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Voicefullness Employed - Cents of Self

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Acappella:
Hi CC!
YES! That is the sort of thing I meant.  I vented for so much of my post and said much more about what I didn't want than what I am wanting.  I believe the latter is more frightening for me.  Anyway, glad you stuck with reading my long post...

The mere thought of a self horn-tooting resume sends me into a shame frenzy.   :shock: That must mean it is a great idea.   :D  

I haven't the mind set/or heart for it right now however I will be on the look out for content for that resume.  In the meantime I'd love to read one from you and anyone who dares. (I mean dare in the fun, courageous and voicefullness way!)

I notice many posts, including my own, on this forum that include retractions of confidence...such as "little" self deprecations (most significantly in the face of a complitment or potential compliment) and clauses like "I am not bragging/being grandiose" etc.  It is as if i/we am/are scared of appearing too confident.  That reminds me of Richard Grossman's post in Rosencrantz's thread about shame as a means of "protecting" "scarce" resources ...as if my fear of appearing and feeling confident is connected to my shame and to a sense that if I am good at something then i will make someone else look bad.   YEEEESH!  

Hi Alan, thank you for your response.  I was feeling like a weirdo for rambling on in such a long post, especially when i didn't get any responses. I may still be weird but at least I have company?  :D

I lost a friend too due to my absorption with my then husband to be.  I thought I was being loyal to my primary relationship and paying the price of building a family.  Instead, I was like a sort of life support whose life depended on being life support.  Giving life-support is one thing, being it is quite another.  Short-term focus and support is one thing but when life support becomes a way of life it is just time to pull the plug, no matter the pain or hope for change.

I also lost time I could have invested in a career and had started to but gave up on shortly after moving in with my husband.  Not because he demanded it directly but because his behavior kept disrupting my life...I just got tired out trying to survive.   And, I thought it would end. Endlessly I thought that.  Now, I am not cooking dinners much anymore and refuse to partake in time draining arguments. And, if we go bankrupt I refuse to panic, as my fear is what feeds my paralysis and his effort to deny the relevancy of my concerns.  He already messed up my excellent credit.  I let it happen though.  Things are better if I just don't let it get to me and do my best to do damage control. If a discussion gets heated I insist we converse through writing on the computer so that we can track what the heck is going on. It is sooo much better and I am less distracted and still I have a hard time keeping my energy up and focusing......bla bla enough of that other topic - how to manage living with someone with N traits....

And Alan, what you said about going back to work soon as a place to develop new friendships...so true!

I believe one sign that in the past I wasn't working where I fit was that I either didn't make friends or when I did they were all in a totally different department and different profession.  I worked in database, management/administration mostly though some development and yet the people I really enjoyed spending time with were all the editors down the hall and the artist types working on the web site.  

Guest,
I didn’t suspect for a moment your intent was to be discouraging and even if that were the outcome of what you said, discouragement is not always a bad thing anyway….i appreciate honest feedback even and sometimes especially when it isn’t what I want to hear.  And, thank you for the encouragement…..."you can reclaim your life for yourself, and that's exactly what it is...reclaiming your life as your own."

Regarding the "baggage", "cleaning house", "cutting" of relationships....I agree there is a sort of stepping back from relationships that is a good type, a cocoon type, of isolation vs. the shame pit, jail cell sort of isolation.  
I did that with my family and twenty years later I am soo glad I did.  Just saw my mom again and am more sure than ever I did the best thing I could have and would do it all again.  I am considering leaving my husband...we have been in the same house but not a team for years.  Even the marriage was without a proposal or romance – really just a logistical and civic thing for health insurance.  Got not what I asked for but what I settled for.  And, I have severed ties with my marketing and computer careers.  Now, I often feel a drift...not who I was and not yet who i am becoming.  I feel like an ameba!

And Cindy…”lopsided relationships” I know what you mean! And they can happen at work too.  

And the holidays…as Guest mentioned and Neko…Arrg.  Wish we could all have a safe place to go to meet one another even just for the holidays or especially then.  Someone mentioned a reunion.  Anyway in the meantime I may get to a Home for the Holidays post as I too am very nervous about how to spend it.  

Hey, maybe I’ll be working…strange but it sounds good right about now.  

I have volunteered (on holidays) and other times.  And also I need a paycheck.  For now, I realize action is important AND so is the quality of the action I take.  I am striking a balance between paralysis of analysis and hyperactive just-do-itness.  

