Voicelessness and Emotional Survival Message Board
Voicelessness and Emotional Survival => Voicelessness and Emotional Survival Message Board => Topic started by: axa on February 20, 2008, 12:20:46 PM
-
Hi,
I have been feeling quite vulnerable lately. I am struggling to see what this vulnerability is about. Underlying it is a sense of aloneness in the world. I have posted about connections and being mistrustful and appreciate the responses which are helping me see my way through this. Something that dawned on me is that I have always felt VESMB was a safe place where I could run to, a sort of home. Acknowledging the positive contact I have had here however, it has ceased to be that "safe place" for me. I understand that, as in life there is always confict, and it can be healthy when it is worked through but it seems more than that here. I am not challenging any individual, I understand that we are all struggling here one way or another but the foundations which always seemed so solid appear shaky to me at this time.
I do not have any answers and I often choose to not read posts which I think will trigger me but it just feels like a different place. Maybe this is a transitional time, some old people are not around so much and I am missing them or maybe I just am just tired of the conflict. I am not suggesting anyone do anything they do not want to do but am just using my voice to say I miss the warmth and once again feel sadness at the loss of my safe place, which I really could do with right now. I feel homeless.
Axa
-
axa,
There are some who will always be here for you and provide a home. I stick to the topics that are posted in need and a desire to help each other learn and understand. Please don't feel like you don't have a home. Just pick which neighborhood you want to stick with for a while :)
Lots of love and wishing you a nice day (and I hope it's warmer there than it is here).
Love, Beth
-
Dear (((((((((Axa)))))))))) Your heart is so tender and that's a wonderful blessing - you are a wonderful blessing - to all of us here. Once again, I'm so glad that you're able to express what you're feeling and to reach out for comfort and understanding.
Please don't ever hesitate to ask for what you need. Your post is very timely for me and much appreciated. This place has been such a solace through tough times... it really is so important to keep the home fires burning. I will try.
Love to you,
Carolyn
-
Beth,
That was such a sweet thing to say. I choose where I post but many times within recent past I have started posts and deleted them. I guess I miss the days when I felt cofident enough to post with ease. It really does feel like such a different place for me. I have gained so much from this place and welcomed the respectful challenges that came my way, made me feel uncomfortable at times, but pushed me to look at my behaviour, in, may I add, a supportive and caring way.
Phoenix, feeling those hugs, thank you.
Carolyn,
Thank you for those kind words. I appreciate you hear what I am saying.
axa
-
I do not have any answers and I often choose to not read posts which I think will trigger me but it just feels like a different place.
Axa,
Agreed with Carolyn here. It was good to hear you express your mind and heart.
The line you wrote above is a good one and is good advice. However, lately, speaking for myself, I realized that I cannot run from certain people, if I truly know myself, who I am, then whatever the person writes can have no power over me. If someone triggers me then it is me, not the person that needs to change. The board can really teach me to practice seeking to understand rather than be understood.
Then I thought to myself that I will ignore that person who trigger me. But instead I decided to face head on the pain they were triggering and what the issue or memory is about. It hurts. But I am less and less affected and less and less triggered, it is freeing. I do not want to ignore people, I know how much that hurts us and I want to do to others what I would want done to me.
Many lessons I have learned here and many more to go.
Take what you like and compost the rest.
((((((((((axa))))))))))
-
Gabben,
I accept that it is not possible to change others nor do I wish to. I think of this place like 3d life. I go to what I feel is like a 3d room to meet with friends and others I do not know so well. My experience has been here, on the whole, people agree/disagree/cry/laugh/support/advise etc....... As in 3d life I feel closer to some more than others. Maybe this is not so much about being triggered as deciding when I started this journey that I don't want to engage with people who I find disrespectful. My experience is that if someone is disrespectful to others there is a pretty good chance they will be disrespectful to me also. I don't need that and I don't want that. Going back to my 3d perspective, recently it has felt, for me, as if I have entered a room with lots of people shouting. My experience is that it is difficult for anyone to hear the other when there is so much shouting going on. I miss the overall tone of the board which I have found very supportive and listening in the past.
