Voicelessness and Emotional Survival > Voicelessness and Emotional Survival Message Board
Mindfulness and codependence thread
Hopalong:
Lighter, what a lovely and moving update to read.
I'm so glad for you that the inner healing you're doing shone back at you today from your DD's unexpected statement. I can imagine the healing power of that moment.
Sometimes just a little recognition and compassion from someone we care about can fill our spiritual tanks for a very long time. Or release us from craving forgiveness and acceptance, when somebody else reminds us what it feels like.
And your work with your inner self is showing you how to also do this for yourself. Bravo!
Peace and more to all of you.
hugs
Hops
lighter:
Hi, Hops:
I'm not able to put it all together yet, but this focus on painful child pieces shows up in unexpected ways. Always surprised and relieved when it lands.
Example.... I was still feeling salty about the retired nurse neighbor's choices and way of speaking to me in recent months..... mostly she's overtly cheerful, like she's trying to talk me into accepting the Yelly Guy ...... she comes across as his cheerleader, of sorts. Normally, she's level headed and not all chatty and fake sounding..... I had the yuck over it, honestly. Building a tall fence was something I was thinking about too often,bc that would be a terrible turn of events, IMO.
I was ruminating over the boundary I felt I'd set for her not to speak ABOUT me with YG and was confused as to how she felt talking about HIM to ME was OK, bc she just seemed to DO IT every time we spoke, without noticing how our property line has been changing and morphing as time goes by. She speaks. I physically react and it IS a reaction..... HAS BEEN a reaction, up to this point. Honestly, I never told HEr not to speak to me about YG. I should do that and I will the next time she brings him up. No worries. I'm so calm about that conversation..... looking forward to having it with loving kindness in mind. It's a surprising and lovely feeling to experience.
This feels like a direct tie to the inner child work and feeling adult Lighter IN my body, in charge, confident and clear about what I can do and can't do. What's mine and what's not to deal with. What I control and what I don't. It's one thing to understand it and another to experience it in my Nervous System AND understand it as I go.
One day I'm perfectly calm, I can't be knocked off my center and nothing phases me.
The next day I'm on my stomach, tripping over a log in the woods, full of thorns wondering if the Yelly Guy is somewhere watching me thrash through the forest to escape a face to face with him, bc I'm feeling vulnerable and sure being assertive in his direction will lead to (insert every type of threat I've dealt with from men.) WTF? REALLY hate that feeling.
Something clicked...... calm decended.
I had 2 nice face to face chats with the nurse recently and am sure I could discuss anything with her without getting knocked off my center, now. Need for approval morphed into frutration and resentment morphed into acceptance and isn't that what always throws me for a loop? My resistence to SOMETHING I can't change. Ya.... I think that's usually the case.
Some part of me wasn't really sure how doing the inner child work would pay off (I certainly didn't go down that path bc I thought it would be fun or happy work) but all roads were leading to Rome and so I went. It was the same with mindfulness work..... the pay offs were unexpected and such a relief. When the pain of staying where we are is worse than the pain of going....
we go.
Glad I could trust and just get on with it.
THIS access to responsiveness, if not wholly consistent, is such a relief....... feeling affronted and betrayed takes wayyyyyy too much energy, goes round in circles and solves nothing. Stepping out of that place and into nonjudgmental awareness...... shifts brain chemistry in such a profound way..... it's so simple and yet so difficult to keep in focus, IME. I feel like I have to be slammed upside the head by some thigs, over and over, before I "get it" but it helps me understand when people around me don't "get it."
Being right isn't a worthy thing. It slows processing and resolving issues, IME.
I'm not saying I assume good intentions on everyone's part. I'm saying I'm open to whatever is present, at any given time, in people doing harmful things.... intntional or unintended doesn't really matter. I don't HAVE to assign judgment to it. Just getting on with what's MINE to handle is the relief. It's the key that opens the lock to what comes next instead of remaining stuck, if that makes sense.
Adult Lighter can be uber assertive, without hesitation, guilt or regret (fear.)
Clarity is clear and available in every moment.
Lighter
lighter:
Hops:
You're right about treating myself with as much compassion and kindness as I treat 8mo Lighter and LL. That's the mission.
It also translates to every being.... not to say everyone is connected, but I think maybe there's truth in that and we're all the person we're mad at, need something from, view with judgment.....
when I judge others, I notice I'm judging myself. That sort of thing.
When I'm more expansive with patience and manage spaciousness around problems..... being compassionate is available. In every direction. I'm not experiencing biochemical hijacks or the need to get myself OUT of them, which is so much better.
Lighter
Hopalong:
I hear that!
It's like you have taken hold of the react-switch in your own brain and dismantled it.
Clogged it all up with compassion until the only way it'd fire is for real threats, not their unimportant copies.
I remember a woman I met in an early support group in the 80s who was alert to danger 24/7. I knew she reminded me of something but couldn't describe it until one night, I listened and considered her and felt her tension and said, "I think what you remind me of is a returning Viet Nam vet who feels this way because he hasn't recognized it's peace time." The way she responded stayed with me for a long time, because it was like she'd been understood and felt it. (Pretty sure I told this story here before but hey, old brain repeats itself. Again.)
My bet is that one day you'll be looking back and you'll think to yourself, There has been no real threat to survival for a long time now. I don't even feel it.
(It's not that those skills will abandon you. Just that you'll know what it's like to live in peace, not need them or think about them or practice them every day.)
Sounds like you're trusting life and loving yourself more, starting with LL. Fantastic.
hugs
Hops
lighter:
Hi, Hops:
I've read your response a few times and responded without sending.
I don't know I feeeeeel exactly what you're describing, though it's possible..... at least in part.
I do know I feel better, experience less guilt, frutration and fear, so.....
things are headed in a very good direction.
I'm glad you're here to share it with me: )
Lighter
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