Take what you like and leave the rest - A God of my own understanding - surrender

I attended a memorial yesterday for someone younger than me.  This always gives you the chance to think about your own mortality and what will be said when you are gone. It is nice that everyone picks the best parts of the person that has moved on.  The version of the truth that will be what we will remember.

I remember my own father's service and how everyone that spoke said he was like a father to them. Ironically he wasn't like a father at all to me and I resented every good word spoken about him. I didn't feel like I meant anything to him or even anyone in my own family. The indifference my family had for me was all done by Christians. This made me reject my own childhood teachings.

I found God again when I got into Al-Anon I liked that the the statement "a God of your own understanding" and "take what you like and leave the rest".  These statements kept me coming back since in my heart I was angry at God. I could see how hypocritical it was for my family to be so active in the church yet not really care about one of their own family members. It felt like lip service to me.

I once said if my father was going to heaven I did not want to go. As I eased into Al-Anon I started to soften towards God. I was still a long ways away from even acknowledging Jesus as even existing as part of my past. The program is full people that have experienced the cruelty of religion and rejected by the people that were suppose to love them. 

My first experience with trusting God was after my husband left. I was not making enough money to support myself. Being new to the program and lived by every word - I read in the daily readers. I trusted that the God of my own understanding would get me through this devastation. I had lost my earthly god to alcoholism and I was and empty shell without the energy to do anything myself. 

I lived minute to minute in those days and unlike my former self I didn't make plans for the future. I was sad and exhausted and I surrendered to what ever came next. I had been beaten down by my situation and the fight in me had gone. 

During that time I experience many daily miracles. First the company I worked for decided to give my position a salary adjustment to bring it up to the same position in other companies.  Then I got a promotion to supervisor and these two things together gave a 30% raise. This never happens in corporate america. All the time I was barely able to get off the couch when I wasn't working. Now I had the income to pay my bills. With every miracle I became more grateful and started to heal. 

I didn't necessarily pray but I just turned everything over to whatever or whoever was out there running the show because I certainly couldn't do it anymore. When I did things got worse.

Where am I now? I believe that each of us has a divine center and depending on what has happened to us this divine center is either enhanced or distorted. We either shine our light upon other people or we are like a cloak of darkness putting out light wherever we go. We must look at how life has changed us and get rid of the lies we believe that are hurting us and the people we say we love. We can be free to love without pretending that the other person is or was perfect. We can stop feeling superior or inferior to the people around us and live in daily peace. 

Al-Anon taught me step by step how to live again. I loved that Al-Anon stressed anonymity not just because you needed to feel safe but because they didn't want your behavior to reflect badly on the group as a whole. This is what I was taught by my mother about being a true christian you won't need to tell people they will know by your actions. This is why I don't understand the hate going on in our own country and how churches can support it. Where is the love that Christ showed and taught during his time here. 

I have returned to my roots and my childhood teachings. I can now separate the weakness of the messengers without throwing out the message. If the words speak to me and I feel encouraged by the those words then I feel it is from the God. 

For me to forgive what my own family has done to me I have to know that they are imperfect just like me. I also have to forgive myself for believing what was said or in some cases not said. I never felt loved after the death of my mother. I chose people in my life that couldn't love me because I didn't feel I was lovable or deserved to loved. If my own family rejected me I must not be worth loving.

Over the years I have come to terms with those feelings and do now realize I am a child of God and therefore lovable. I can forgive the people in my past and I show myself the love I deserve whether I feel it from those around me or not. I am a whole person and today I am able to feel joy. 

In the end no matter what is said at my own memorial if there is one it doesn't really matter. It is whether while on earth I could find joy and if I was able to leave here without resentments. If I can lead by example and trust only in a power greater than myself. 

Take what you like and leave the rest. 

 

Scared to move - Alcoholism - Part of my story

During one of my meditations this I saw my ex-husband standing on a large rock in the middle of a river. The sight brought tears to my eyes this really happened. We were on a trip to our engagement party in New York and had stopped to visit my family in North Carolina. I stayed in the car and watched him jump around the rocks I was too scared to get out there in the water and he agreed it was too dangerous for me.

I think about that girl in the car I had so much fear because I loved this man and I felt like at any moment it would end in disaster. I was afraid to move. Life was tough then we had no money at the time of our marriage we had 50 dollars in our account. Our bond was around the sadness we had had in our childhood and our ability to survive. I felt like I would die without him. 