Hope this makes some sense, my 2cents worth. I am pleased that you are gaining from being here. Trying to learn my lessons also - many more to go for me too.
axa
-
if someone is disrespectful to others there is a pretty good chance they will be disrespectful to me also.
That's a healthy screening device, Axa...I wholeheartedly agree.
I miss you.
I also miss the reliable gentleness, consideration and peace.
I also wish the board hadn't become a dart board for projectile posters.
It makes me sad. We had a long run as a consistently respectful and maturely nurturing community, and then I feel as though the board was invaded by strident pious screechers. I feel battered by the volume sometimes.
I'm hanging in here because I SO valued the thoughtful, self-examinng (as opposed to self-loathing) posts here that have taught me so much. Including yours.
Stay if you can. Maybe many of us (Where's Mum?) we'll weather it together and the board will recover its equilibrium, and those to whom this is just another waystation in a forum feeding frenzy will go find another place for the daily drama.
(Sound bitter? Wow. Didn't realize I was. I'll release that as fast as I can.)
love,
Hops
-
((((((((((Hops))))))))) yes, it sounds bitter, but I understand. And I think the whole spiel with the board is just a phase.
Love and more hugs,
Carolyn
-
(((((( Axa ))))))) and (((((( Hops )))))))
Love and peace to you both.
Leah x
-
Peace and hugs to you ((((((((((((((Hops)))))))))))))
-
Awoooooooo, BeSee!
Many times a-woooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooo!
love and thanks,
Hops
PS thanks for hugs, Lise and Leah
-
You are most welcome, Hops
Have you had any feedback from your minster regarding your suggestion of a "Help Needs" ??
Was thinking about it today.
Love, Leah
-
Hi Axa,
I haven't been reading here much lately so I'm not with it at the moment regarding who/what conflict etc, but I can sure relate to your post.
What feels warm and homey to me, though, are all the above posts that came after yours and the people who took the time and bothered to post them. There are plenty of people here who not only wish to treat you with respect but who truly seem to respect you (it looks like to me). That's a wonderful thing eh?
It's hard to ignor the rest but it is probably the best thing to do (which I need to follow myself --- did you hear that self??? !!! Ignor the rest!!!).
Then at other times.......
my goat gets got (and I may go away for awhile.....and try to figger out how to get it back...."here goat! here goat!!").
As Hops said: I feel battered by the volume sometimes
Me too.
Question: Who really has the volume control?
Nother question: What if we just press: "Mute"? or change the channel?
That's not always easy though is it? I do get that....been there.....all that.
Anyway, I hope this helps and if not.......pitch to the wicked wind.
((((((((Axa))))))) When I really think about it........even the hard/rough/rude/even nasty stuff ......helped me. I had to choose whether or not to use my voice and to what extent and to learn to judge carefully. (on edit: Am I even nearly near there yet?)
Sela
-
Hi Leah,
The minister's cogitating over whether I need a team of volunteers and a pilot run with smaller groups first...we're corresponding about it. Thanks for asking.
Hi Sela,
I hear you. Thanks for the calm and perspective.
What I find when religion becomes a primary language here (wouldn't matter which one, it just happens to be Christianity that dominates) is that the text stuff is inexhuastible. (Which feels exhausting.) As are Net articles, etc. Sometimes it feels more impersonal in a way, even through the personal stories, because things come to a certain point and there's always the text or reference to deity and that seems to stop the work. (Or maybe, for believers, that's where the work begins.) I don't disrespect it at all, particularly in the case of believers whom I love and respect so much, I just sometimes wish there could be certain threads where believers testify and work on their religious issues, and other threads could be for just sharing life, more the way the board used to be.
