Holding On/Letting Go

I don't want to hold on.
I want the strength to let go.
   - from Sweet Serendipity by Lee DeWyze

How did I get here?  How do I move forward?  Those are the questions I ask myself every minute of every day... 

Letting go of what has become my life over the past 21 years is quite a daunting task.  I'm questioning every decision I make and, thus, making so many mistakes.  I have searched for strength to let go anywhere I could...in friends, in music, in inspirational quotations.  I now realize that all I've succeeded to do is hide from myself, my pain.  I can no longer hide.  The pain won't let me...  It's time to face all that I've been feeling.  It's time to start moving forward with what I have and to stop waiting for answers and for resolution to come.  I know this...but, oh, how the fear and loneliness torture me...  So...today, I am going to start moving and stop hiding.  I MUST face the fear and fight the loneliness.  If I stay here, in hiding, I will surely cease to be... And ceasing to be is NOT an option.

I have no choice but to face what is my life.  To take the cards that I have been dealt and make the best plays I can to try to win the game.  So far, I seem to be losing every hand...but with each hand lost, I am learning more about how to play the game.  One day I will win a hand...I hope.  Maybe then I'll find that Sweet Serendipity...

"Yea, though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death

         I will fear no evil, for thou art with me;" - Excerpt from Psalms 23:4

Contradictions

Contradiction - something illogical: something that has aspects that are illogical or inconsistent with each other; opposing statement: a statement, or the making of a statement, that opposes or disagrees with somebody or something.

A friend told me a little while ago to stop contradicting myself all the time.  That really cut me.  What was I doing or saying to contradict myself?  Why could he see it, and I couldn't?  Several weeks have passed since then.  He, of course, was right.  (Don't let him know I said that, though...  He's quick to tell you that he's ALWAYS right...and what a curse it is.)  Truth is, I am finding more contradictions in my life than he ever dreamed of. 

I'm also learning to laugh at myself, thanks to another friend.  To find humor in those things that have always taunted me, like my unusually large feet.  He calls them my "big manly feet".  From anyone else, I would have been horrified.  But I found myself loving the fact that I had "funny" feet.  That I am "well grounded" and "have a firm understanding".  (Yeah, I've heard it ALL.)  To finally find some peace with part of who I am has been quite cathartic.  Oh, the years I've spent hating myself and those damn feet.....

I used to have a very orderly, neat life....and home.  That, of course, was before I had three young children, and three dogs, and let's not forget the grown child I've been raising.  My home now looks like a war zone, literally.  The carpets need to be replaced.  The walls need to be painted.  Any number of things repaired or replaced.  I don't have pretty little objects or pictures sitting around anymore.  Just dust, everywhere.  I've let my once beautiful, orderly, "sanctuary" become a nuclear waste disposal site.  Turns out, the condition of my "sanctuary" is a metaphor for what my life has also become. 

Once, I was boasted about for my organization and neatness.  For my ability to multi-task and accomplish that which could seemingly not be accomplished.  Now, I find I don't accomplish much of anything, except sitting at the computer wishing someone would reach out to me, feeling and needing the same as I do.  I keep saying "I'm eating less and doing more."  Well, I've got the "eating less" down.  I've dropped a little over 30 pounds now.  (Don't get too excited, though - just a drop in the bucket.)  Still having trouble with the "doing more" most days.  Unless you count warming a desk chair and surfing the web for inspiration, hour upon hour, as doing more. 

I keep writing about change.  That I am changing.  But, the truth is, I feel suspended in time.  The sun rises and sets each day, as does the moon, but each new day is really just a repeat of the day before.  (SSDD as my "right" friend says.)  I just have more time than I can handle.  Which brings me to the song my "funny" friend wrote and recorded called "All This Time":

"All this time.  What am I gonna do with all this time? 

I don't want to live with all this time on my hands, anymore."

I have played that song over and over again.  It slices to the core of my problem.  I can't live with all this time on my hands.  I've got to get up and start "doing more".   I've got to find something to occupy my mind...so the time won't.  

I want so desperately to quickly pour out the last few drops of the rancid wine of my old life, break the old bottle, and start pouring fresh wine into a new bottle.  I have begun doing that, but it takes so much time...and I have so little patience.  I live in contradiction...  I am contradiction.  I have to remember that the new wine must go in slowly....in drops, really.  If I fill it too quickly, the new bottle will overflow, and the new wine will lose some of it's flavor.  Some of the new person I want to be.  Of the new life I want to live.  I've got to slow....down....  Good things come to those who wait, right??

So, I now find myself inspired by the sunrise.  It slowly rises from it's slumber every morning, and I eagerly seek it out.  I stalk it, if you will.  I seek a rebirth, a new beginning...with each breath I take.

Oh, that my new life would be as beautiful, and as full of color,
as one of those sunrises....