Like me his mother had died when he was 11 she had a brain tumor and left six kids behind. Two in diapers, two in middle school and two in high school. The older kids were shipped off to an uncle and the younger two to an aunt. He and his middle brother were left with his father who drank non - stop for three years leaving the boys to fend for themselves. They did what they could to get by sometimes stealing food to survive.

We were survivors and our connections was so strong that we never spent a night apart in almost eight years. I loved him because he was a mirror of the pain in me and I knew he understood what it was like to be on your own. He had something I did not have he had anger and he wasn't afraid to stand up for himself or for me. This made me feel safe because my own family never stood up for me. He was loyal something I really longed for I have felt alone since ever before my mother got sick. 

My husband's alcoholism increased with every year along with his anger. He was mad a his dad even though he had stopped drinking after meeting a single woman with no children. She was kind and generous and took on all those kids and they had two of there own. My husband couldn't reconcile the anger he had towards his dad. His dad was such a great guy now who was loving how could he be mad at him. The anger got re-directed towards mostly strangers and eventually me. 

The verbal abuse that came out towards the end of our relationship was really scary. Because of the bubble that we had created around our relationship I was isolated with only his drinking friends around us. I felt even more like an alien surrounded people that could drink for days. As the drinking progressed the meaner he was and I believed everything he said about me. My own anger was turned inward and I became depressed and scared to move.

I did feel physically threatened but nothing ever happened. I watched every word I said to make sure not to provoke him. I walked on egg shells but I couldn't imagine my life without him.

I tried many things to get the relationship back on track.  All the things that worked in the early days but things got worse with me being alone all the time just waiting for him to come home. I tried to talk my way back in to make the perfect house to fix the perfect meal. I didn't know about alcoholism back then "cunning baffling and powerful" I thought I could fix it if I just kept trying. Our relationship ended one Thanksgiving when he said he that he didn't love me and wanted a divorce. 

That was probably the most honest thing he ever said to me. He didn't tell me he had a girlfriend I am sure to save himself from being more of a bad guy. Alcoholism knows how to protect itself and how to manipulate the opinions of others. He was the life of the party and I was just dragging him down and this is what I believed because he told me it was true. 

He left and I was no one without him. I am smart and kept my life together financially so that when I wasn't working I could lay on the couch and sleep with all my clothes on sometimes the whole weekend. I lost my identity to alcoholism and didn't even know it.

I remember when I went to counseling and she asked me about the drinking. I said I never saw him drunk but he was always drinking. My only experience with alcoholics was my uncle who would be sober for six months and then binge until he passed out on floor.  My husband had a good job and was very popular. It was me that holding us back and I wanted to fix that. 

He was gone by the time I began to attend Al-Anon. It was the only thing I did besides sleep on the couch and go to work. I had a great sponsor who at first insisted on picking me up every day to go to a meeting if there was one. I had one hour of peace every day and I eventually was able to drive myself.

I was using the slogans because I was dead inside and they were simple. I listened to collections of positive phases in my car even though I didn't believe them. I was a zombie on the inside just doing a list of things I was told to do. Alcoholism had broken me I didn't have any solutions left inside of me. I surrendered my will over to a God of my own understanding.

I don't think I will ever really get over that relationship because it made me feel so safe when I needed that. It also ruined me and made me hate myself because I couldn't fix it. It saved me in the end because I found Al-Anon and I had to work through all the problems created by the death of my mother and the indifference of my family towards me. I had to see that my suffering was cause by the beliefs I had about myself. 

Yes other people planted some of those negative ideas and yes over the years those ideas were re-enforce by being rejected over and over but it was my own self talk that believed this crap. People are messed up and if you rely on what they do or say as proof you are enough then you are never on solid ground. We are all born complete and whole and deserve love and if we don't get it it isn't because we don't deserve it. 

I believe in forgiveness and letting go. You have to learn the lessons life teaches you or your just stuck forever with the same thoughts with the same kind of relationships. I don't really like to go back and tell my story anymore but today I felt it needed to be said. 

I can romanticize those early days watching him standing on those rocks but things were already heading for the rocks but I was young and he saved me momentarily from my own suffering. He made me feel safe and wanted. I have forgiven him and being able to feel that moment of love for him in my meditation made me see that I can love what we had even if it didn't last. This is an old story but one that made me who I am today. Today I am whole and happy most of the time. 