Why I should be able to control this sort of thing, though, is beyond me. And it's not a bad experience for me to be in the minority...I'm used to that. Christianity does dominate our culture (as well as inspire it) and I'm the only UU on the block. Literally, in my neighborhood...there are Presbyterians in several directions, all my neighbors (they even got together to buy several houses in a row)...and me. They're good people. I just get lonesome for somebody who's more nonconformist.
Hmmm. Come to think of it, I have seen Stop the War yard signs and a lavender front door up the block. I think it's two gay guys. I must go bang on the door and take them muffins. :lol:
MUFFINS!
love
Hops
-
Wow, Hops... Back to your thoughts on 'if someone is disrespectful to someone else, I feel they could be disrespectful to me.'
This one phrase is wonderful as a life mantra. Fill in any word for disrespectful... (well, not quite any...) and it will work. I DO gear my reactions to people here and in 3D by their general actions. If a person is gossipy, I never talk about anything but the weather :) If they pick on people, I show disapproval by not seconding their jibe and cutting contact, and so on. Such a great point, Hops.
Love, Beth
-
Naked painting!
And some art, too!
Singing on the sidewalk!
Whoopee cushions!
Blowing off notions of what middle-aged females are supposed to act like!
CRONEHOOD!
Whoo-aaahhh! Cackle, cackle...
Wearing jeans and no bras to church!
Being holy fools!
Riding scooters!
Planting front yards in victory gardens with pink flamingos!
(Aaargh, perhaps I don't belong in the state in which I live...)
If it weren't for his depression, I found much to love in the Al Pacino character in Scent of a Woman. He was profane, but more human than anyone else in the story.
I guess for me, nonconformist suggests joy.
Too many girdles around when I was a child, body burkas...
xo
Hops
-
Scuse me, Miss Hopsie....
but I am a non-conformist fundy who wears jeans to church and none of those confining undergarments...
so there :P
:D
Hugs and love,
Carolyn
-
Carolyn,
I'm laughing right now.
Last year I wrote paper on modest fashion -- the lack there of, it was published.
OK, now I'm running...................I can feel the lynch mob coming after me.
(P.S. sometimes I wear jeans to church too -- shhhhhhh :wink:)
-
LOL Amber!! :lol: How I'd love to see photos of that costumed flamingo! What a great idea :D
Tell you what, 12 years of parochial school and dresses every day... anybody'd be hard pressed to take away my jeans at this stage of life... lol... or get me to wear anything that pinches, pokes, or restrains... LOL
-
Awesome, boogying down wid da fundies!!!
8) :lol: 8) :lol: 8) :lol:
(I'm lucky y'all put up with me.)
xxoo,
Hops
-
Naw, I feel truly blessed to know you (((((((Hops)))))) ... always.
Love,
Carolyn
P.S. ((((((((((Axa)))))))))) I hope you've had a good day and are feeling more at ease.
-
Axa,
I just read your original post on this thread.
I haven't read the responses but the theme of being alone, or homeless has been a recurring one since my relationship with my ex started unravelling.
I can remember feeling like I had found a home in him, and when I realized he was not who he said he was, that feeling of being lost, alone and homeless was palpable.
I'm starting to come to grips with the awareness that there may be no home. I'm starting to try and digest the possibility I will always be alone in some sort of existential way, even if/when I start my next romantic relationship. I'm starting to believe that maybe a healthy love can only ever exist if it does not include attachment.
It's not what I want to believe, and who knows, I may reject what I am saying this time next week. But tonight, I'm entertaining the idea that maybe the only way I'll be free from relationship pain is to not be so vulnerable and attached to someone else. (I'd rather be madly, deeply in love with someone and happy ever after, but I don't know that I think that's a reality anymore, and I'd rather be without the pain I endured the last few years loving someone so much who didn't treat my love well.)
Do you ever wonder if maybe we're all islands...in a galapagos?
-
This is a great thread! It is fun to joke around with Hops and realize that jeans are cool in church! But the bra less thing is a no! My boobs have not been perky enough for that in years. Axa-Please keep posting these non threatening threads. I need um-WE need um.