New Wine In Old Bottles

Old wine is spilled to make way for the new

Old battles cast aside, they just will not do

The old life that haunts me, I long to forget

The new life I would live, I do not know yet

New wine must never be poured into bottles that are old

For if it is, I know what that will do

When the new life grows and changes with each passing day

Then the old body will hurt, crack, as the old patterns fall away

Old bottles and new wine just do not fit

An old life will not give way to let it

A new life in an old body, a far away goal

A new life, a new way of living, happiness for the soul.

                                                                                                   

Written by Margaret Willie Batchelor, my Granny B, 10-09-77

I miss you Granny B.  You are always in my heart....

Time

Sometimes when I look at the hands of a clock, a strange chill runs up and down my spine.  I feel as though I'm in a race to beat the hands of the clock to wherever I'm going.  No matter how hard I try, I can't get rid of them.  They follow me everywhere.

Time is always on my hands.  It seems to push me onward.  It seems to force me to do things a little bit faster each time.  It seems to burden me with the knowledge that I can't just stop.  I must keep running, hand in hand, with the time that surrounds me.

Time seems to take away my joy.  It seems to force me to trudge on, to forget the joy, only to find sadness further down the road.  It seems to take away my most precious moments with the tick of its seconds, and bring me closer to death.  It brings me closer to the earth with each day that it closes.

Time forces me to wonder how much longer I can hold on.  It tires my hands and weakens my bones.  It gives me more knowledge with each passing hour.  Time shows me love, and it takes that love away with the quick movement of its minutes.

Time sets its own limits.  It can make the longest year seem as short as a day.  It can make tense moments seem infinitely long.

Time tries to hide from me, but I always know it's there.  It beckons me closer to hear its ticking seconds.  That's when I feel a chill up and down my spine.  I begin wondering what time is and if I could live without it.  Then I find time, and I feel the relief of knowing that time is mine, if I will only use it.

October 10, 1989

Insanity

"The definition of insanity is doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results." - Albert Einstein


I've apparently been insane most of my life...  Well, guess what!  It's finally time to stop the insanity!  To stop laboring over the same doubts and expectations while hoping for some miraculous "change" to occur.  I must stop circling the base of the mountain while merely contemplating the journey to the pinnacle.  I must CLIMB the mountain if I ever want to get to the top. 


This is quite a daunting task for me.  For, to reach the pinnacle, I must face my fears, my doubts, ... myself.  I must confront the mistakes I've made, the fear of the mistakes I will make in the future, and where I am today.  In doing so, I've learned that I have gained so much wisdom.  Some of my mistakes have been quite painful, but they have helped to create the person I am today.  As for mistakes in the future, I choose to now look at them as a chance for personal growth.  To show myself the true strength of my character.  As for the person I am today.  I'm learning to accept her.  To be kinder to her.  To appreciate all that she is and can be.  To love myself for who I am...

Sisyphean Challenge

Sisyphean - endless and unavailing, as labor or a task.

In Greek mythology, Sisyphus (pronounced /ˈsɪsəfəs/) was a king punished by being compelled to roll a huge boulder up a hill, only to watch it roll back down, and to repeat this throughout eternity.  Prometheus was chained to a rock and had two vultures come and eat out his liver every day. Another sat in a pool of water, but every time he tried to get a drink, the water disappeared.  All of this took place in Tartarus. May as well have been called "life" in my opinion... 

Seems I've lived a sisyphean existence for a long time.  I've stayed in an unfulfilling relationship for 21 years.  Why you say?  The short answer is fear.  Fear of what I may never find, and... of what I might find.  Fear of being alone.  Fear of change.  Fear of fear???

Pandora's box has been opened.  All that I had allowed to bind me now seems so insignificant.  Prometheus has now been unchained.  I now seek change, swiftly and aggressively.  I now see the truth of my confinement.  I can now attack my fears by coming face to face with them.  They constantly seek to push me backwards.  Try to take away what is mine.  Put doubts in my mind.  But, as Tom Petty sings, "I Won't Back Down".  I'm tired of hiding.  I'm tired of playing games.  I'm tired of trying to be something I'm not.  I want to breathe in the truth of who I am and who I can be.

Some in my life seek to stop my journey.  To my surprise, many more have rallied around me to lift me up.  On this new journey, I have already made wrong turns and took curves too sharply, but I now know who I am.  Who I am meant to be.  I will not lose her again.  I will not continue this Sisyphean existence. 

"Truth alone will endure, all the rest will be swept away before the tide of time. I must continue to bear testimony to truth even if I am forsaken by all. Mine may today be a voice in the wilderness, but it will be heard when all other voices are silenced, if it is the voice of Truth." Mahatma Gandhi

Catharsis

Stop the self doubt
Happiness is not derived from others
Stop lamenting dreams lost
Make your dreams come true
Find your wings, reclaim your spirit
Distraction only served to numb this pain
Feeling it has pushed me toward the answers I seek
My steps are deliberate now
My path is my own and resolute
I committed suicide so many years ago
New breath now fills my soul
The dawn is now breaking
I can see the future coming at me
I am reaching for it, but afraid
For the darkness still seeks to reclaim me
I will not succumb, surrender
I will tread on toward the unknown
I will fight for what is my own

Clarity is a double-edged sword