 

 

My picker is broken - I have loved well - that is enough

I am off this weekend which is nice but I don't have a clear plan of what to do with my time.  I have a number of projects like usual but they all seem kind of daunting at this point. I also have outdoor projects but is is really hot and humid today and we just had a short rain shower which doesn't help.

I was texting back and forth with a young friend this morning she is getting ready to move into her first house. It is a property that her mother has owned as a rental for a few years. I don't know what the arrangement is long term but is seems pretty permanent. She hasn't had a steady anybody in a number of years since her relationship with an active alcoholic . I can totally get that.

You feel that you can't trust anyone and worse you can't trust yourself. My sponsor use to say "your picker is broken" she meant it in a humorous way but saying that just reinforced what I was thinking.  I wanted to control everything back then and I my analytical brain worked hard to find a solution and correct the repeated mistakes I was making. 

The second time around I thought I corrected my picking problem and it was by far a much better situation but still there was that underlying drinking problem. I will be the first to say I had some serious problems of my own or we wouldn't have been such a great match. 

I was a caretaker and derived my self esteem from creating an atmosphere of comfort. It was more important for the people around me to be happy than my own happiness. I did this mostly in a stealth way where no one really knew all the small things I was doing.  I have done this in all areas of my life because I just like for other people not to suffer. 

The problem is that at some point along the line I get weary and resentful. I feel I am too far in to turn back and risk the disappointment of others. I would rather suffer myself than inflict it on other people. I can see that this is my pattern and I don't do it anymore which makes me feel guilty only sometimes. I am definitely not as popular as I use to be but I feel rested and happy. 

I have learned that suffering can really make you grow so who am I to keep other people from growing. I know this is just another justification but it works for me. 

My work is a substitute for catering to the needs of others and I get paid to do it. I do try to encourage anyone I come in contact with. It is rough out there right now and people are spending more time with themselves than ever and it is uncomfortable. We are creatures of habit and suddenly the things we counted on to distract us aren't there. The only solution is to keep moving and call someone at least once a day. 

My picker has picked me at this point. I do think sometimes how nice it would be to share my life with someone but for now I am content to just live each day and be grateful. I know that we are all looking for someone to take care of us and this has made me popular in the past. I have loved well and with all my heart even if in the end it wasn't appreciated.  I can appreciate myself now and the energy I invested in the people that I have shared my life with and that is enough.

 

Daily forgiveness and lies we tell ourselves

 I am still doing my daily out loud forgiveness. Saying the names of the three people I still feel resentment towards sometimes. It doesn't seem like lip service anymore and it really doesn't seem like anything at all. The solution is always inside my own head but it has taken this long to get to the point where I know I have the solution.

The brain is the collector of all the things we have ever experienced the words that have been said to us and the things we have seen. Repetition is the root of all the negativity we have experienced  Starting with when we are young and a  seed of negativity planted by someone we thought knew everything or someone that loved us or maybe someone that was trying to help.

For me it started when I had problems in school.  The first week of school ending up in the hall of Mrs. Outz's class a women my mother went to college with. This was stressful and was the beginning of a long life of just not fitting in really. I quickly got the impression that there was something wrong with me and it was very upsetting to my my mother.  

She addressed this as a discipline problem and up the number of whippings I received then put me on a sugar free diet.  In the second grade I had my eyes tested and I am legally blind without my glasses.  This did help my grades a lot but not really my behavior.  There was some discussion of medication but my parents didn't like the idea and although they weren't hippies but they did think diet was important hence the no sugar regimen. 

I even spent a few months in special ed with Bobby who lived on my street. I thought it was strange that they gave me this time off from class to play with Bobby who obviously had some serious problems. The truth is no one could explain why what we were doing in class was so important.  It seemed so dull to me I could think of a million different things I could be doing with my time. 

When my mom got cancer in the third grade the focus shifted to her and I had to figure things out for myself.  I had to make myself invisible as much as possible and entertainment myself. This led to many hours in our basement alone coming up with projects constantly creating things. I had some friends mostly younger kids who didn't mind having a leader to follow.  I made things fun and no one got into trouble. It was a good time in my life but it did shape the person I became.