-
Daily-I look at my just married daughter and see how much in love they are-but I know in 20 years that spark will be gone. But the shame is that I have never felt that reciprocal love since I was a teenager and it sucks to not love someone so madly and have them love you so madly back does it not?
-
Perky or no perky--no bra for me, if I can get away with it(LOL) Ami
PS The grandma's knew what they were doing!
-
It is lovely to hear you guys laughing again............been a loooooooooooooong time. And Carolyn it has been a good day, interesting lectures, some fun and feeling whacked right now but happy.
Sela xxxx
Dailymail, I have been thinking about homeless a lot lately. I moved from my house and am renting a room so that feels a bit like homelessness, the conflict here seemed to invade a space I considered a form of home and I guess this theme has been with me for a while. I also am begining to feel maybe there is no home and maybe that is ok. I sometimes embarce my aloneness and it can feel quite powerful but the signals around me in everyday life seem to contradict this. How can I be ok and be alone and not attached. I have a son, whom I love but do not feel attached to in a dependant way. In fact I do not feel any great attachment to anyone and it is a strange feeling. Sometimes I feel as if I am missing out on something but my experience has been that "attachment" has not been a good experience for me. I think when I desire something/someone I loose something of myself. I believe it is possible to love and allow the other be free, to not demand from them or want to control them. I have not achieved this but I do think that is what real love is about. I wonder if we are all islands but because this feels like such a scary concept we fill our lives with attachments to avoid the aloneness.............. have not figured it out really but do like to think about it.
xx
axa
-
And you naughty braless girls in jeans please feel free to invade my threads any time YESSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSS
XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX
A firmly supported underwired axa
-
(squeezing in between the braless girls briefly - or is that briefless girls? :shock: )
I think aloneness, "solitude" is a beautiful thing. Beautiful things are created in solitude: masterpieces, arias, literature. I think solitude becomes loneliness if we ache for companionship but fail in getting it.
I think if we're choosing to be alone, to heal, to create, to get quiet, to rejuvenate then it isn't wrong.
If we find we're alone and withdrawing from friends, family, love (of any kind), if we're drawing the blinds, not answering the phone, turning companionship away and becoming paler and weaker, we've gone astray.
What others feel about us finding our "home" and carrying it "with us", instead of building it around us isn't any of MY business :)
(imagining being happy and unattached in my future)
I don't know, I'm thinking out loud right now.
-
Daily,
I have made changes from self enforced isolation to a healthier aloneness. I rarely feel lonely any more. I think the years of therapy helped me break through the pain of loneliness. When I think of a future on my own I can get a bit scared until I check with where I am now: alone and ok. But have to admit been noticing a few of the oppositie sex lately............ just in passing, may I add, just in passing!
Axa
-
Be careful because if you are like me you will end up with a man with a drinking problem. Problem with me is my self esteem was whittled away until I felt I did not deserve a good man!
-
Well, Kelly, just looking these days, right now I think I deserve the best!
xxx
axa
-
Good job!! If you are in that place then you will find a good one....
-
Hi DailyMail,
Do you ever wonder if maybe we're all islands...in a galapagos?
Uhmmm. No. We're too mean to each other.
tt
-
And you naughty braless girls in jeans please feel free to invade my threads any time YESSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSS
XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX
A firmly supported underwired axa
LOL Axa! We did kinda invade, didn't we!
Well, Kelly, just looking these days, right now I think I deserve the best!
xxx
axa
Bravo and Amen!! :D You certainly do!
Love,
Carolyn
P.S. Ami... lol... way to go!
-
Teartracks,
we're too mean to each other?
-
going braless and growing out your curly leg hair definitely helps one catch a man...
not? :shock:
Hops
-
Hi DailyMail,
we're too mean to each other?
Don't worry DailyMail. Hardly anyone gets my humor.
