update from write

[write]

Hello everyone!

Hope everyone is well and happy, as much as possible anyway. I know the holidays are a mixed time.

I have been meaning to come back for a few days and give you all an update.

Firstly it has been a big breathing space to close down all my internet involvement for a while. I also took a break from therapy. I wanted a bit of time on my own to get used to being alone without feeling lonely if you know what I mean.

It's still a little weird to feel so whole, spoke to my sister today and she interrupted me and said she couldn't talk, there was just a split second where her voice was irritable and I still felt hurt and rejected, but barely at all. I told her we'd talk when she's less busy and we ended amicably. My healing is almost there.

Same with ex- I listen to his bile and ranting and it's at a distance, sometimes I say 'are you really this unhappy?' but he and I have the best relationship we can, which is as close a friendship as possible with someone who intermittently sabotages anything happy. He's kindness itself in between bouts of rage and despair.

My son is almost 12! We got two kittens in the fall, very cute companions.

My business is still growing and I'm doing exactly what I want to day in day out. It's become quiet a care ministry and I am thinking of starting a not-for-profit next year to reach people who can't afford the service and cover my expenses etc.

Still struggling financially in terms of there's never any left over each month, but I always have exactly all I need, which is good enough. I really do rely on prayer but some marvellous things have been happening in response to that so I don't worry too much.

The best thing this year is my health is 100 %. I haven't had any problems which weren't easily solved with a small dose of Seroquel and 12 hours sleep. I just sang a huge holiday season with no problems.

I have a new apartment close ex and son and dog, it's really pretty overlooking trees with a garden room, next to a park, so tranquil.

Everything is down-sized so I can afford my lifestyle, and I got to go on my SF trip and had a wonderful time.

Happy holidays everyone!!! G_D bless,

~W

[Hopalong]

Write!

What a treat to hear from you!

I am so happy to hear about your health and balance and pleasures and

SAN FRANCISCO!

Oh good for you.

Thanks so much for the update.

love,
Hops

[gratitude28]

(((((((((((((((write))))))))))))

So nice to hear from you and know that you have made a nice life!!!! Thank you for sharing your nice news.

Love, Beth

[lighter]

Hello there,  Write.


Every once in a while I notice the space where your voice used to be, and I miss it. 

So glad you checked in and things are going so well.

[Certain Hope]

Write    Merry Christmas to you! It's wonderful to read you... a great gift, indeed!

You sound absolutely spectacular and I'm so thankful that you thought to post again here... so thanks!

With love and hugs,

Carolyn

[Ami]

Dear Write,
  It is so nice to hear from you. You sound like you have learned many things and are living them out. I am so happy that you are finding peace. Keep updating when you have time.      Love   Ami

[CB123]

Write,

I surprise even myself at how often I think of you and wonder how you are.  I'm so glad you came back and updated us.  So glad that you are doing so well.

I've often wished you were around to bat some ideas around with.  I think of you as a step ahead of me on the journey. 

Enjoy your Christmas! 

Love,
CB

[cats paw]

Hello, Write -

  I remember you.  Sometimes breathing space can breathe new life into things, thankfully, and your update is a gift to read.

  Merry Christmas, and it sounds like 2008 will be a happy New Year.

cats paw

[write]

Thank you Hops, Grat, Lighter, CH, Ami, CB, Cat's paw!

I do miss the board in some ways but I also needed space, I am changing.
I think it is essential to be able to live with loneliness first before I can love someone permanently in my life again, and things like the board too much fill voids of something I have to learn to deal with.

Oh-I just recognised the word roots: 'voids' and 'avoidance'. That's what i felt I was starting to use the board and therapy as- sidetracks away from my core issue, intimacy.

For an abandoned child any kind of aloneness is so frightening for years and years, that is what I am coming to terms with this year.

My therapist once said in order to do a relationship you have to be able to cope with loss and rejection. My way of coping has been to trust no one fully. I have never trusted anyone before, so now I want to begin by learning to trust me.

Also, it's really become important to be growing my authenticity. I want to be my own person and too much belonging anywhere can stifle that.

Right back in the 1200s Hildegard Von Bingen wrote this:

We cannot live in a world that is not our own, in a world that is interpreted for us by others.
An interpreted world is not a HOME.
Part of the terror is to take back our own listening, to use our own voice, to see our own light.   

It speaks so strongly to me, more than ever, at Christmas; I don't even know why I am doing Christmas, which has memories of heartbreak, is too sentimental and commercial for me, and stress my health!

I do it because my world got interpreted for me somewhere along the line.
Someone forgot they were only sharing and implied I was some way more or less if I did or didn't do a certain thing- even something meaningless to me.