I have always believed that I am a problem and even to this day I try to not bother people if I don't have to. I am self sufficient in every way possible which makes me come across and not needing anyone. I am sure my exes would agree with that. They wanted someone who didn't need anything from them and could be autonomous. I remember the few times I needed emotional support they ran away.

This how I have become me. The difference now is that I don't think I am a problem. The child in me learned that a long time ago.  I have made it a habit to not ask for help because in the past I haven't gotten it from the people that said they loved me. The difference now is that I know it is not my fault. Humans are messed up and we live alone in our heads with only our own feedback. We hurt the child in others as well as the child inside without even realizing it.

I am constantly listening to what I am telling myself and when it is negative I ask myself "why do you believe this?" It is always the patterns we have laid down in our brains that we have repeated over and over again. We have to make an effort to stop repeating and replacing them with positive thoughts about ourselves.

My 21 days of forgiveness is an exercise of re-writing the past and replacing the bad with the good. My point is that we have the power to stop the words in our own mind. We can stop believing they are true and get out from under the lies we tell ourselves. We can experience freedom for the first time.

Forgiveness in 21 days - Freedom

I heard a teacher talk about forgiveness and the brain and how saying out loud the people that you still have angst against "I forgive you ____" will set you free.  Just like everything else this starts to sink in brain after 21 days. You get another path etched in your brain just like a new habit.  I have to admit that it feels fake. It reminds me of the slogan "fake it until you make it".  It does feel like it is working.

I have three people on this list and after a couple weeks of practicing this I can actually say their names without making comments afterward. One person in particular has been hard to forgive my stepmother. The other two are just my ex's and the venom is just not there anymore.  I was an adult and they were adults and the pain has passed.

My stepmother was the adult and I was the child.  She was vicious towards me and really everybody else. Every word that came out of her mouth was hateful never a kind word for anyone even now. I think the difference for me was that I was a child and I believed ever word she said about me well into my adulthood.  I stayed that fearful child never measuring up to her standards which became my standards. This is why childhood trauma is so hard to unto for most people. The child inside is still there in some capacity and still believes the words said back then.  

I couldn't understand why she disliked so much. I tried to be perfect in every way but "I was never enough".  I thought it was me that I was not lovable and took this with me through most of my life. In every relationship I felt I was not enough. Really in the end I was not enough for myself. I had to get that thought out my system.  Since I am analytical I can list reasons why this idea is true.  This is not a good combination and can cause a loop of negativity. 

I was surprised that my Dad wasn't on this list of forgiveness. I have forgiven him mainly because after our last meeting together I realized he did not have the ability to be more than he was. After a violent childhood where an angry father beat everyone into submission my dad and most of his siblings shut down and are still that way today. They are all kind and generous but show little emotion. This is how he survived.

I always longed for him to stand up for me when I was being verbally abused by my stepmother. I thought his silence meant that he didn't love me. My mother was dead and now my daddy obviously didn't think I was worth fighting for either.  He had a new family and I was disposable. I left at sixteen because I felt unloved and my position in the family was the maid and babysitter. My cleaning was inspected like I was in the military.

I know her life was not easy and she made a bad choice at an early age and married a man who left her while she was pregnant. She has never gotten over that and the last time I saw her she was still talking about how he left her.  I am sure even though she blamed him in her heart she felt that it was her fault.. Her mother moved in with her a strict woman with high standards the divorce was a disgrace.

I have to admit that I can say her name out loud without wincing. It is truly the last hurdle the child in me has to jump to be set free. The patterns made in my brain so long ago were deep and my belief in them just deepened their truth for me. Because I believed them it made them stronger. The brain goes to what is familiar the thoughts and beliefs we have always had. We have to replace those thoughts to move on. This is why we try to escape through addition which is also a familiar pattern. 

Twenty one days seems to be the magic number to create lasting habits and in this case forgiveness. I feel lighter even if I am just half way through at this point. She always represented evil to me. A person so hurt going through life spreading  that hurt to other people. Another slogan "hurt people hurt people" she isn't any different than my own dad damaged by her childhood and rejected by someone she thought would love her forever. I surely can relate to this. 

Try forgiveness for 21 days - You know who they are when you can't say their out loud without a little pain but you will get past it.  I have been an adult a long time now physically and spiritually but this last little act of forgiveness, maybe not so little, feels good. The child in me wants to hold a grudge but trust me now to do what is best for the both of us. We are ready to forgive it will set us free.