I said this in the context of how the inhabitants of the Galapagos are so sweet and gentle. I'm not particularly cynical, but I think there is a meanness in humans unparalleled otherwise in nature. You know we do have eyes that look frontward. Predators, you know...
tt
-
:)
and here I was thinking we're all alone TOGETHER
- hungry or not ;)
-
Hi axa,
About feeling homeless...
During my recovery, eight years now, at some point I remembered a picture I used to draw repeatedly as a child. Imagine a drawing by a girl about age four and up. It was on lined tablet paper, pretty crudely drawn. It was a house with windows. The windows shone from within. I used yellow crayons to make them shine. I was always standing outside. I now believe that this drawing was about me longing for a home or at least the feeling that I had a home. The house we lived in was as far as I know home for only one person whose absolute rule and reign didn't allow for any others to think of it as home. To this day, I have never experienced the feeling of being 'at home'. My posts rarely contain answers. More often they ask questions. I guess I wanted you to know that you may feel homeless, but you're not alone.
I always like your updates and sharing different parts of your story.
Love,
tt
-
((((((((Bean)))))))) been thinking of you. If you feel like sharing about current events/resolutions/whatever, I'd like to hear.
((((((((tt)))))))) this hit my heart - The house we lived in was as far as I know home for only one person whose absolute rule and reign didn't allow for any others to think of it as home.
Just so, yes. And still is.
Home is where the heart is...
More hugs,
Carolyn
-
Hi DailyMail,
:D
growl, snarl, hiss~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~c:o<
:lol:
tt
-
Hi Carolyn,
Thank you. I feel the love.
tt
-
tt, this is completely off topic, but when I ordered a couple books this evening, Amazon gave me a list of other books in which I might be interested, you know? And one was a re-release of Intimacy, by Henri Nouwen. Just wondering whether you've read it?
(one of the books I ordered is Integrity, by Townsend... remember you've mentioned it - and I'm excited :))
Carolyn
P.S. lol Bean... okay, acknowledged and understood. My son loves symmetry, too.. just watched him perfectly align his ice cream scoops in the bowl. :D
-
Oh axa,
Sorry. bean is right, I should be more circumspect when posting and keep in mind that it is your thread.
tt
Carolyn. My books are in storage. I've read several of Nouwens. They are all good.
Integrity is excellent. Can't wait for your comments.
tt
-
i am so confused... lol... but i'm trying not to take it personally :P
-
Yay!!
Got my Beaner hugs :D
Thanks!!
And dear Axa, I hope that havin us (me? okay, me) act up on your thread has made it feel homier... and if not, I am sorry. Will buh have now.
Love,
Carolyn
-
Hi bean,
:oops: I wasn't real sure what you meant. I think it was about the love of symetry? I love it that you remember that about me. I posted that to the board several years ago as I recall. You have a good memory! Hugs!
tt
-
TT.
Thank you for sharing about your drawing, it did resonate. There have been times when I have felt "at home" usually when my children were little and I was cooking but like everything else that passed.
As far as having off topic conversations on here.........to be honest I enjoy it, it does feel more 3d, you know, when people go off on tangents and it adds a sense of ease and intimacy to the conversation.......please feel free girls
Axa
-
axa,
one thing I've noticed that as I started trusting people, they couldn't hurt me anymore.
This seems counterintuitive to someone who's been abused. Homeless is synonymous with "not having anyone." People who don't have anyone simply aren't ready to trust, because good people do exist. That does not mean everyone is trustworthy. They aren't. But some people are, and it's human nature to seek out and find those people when we're ready. People that we can reach out to. I truly do understand not being ready to trust. I think it is an necessary step in the journey. I spent many many years there, more than I'd like to admit (shameful feelings there).
I used to believe that I couldn't have friends unless they were wholeheartedly able to "understand" and "support" me. I thought this meant treating me gingerly, and kindly, and being able to listen and react with the right words when I explained my horribly dysfunctional and (yes) mentally ill parents. Well, I held out a long time for that. Those people never came along.