I bought some books and began reading them and had some reactions immediately…..the first of which was that I was reading a book written by a professional in the form of letters to a graduate student she was mentoring.  MENTORING!?  Being cared about, assisted, taken under a wing (for even a moment)?  What the heck does that feel like. I so want a mentor in either of the fields I am considering and also the concept is sooooo foreign!  Has anyone reading this had a mentor?  Or known someone who did?  How does one go about getting a mentor?  I am about to put an ad in the paper…only kidding…don’t think it works that way or perhaps that is thinking outside the box?  Time to go back to the box?  :D   Seriously, any experiences/ideas?  I am so used to going it alone and am trying to break that stoic on my own paradigm, as I believe it is one thing that keeps me voiceless and that my voicelessness perpetuates.

Anonymous:
I have and use mentor relationships, and try to pay back.  I brought a student breakfast this morning, and later a proffessor offered to see about transcription for some interviews for my thesis.  But usually the mentorships are less concrete, more in the form of emotional support and advice.  

I try this way.  I write a really honest, short, and straightforward letter to someone I admire, or whose work I admire.  I just tell them what I want to do, and ask for advice.  Then I keep up the conversation.  Nothing gets you farther than a sincere handwritten thank you.  And I always reciprocate.

Over 10 years ago, unsuccessfully trying to get back to school, I wrote the deans of most major law schools.  Almost every one wrote back.  Some were flattered,  Most offered advice and said I could write again, and to drop by their office.  Last year I wrote a researcher in the area of my thesis, and he sent me many of his papers, including some unpublished research.  He also said to look him up if I want to go to the grad school where he teaches.  I've written to him several times, and will send him my thesis parts, asking for input.

Just write an honset, short letter, after you've found someone you would like to know, and I bet you'll be amazed at the responsse.  These people aren't in it for the money, after all.  Good luck, and tell us how it goes!

cindy:
Sorry, cindy above, I seem to forget.  Can't spell, either.

Acappella:
Thank you Cindy,

The whole possibility of mentoring feels more real and potentially friendly to me after reading about your experience and having your input.

You are really out there in the world...writing letters, exchanging with people.  I am aspiring to that.  I'll let you know how it goes...for now, goin slowly.  

Anyway, I like your suggestion about a letter.  That approach allows for facing my fear in steps and it affords the other person the latitude of reading when they get to it, sort of like a voice mail message but without my having to try and call them when no one is answering their phone.  Oh, and a letter means I won’t be sweating profusely in fear while trying to communicate.  Actually, I don’t sweat in fear anymore, most of the time.

Looking back, I had opportunities for having a mentor but didn't know what it was, couldn't believe someone was taking an interest in my future.  I look back now and realize, "Oh, that's what that was.  They were taking an interest."  Moreover, I have a difficult time allowing anyone to focus on my interests or me so I sculked away instinctively in response to attention before I even realized what was going on.  For decades I didn't even know what my interests were. I have done a bit of mentoring myself and felt soooooo inadequate but also enjoyed it.  Still, I imagined that successful people (note I don't put myself in that category) wouldn't be bothered.  Really, I see what a biased, narrowly defined and impersonal worldview I have when thinking and feeling that way.  I am working on it.   :D

Thank you again.

Anonymous:
Hi Nilhil,
 

--- Quote ---you have lost momentum and find yourself struggling just to focus on what you need to do to have control over your life and to become fully who you are. If I am wrong, please correct me.
--- End quote ---


No corrections, that was it.  You are quite right.

I liked your description
--- Quote ---quiet certainty that inhabits me
--- End quote ---
. It is as if you just described the essence of peacefulness.

Patience, as you mentioned is key. This process at its best feels like a dance between stillness and movement, stop and start.

CREATING INNER SPACE
Usually, I am frantically living life as if crisis was just around the corner.  In some ways the crisis my husband has created (and I co-authored by association) has been good for me.  I finally am not going to run but instead walk right through the fire.  Like with any seemingly magic act, I like a good magician, am going to make it happen with consciousness rather than busy reactivity.  

Now, today, I am finally sitting at MY desk.  Like pulling a rabbit out of a hat I made space for my interests and myself.  Like what you said about giving to yourself
--- Quote ---give myself some mental time and space and look deep inside
--- End quote ---
.

I moved 6 times in the last 5 years and overcame melanoma and other stresses. I am exhausted.  I have been dragging my books and garden around behind me like a dead appendage.  (That is an improvement, as a child I didn’t get to own anything, or have hobbies.  Just discovered that limb).  Then, the last few years I have been so focused on the crisis de jour with J. that I felt I couldn't focus on the luxury of finding work I liked.  Finally, instead of my desk and books sitting like props on a stage waiting for a plot and a character, I am sitting here with them and without a script or story to go by I am leaving an openness for discovering what improvisational "me" is laying here dormant.  Instead of slapping a role to play on myself like I was auditioning for a life I am looking for what is already here somewhere.  If I end up homeless I’ll continue this process in a park or shelter somehow.  

I am glad you find solace here.  Here we are, helping one another bare the unbearable.   :D

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