Voicelessness and Emotional Survival > Voicelessness and Emotional Survival Message Board
Heist on Something....
lighter:
Hope:
Nothing takes the pressure off like going slow, I ME.
Making out like teenagers is THE BEST. No need to worry about other people if you aren't giving too much if yourself away.
Breath. Have and share your opinions.
Be more interested in your feelings than his.
If it's not right, it's not right.
Remember the AAAs
Assess
Accept
Act
Make not one excuse for bad behavior, and lean into new experience.
You're an interesting, very loyal human being. Remember that always.
Lighter
Hopalong:
Wow.
I'm feeling a little happy shock at the moment.
Went to dinner with B (I invited him to a restaurant to avoid the automatic "domestic dating" thing) and sucked up my courage and told him what had come up for me as concern and/or doubts...and why...and he shared his own...and we listened to each other and it was actually very reassuring.
The main thing I felt was respected. Truly listened to. So now I'm feeling we've taken a big step forward. And I'm totally surprised. (I was prepared to write him off, depending on how he reacted to the things I brought up: the meaning of the sexual harassment tsunami in the news, and secondly, how I'd personally felt when he'd made a sexist remark about waitresses that I found demeaning.)
I ignored eggshells and just told him very openly how racism and sexism are deep deep experiences in my life (sexism personally, racism observed and taken in as a child observer) that are just core to who I am. And I saw no contempt or dismissal or anything like that on his face (and had feared I might). He listened seriously and took it in, I believe.
And Lighter, the necking like teenagers we managed in the parking lot!
I told him I thought knowing each other in different settings was important too, including meeting friends...and he came back to that and said he would like to meet some of my friends, and he also suggested a short trip together (without sex). I liked both of these ideas a lot and now I think we have a direction to go...to see where we might go.
I'm very surprised. But this is feeling better. Even, if I dare say it to myself, good.
xxoo
Hops
Twoapenny:
Oh wow, Hops, this does sound good! You were heard :) I think bringing up things that can give rise to what we all know so well in others - defensiveness, accusations of being 'too sensitive', raised eyebrows or that kind of patronising tolerance of indulging someone who's a bit silly - is so vital and having him listen and take things on board - I don't think that could have gone any better! He sounds settled enough in himself to be able to hear another viewpoint without taking it as a criticism and feeling the need to stamp on it and good on you for drawing that line very firmly in the sand - very brave when you knew it could mean you going home alone. This sounds like such a good step in the right direction :)
sKePTiKal:
Hee hee..... doing a happy dance over here for ya Hops! That's delightful news.
I don't know if it's all women, or just women who've been going through the life process of examining and working on themselves, and then, trying to build something in their lives... but I've noticed a "thing we do" that ultimately - gets in our own way. (Me included, and Holly in a big way right now.) It may not even be relevant to you (and your ability to say what was bothering you is actual proof that you're not stuck in this.)
We take the raw materials of what's in our lives - people included, and all our feelings and rationalizations and intellectual processing - and put it into a mental "virtual world". And then we try to stage-manage it in that imaginary virtual world, re-arrange things, identify what's "missing" - and what's just fine and that we want more of...
and then we measure reality against it and make judgements about it and create dilemmas, and unnecessary, artificial choices - and sometimes internal or interpersonal "conflicts" - to try to suss out what is actually in front of us on our "quest" for fulfillment or a cozy life or flipping the bird at the early life that we're getting revenge on by "living well".
All without directly interacting, in the moment, in our realities. Passive versus active - and always one extreme or the other and nothing less will "do". Meanwhile the virtual world gets baroque-ly embroidered in the most fanciful ways.
And that habit or "way of being" is what is the actual source of many of the real problems we are trying to solve. Direct interaction with the others in our lives and allowing ourselves - insisting of ourselves - that we be somewhere between totally passive and totally active (and in charge) - is really where our "happy zone" is. Popping the bubble of the virtual world, making the commitment to ourselves that we DO matter and what we want from life IS IMPORTANT... and we're not going pretend or BS ourselves into accepting anything less (even though in reality that's always subject to change)... all this creates energy and momentum.
Maybe I don't quite see ALL of that yet. And it may not be relevant at all to your happy news... since its the opposite of what I'm noticing.
Hopalong:
Thanks, Tupp! Your description of some classic reactions to a woman asserting her truth is spot on. Been there, seen/heard that---way too often. In our dinner convo we revisited the thing about him focusing on the "non-sweet" parts of me and I told him, "'Sweet' is not something I aspire to. 'Keep sweet' was Warren Jeffs' first commandment for girls and women. My core values are kindness, compassion and empathy and those will do." He replied with some power in it, "Those are my core values too."
I also said "You know you can't re-engineer me, right? I am who I am, and this is the whole package." The non-defensive, accepting way he reacted felt very good.
I'm really surprised but for now it looks as though we're moving forward. (I also mentioned us not being on the same page yet as he's dating others, as another reason I'm not eager to spend all our time alone in increasing intimacy...and then he said, well since I met you I really haven't been.) That's a bit contradictory so I would still like to get clarity on that. Maybe he was just trying to protect himself by making me think he was still dating. It's not clear but I'm choosing to believe him.
Another thing he said is that he's seeing a counselor, female. He said to her, "She's been divorced twice and is estranged from her daughter." She said, "That's a yellow flag." I said, "I think she's right, and Yellow means go slowly." Then he asked again about my marriages and I told those stories (I understand you can need to re-tell the stories, or it might be a function of his age.)
I think he tends to over-simplify things and look for very binary answers. We're opposite in that sense too. On the other hand, as we talked back and forth, communication was really working.
About his waitress comment, his reply was, "I was being a jerk." I told him how I'd reacted to it (heart sinking, really backing off inside). He said he was going to be thinking about that.
And Amber, this is BRILLIANT.
--- Quote ---We take the raw materials of what's in our lives - people included, and all our feelings and rationalizations and intellectual processing - and put it into a mental "virtual world". And then we try to stage-manage it in that imaginary virtual world, re-arrange things, identify what's "missing" - and what's just fine and that we want more of...
and then we measure reality against it and make judgements about it and create dilemmas, and unnecessary, artificial choices - and sometimes internal or interpersonal "conflicts" - to try to suss out what is actually in front of us on our "quest" for fulfillment or a cozy life or flipping the bird at the early life that we're getting revenge on by "living well".
All without directly interacting, in the moment, in our realities. Passive versus active - and always one extreme or the other and nothing less will "do". Meanwhile the virtual world gets baroque-ly embroidered in the most fanciful ways.
And that habit or "way of being" is what is the actual source of many of the real problems we are trying to solve. Direct interaction with the others in our lives and allowing ourselves - insisting of ourselves - that we be somewhere between totally passive and totally active (and in charge) - is really where our "happy zone" is. Popping the bubble of the virtual world, making the commitment to ourselves that we DO matter and what we want from life IS IMPORTANT... and we're not going pretend or BS ourselves into accepting anything less (even though in reality that's always subject to change)... all this creates energy and momentum.
--- End quote ---
So that quiet introvert observing the dance and the dancers has put together THIS. While this extrovert was too busy blabbing to do the same. Thank you.
love
Hops
Navigation
[0] Message Index
[#] Next page
[*] Previous page
Go to full version