told me she thought she must have murdered her little brother...until the child that was never acknowledged as once being in the family wrote to her and told her the story of his mother and what she had done. She closed the practice down. Since the mystery was solved she no longer needed to look for answers in the world of the brain. She wasn't the bad person she thought she was after all.

That's a bit how I feel. Why go on reading about trauma when you have followed the path to its logical end?

Now, I look at the world through different eyes. I made it. I am strong. My days are to enjoy.

-

Gratitude

 Until today, I was of the understanding that a gratitude practice involved taking a minute or two to think about a few things for the day, or maybe the week - a period of time - for which you were grateful. So, a person might think a little about it and come up with something like - I am grateful for the meal my wife cooked for me...I am grateful that I had my raincoat with me because it rained...I am grateful to have beautiful and kind hearted children...I am grateful to have lost no-one to COVID-19.

A person might be grateful for the little things and for the overarching picture of one's life, and anything in between. And that's not a bad thing. It's nice.

However, according to the science, it's not nearly as good as developing a script about gratitude that you can write, rehearse, embed in the mind, and bring up for a minute or two on a regular basis.

I'm writing this from memory, no notes, and it was a long podcast I was listening to, but here's the idea in a nutshell.

First, we sort out lives best when we have a narrative. We like to have a beginning, a middle and an end; protagonists and antagonists. We like stories. It's the same for gratitude. It's too broad and random of strokes for us to come up with a little list of things for which to be grateful. We need some structure around it and creating that structure is straightforward.

So, sit quietly with yourself and cast your mind to a time near or far when you felt gratitude for something that someone did for you.

Alternatively, or as a second story, think about a time when you did something for someone else and felt the receiving of their gratitude.

Now, write yourself a little script. It could be bullet points but get it down on paper, or go through the motions of the experience visually in your mind.

Here is an example:

In October 2016 I returned from New Zealand where I attended a 7 day retreat, mainly experienced in silence.

The next day my family celebrated by birthday at a lunch held at a restaurant they knew I loved.

When we returned home after lunch they gave me a gift. There was a card and inside the card were two air tickets to Bali for my husband and me.

I instantly began to weep. This bamboozled them until I managed to get out the words, "I am so lucky to have you."

The gratitude I felt was a whole body and mind experience and was expressed in tears. My heart welled with gratitude and spilled over. I felt loved; lucky; appreciated; heartfelt gratitude.

So, there's a little script that I can use; would probably take a minute to conjure and feel through.

Apparently, it's this kind of minute of gratitude, repeated a few times a week, at any time of the day, that releases a positive emotional state that can effect a human in many optimal ways. Should you feel space in and around your heart I think you can take that to mean you did it right.

Etiquette

 Someone referred to me recently as "cautious"; that is, neither introverted nor extroverted, but cautious. I had never thought of it that way, but the more I thought about it, I came to the following conclusion.

I enjoy people, as a general rule. And, I enjoy time alone. I need both.

I don't need people to give me energy, like a light bulb requires energy. At the same time, I don't need, and don't want, to have energy sucked from me, or carry the negative energies of other people.

There's a distinct difference here which I am trying to put into words, mostly for myself.

My prisoner penpal...he's in a very rough spot and I don't expect him to provide me with energy (although he sometimes does), or even curiosity about my life. My positive energy, together with a keen listening ear is what I give to him. The correspondence we share is meaningful to me and I would miss it were it to come to an end.

I am very open to providing a listening ear in any number of situations and again, it's a gift I willingly give.

At the same time, I am subject to the ups and downs of being human. No-one can get away from this, unless you are an enlightened soul. Maybe the Dalai Lama can get away with it.

My nature is to be calm and positive; to work with momentum to move forward in life. I have built resilience to adapt to circumstances as they have unfolded to date.

Having said all that, I shy away from being brought down. Since the comment was made about me being cautious, I became aware of the fact that if I determine that an interaction or being in the company of someone in particular will bring me down, I do my best to avoid the circumstance, most especially if it happens again and again.

Years ago, I bought a book about living gracefully. It's somewhere on the book shelf. The writer made the comment that sometimes she isn't feeling her best and that when that happens she consciously chooses to keep her own company, rather than inflicting her negative mindset on someone else. 

As I was writing here today I was aware of reading the comment at the time and thinking this a good strategy. 

It's one thing to be a good friend, or spouse, or mother of an adult child and to offer them your ear. Generally speaking, that's the right thing to do.

However, to expect someone else to take on your emotional life in the moment - your frustration, or anger, or insecurity - much as they might ask you to wear their coat since they are overheated, is asking too much, even of an empath, or someone willing to give more than they take.

It's such a shame that the etiquette books of yesteryear are out of vogue. They contained much wisdom.