Interrupted

A slight understatement, perhaps… I think I stopped trying to save myself for about a month because what’s the point?  I can only accept a work-at-home position unless I relocate and nobody is offering that up right now! The only positions I do get calls for are in office.  What am I supposed to do with that?  Risk killing my relative for a pay check?  Even if I did do that, my relative would put me on the street.  And so I stopped trying for a while.

What I did do is focus on the internal.  I am doing a very in-depth study of the New Testament that actually aligned quite well with the Easter holiday.  I am also reading The Power of Now, a book I’ve heard of several times from several different people.  The latest time involved an apparently well-known male lead actor discussing this book and this “Shhh…” he gives himself when his nerves, anxiety or depression spring up out of nowhere.  I don’t really recall how I came across the video, but it left me thinking.  I don’t do Mr. Evans “Shhh…” for me it’s a moment of silence followed by “anything can happen”.  I don’t know something he said turned a light on in my head and so I bought the book by Eckhart Tolle and am in awe of how much it is hitting me between the eyes.  I feel like this book might hold the key to the actual uprooting of some strongholds that I have tried to rip out for the past seven years and while I have made progress, I have also been unsuccessful.  I can’t fathom anyone not loving this book, but it is apparently a love it or hate it book so if it’s not your thing - have no fear - the rest of this post moves on to the other things I am doing.
My soul is in a cleansing mode.  And I’m not just talking about some spring cleaning although I am hard at work at that too.  I have been going through everything I own: clothes, books, jewelry, journals, pictures, notes, makeup, perfume… if it exists and I have it - I am going through it and getting rid of a lot.  My soul is craving simplicity.  Heck, I don’t even know if I will ever wear makeup again.  Ok, so maybe some primer and a light skin tint for that SPF, but not much else. You know why?  Because not wearing makeup for the last few months has made me aware that I don’t look so bad without it.  I guess I only saw myself for a few minutes each day without it and since it can be quite a contrast between made up and fresh faced for this porcelain queen I always thought I really needed the makeup.  Like I couldn’t appreciate myself without it until I got used to seeing the real me on a daily basis. 

I am also letting go of some deep seated desires due to the introspective realization that some of the things I want so badly to enter my life probably cannot.  I didn’t realize what all had been stripped from me all those years ago and what continued to be stripped from me every time a new assault occurred.  I didn’t understand.  Of course, I was always drunk and that doesn’t tend to ever help any situation.  I used to laugh it off when people wondered why I was never dating.  I would always tell them I’m like Edina - all I need is my bottle and I’m good.  I didn’t realize that my life was passing me by.  I didn’t realize that I was losing precious years and opportunities to alcohol and that thing that happened and continued to happen in different situations and forms through out my life.  I didn’t get it until I was over half way through my 39th year in a forced isolation and introspection. I don’t know how to be with a man.  And I don’t know that I ever will.  Mentally, emotionally & physically.  I’ve never been consensual with anyone and that’s just a damn weird conversation to have with someone at my age. Now if only my sex drive would disappear. Oh, but no… it’s in full swing making me crazy.

But with the eventual letting go - new things will begin to emerge.  I know this to be true.  And there’s a lot of letting go going on right now.  While I am back to trying to find a job, it might be too late for that too.  By too late, I mean I don’t know if I will be able to keep my car.  I worked so hard to get it, but it might be gone soon bringing even bigger problems into focus.  I also might default on everything.  I might be going back down to the bottom.  It wasn’t so bad being there when I was drunk - it’s being there sober that has me worried. I don’t know if I can handle that.  I’m really hoping I don’t have to find out.  But let’s be honest, my rope, I’m at the end of it and I am going to have to let go.  Maybe therein lies the lesson.

Please don’t think I’m distraught or upset even.  I am not.  I am at peace.  Not particularly happy, but I am at peace with whatever unfolds.  Either I get saved for the umpteenth time or I don’t.  You can’t press your luck forever, right? Even if you are Scots-Irish and whatever else I am? Besides, the things I am learning during this non-working period feel kind of priceless.  I feel like I am right where I am supposed to be and it’s the strangest feeling ever.
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“No matter how many scars we carry from what we have gone through and suffered in the past, our intrinsic wholeness is still here: what else contains the scars? None of us has to be a helpless victim of what was done to us or what was not done for us in the past, nor do we have to be helpless in the face of what we may be suffering now. We are also what was present before the scarring—our original wholeness, what was born whole. And we can reconnect with that intrinsic wholeness at any time, because its very nature is that it is always present. It is who we truly are.” 
― Jon Kabat-Zinn, Full Catastrophe Living (Revised Edition): Using the Wisdom of Your Body and Mind to Face Stress, Pain, and Illness