I internalised it and started to live and breath it just like living next door to a factory the fumes may be toxic or unpleasant but it's too much bother to move....

This is my last 'commercial Christmas' I did make that choice this month.
My music can be my gift and special worship for the holidays season, but no more money involved except a cheque to an international interfaith charity. Unicef are trying to end child poverty, maybe I'll get involved with that- it can't be so difficult amid all this materialism to find people clothes and food and education, for some people at least? I can do a little bit anyway, and make it feel like a good time of year again.

One of my favourite novelists Margaret Drabble wrote that we used to have so much less and value it so much more- I know that I don't value material things the same now, Christmas used to be a beacon in the year for a bit of extra comfort and fun; now I can have turkey every night of the week it isn't going to move me the same to cook it once a year I guess! I need some new values and traditions for the life we live now.

I think of you as a step ahead of me on the journey. 

I think our journeys are all separate and multi-faceted CB, you are no doubt ahead of me in some of your healing and planning too.

The big challenge for a person with a mental illness is to maintain health and for a mood disorder- to manage strong emotions. I'm sure you would be well-ahead of me on that, though you would also smile at my progress too:

no outburts this year, I haven't hurt anyone in anything, I've taken responsibility for all my actions and even a few times shouldered those of others to put things back in balance; I've medicated where necessary and kept a healthy routine going even in times of stress ( I had a breast cancer scare in the fall; ex had a big outburst at Thanksgiving )

Many times I still cry and grieve, I don't always know what exactly except it is mourning, and sometimes I do not know quite why I feel so strongly, and should I label it illness.

I have had to learn patience- I am still out of step with timing more than not, and easily hurt or disappointed.

Rejection is easier for me than to wait and not quite know: another reason I must be able to cope better, for if I embark on a love relationship there's a lot of not-knowing, and never really certitude, just a process of renewed commitment and coming-together.

I've come to see relationships as more of a long-term compromise and merging of paths than a set of near-perfect criteria to identify and seek out.

That said- no more abuse. Ever. If something feels wrong I gently step away. More aloneness.....but I am pretty confident it is better for me to be by myself than with someone who projects their issues at me. If I can exercise self-control with constant mood swings and mania, I think it's not unreasonable to find that in a partner.

Oh the schmalz of Christmas though- isn't it lonely to feel like the only one who never had a happy holiday...yet I never did. I cannot remember one, ever. So next year will be a new kind of Christmas, nothing negative, but something which reflects my new life and aspirations.

I've left behind a lot to become this healthy free me: my marriage, my plans and dreams, The Church, the medical model of mental illness, conformity, and the security of lapsing into alcoholism and mental illness instead of making mature decisions.

But my faith and love of G_d is strong as ever, I have my health and a sense of light which suffuses everything: human aloneness isn't the demon it used to be. My son is growing up, I take delight in my pets and walking, and in my work and musical and literary pursuits.

Now I'm in a place where I can let go of negativity and insecurity. I can give myself permission to fly and know that I can cope with what happens, failure or success.

*

I haven't been able to follow much of what's happening with other people here but do know that I care about you all and send love and prayers, and anyone who's having a hard time- you are loved and things will turn a corner eventually.

Jesus said 'blessed are the pure in heart for they shall see G_d'. Sometimes we can't feel the spiritual until we have pain, or even until that pain passes. But the pain cleanses us some way, I can see that now. G_d is with me all the time, like when I was a small child. Didn't Jesus say that too: unless you are as a child....

So many of the things I am interpreting for myself are so fulfilling of other people's prophecies and wisdom!

My new motto is: persist in good. Maybe I should make a little crest- part of my  new winter holidays?!

Love

~W

[lighter]

Thanks for sharing your journey, up to this point.

I particularly enjoyed:

"We cannot live in a world that is not our own, in a world that is interpreted for us by others.
An interpreted world is not a HOME.
Part of the terror is to take back our own listening, to use our own voice, to see our own light."

and your thoughts on feeling God.......

" Sometimes we can't feel the spiritual until we have pain, or even until that pain passes."


That's how it was for me and I'm so glad you came back to share your journey.  

[Bella_French]

Hi Write,
I'm not  around much lately myself, but i just wanted to thank you for the update! Its very uplifting! Hey its great that you live close to a park. I must try to talk you into feeding the birds there, lol. Its incredible to spend a few moments in the day, getting to know the local critters:) You are so fortuneate!

X Bella

[teartracks]

Hi Write,

I've been traveling this week and didn't have much computer time, but it is truly good to see you back on the board.  I've missed you.