But the process of getting some trust back, and allowing others in made me feel less "homeless." Cause it is truly a domino effect. If you trust a little, and let someone in, and that person doesn't crush you (or they do a little, but I survived) I gained a bit more trust. And in time I gained a bit more. And in a lot of time, a bit more. And I still do not trust easily, but I trust some, and that is a good thing for me.
Traipsing around this board can feel a lot like a minefield for me at times. Those times, I avoid it or work my way through. I'm pretty sure I've lost both my legs here. But hey, I'm back and I'm still trusting somebody. And then I'm trusting somebody new. And then I've learned to trust myself.
axa, this is hard work. You're brave to speak so rawly about it.
love,
bean
Bean,
Your post on trust and homelessness has been one of the most beautiful gifts I have ever received. I know what you say is true and I am learning it little by little. I have trusted the wrong people, shied away from those who were trustworthy because I could not differentiate between those with a good heart and the Ns. I have been working from a child place where I wanted the all perfect parent to be my friend, and of course they do not exist. I am stepping out into the world of trust knowing that trust does not mean that I abandon myself. This is where I have kept making mistakes. To me to trust meant not so much about the other but about me thrusting myself into a place where I gave up on me and expected the other to provide all the answers. Having been raised in an Nfamily I have gravitated towards N to deliver the perfect solution. Talk about going to the desert to find the ocean!
You know what Bean, I am ok and I am getting easier all the time. My post about realising my anger towards XN was a projection of myself seems to have shifted a space to allow another piece of adulthood to exist. Thank you so much for taking the time to post on this thread, I appreciate it greatly.
xxx
axa
-
axa,
one thing I've noticed that as I started trusting people, they couldn't hurt me anymore.
This seems counterintuitive to someone who's been abused. Homeless is synonymous with "not having anyone." People who don't have anyone simply aren't ready to trust, because good people do exist. That does not mean everyone is trustworthy. They aren't. But some people are, and it's human nature to seek out and find those people when we're ready. People that we can reach out to. I truly do understand not being ready to trust. I think it is an necessary step in the journey. I spent many many years there, more than I'd like to admit (shameful feelings there).
I used to believe that I couldn't have friends unless they were wholeheartedly able to "understand" and "support" me. I thought this meant treating me gingerly, and kindly, and being able to listen and react with the right words when I explained my horribly dysfunctional and (yes) mentally ill parents. Well, I held out a long time for that. Those people never came along.
But the process of getting some trust back, and allowing others in made me feel less "homeless." Cause it is truly a domino effect. If you trust a little, and let someone in, and that person doesn't crush you (or they do a little, but I survived) I gained a bit more trust. And in time I gained a bit more. And in a lot of time, a bit more. And I still do not trust easily, but I trust some, and that is a good thing for me.
Traipsing around this board can feel a lot like a minefield for me at times. Those times, I avoid it or work my way through. I'm pretty sure I've lost both my legs here. But hey, I'm back and I'm still trusting somebody. And then I'm trusting somebody new. And then I've learned to trust myself.
axa, this is hard work. You're brave to speak so rawly about it.
love,
bean
Dear Bean,
. That is so BRILLIANT---My cyberspace hat goes off to you! Ami
-
Hi bean,
memory not so good..
It's you that's unforgetable (well, to me anyway )
((((((((((tt))))))))))
thanks for acknowledging that post, that makes me feel good
bean
That's awfully sweet of you bean. I've become something of a relic on the board. Been around a long, long time. When I look back over these years, I wonder sometimes if I ever really contributed anything of value. I was just reading my posts from the previous year wanting to evaluate them for meaningfulness. Honestly, I wasn't impressed. I've purposed to do better this year or not do at all.
I remember your journey these last couple of years. I have been witness to your going from mushy to strong and vibrant. I love that.
It's easy to see that your post #54 to axa comes from an uncluttered, clear, strong voice.
Love,
tt