Hope your holiday is wonderful and full of blessings.

tt

[Certain Hope]

Dear Write,

So many of the things about which you write have been on my heart lately...
especially about de-commercializing Christmas!
We have, this year... and not by default, you know?
I mean, I didn't just ignore the holiday because I was frozen in a semi-comatose state or neglect it because I was too pre-occupied...
both of these have occurred in the past, causing me to battle my way through in a state of exhaustion and often physical illness.
All of that to say -  I think that we reach this point when we reach it, and not a moment sooner.
I've enjoyed watching others participate in their rituals of importance... but OH, am I ever glad to be in my own home, where we have strung some lovely lights wrapped in snowy garland, lit a fire in the fireplace, glowing candles all around, and sweet thoughts of the One who came to earth that day... so satisfying. 
In other words, we did not "shop till we dropped".
This season for us is about acts of service and time spent both together and privately, honoring the reason for the season. The best yet, actually.
No more of someone else interpreting my world for me, declaring me less because I didn't do something that they considered a mandate... amen!

And self-control... oh, thank you for your words on that. To learn to stop over-analyzing every overwhelmingly strong feeling in order to attribute it to... whatever (in my case, likely hormonal fluctuations). To simply stop all that and allow it to pass... not unnoticed, but ineffectual...
It's so difficult to put into words, but I feel, more and more, that life has become a matter of simply being, instead of constantly searching/managing/re-arranging...

Then you wrote:

Jesus said 'blessed are the pure in heart for they shall see G_d'. Sometimes we can't feel the spiritual until we have pain, or even until that pain passes. But the pain cleanses us some way, I can see that now. G_d is with me all the time, like when I was a small child. Didn't Jesus say that too: unless you are as a child....

Yes... Verily I say unto you, Whosoever shall not receive the kingdom of God as a little child, he shall not enter therein. Mark 10:15
And again... Whosoever therefore shall humble himself as this little child, the same is greatest in the kingdom of heaven. Matthew 18:4

Humbling self after only just discovering self... what a challenge.

My new motto is: persist in good...

Ahh... a passage which repeatedly returns to me... Weary not in welldoing... Galatians 6, 2Thessalonians 3 - and I say, "But I can't!"
and the Lord Jesus says, "I know... but I can."

So much love to you, dear Write, this Christmas and always,
Carolyn

[Leah]

Dear Write,

Thank you for sharing of your life and the wonderful place in which you now stand, which is truly so very insightful, and preciously uplifting.

I stopped trusting people, after all that had happened to me, and now, once again, I am able to trust myself, this time however, with no feelings of doubt.  In the precious place of where I now stand, in my life, I am able to trust myself, and be true to myself, as a life priority.  That's my authenticity. 

And, my being independent, of being my own person, is so very precious to me.  As such, my life choice is to move forwards, and not be forced by another into reverse, for another's motive or agenda of some kind.

"To be the best one can be, and to be true" is my hope, along my chosen path of life.

Write, I do so appreciate this quotation that you mentioned ... 

... "right back in the 1200s Hildegard Von Bingen wrote this:

We cannot live in a world that is not our own, in a world that is interpreted for us by others.

An interpreted world is not a HOME.

Part of the terror is to take back our own listening, to use our own voice, to see our own light.   


Which is why, I cannot give my consent for anyone to do a work of forcing me into reverse.

While I am not familiar with your favourite novelist; Margaret Drabble, who wrote that we used to have so much less and value it so much more, I sincerely reasonate with what she says, as truly, that is my heart at this point in my life, and truly, I simply don't value material things at all.

Yes, I agree, our journeys are all separate and multi-faceted, indeed, they are, as we are all, each of us, equal, yet, we are unique individuals.


With your evident sincere heart of genuine humility, I sense His hand will remain firmly placed on your quiet care ministry, and also, His leading of your starting a not-for-profit next year to reach people who can't afford the service etc.  And while you may struggle a little financially sometimes, He always meets our needs, as we walk close to Him with no reliance upon ourselves, but on Him through prayer, as you are doing.  He can, and always does, as it would seem to be His way, do some marvellous things through genuine humble hearted, quiet gentle spirited ones in His hand.  That's how I * see * you, Write.

May His light shine upon you always, as it is so very evidently shining upon you, and through you, now, at this time.

"May you have a Blessed Christmas and a Blessed New Year"

Love to you,

Leah

[reallyME]

Hey write! Rock ON!!!!!!!!!!!

I can tell you there are few more awesome gifts to me, than seeing a struggler find areas of VICTORY!

Blessya!
~Laura