title
Wow. So it feels like forever since I’ve written here.
I’m actually really writing again. I’m working on my next book. I’ve been writing it in chunks; following the original outline on the contract, but with much different and deeper content than I imagined several years ago.
Hmmm. perhaps deeper isn’t the exact word. maybe I’ll just stick with different.
I have actually kept up with my Lenten Daily Grateful 5 posts, they’ve been posted on my facebook stati. I’m thinking about tying my facebook and this blog together again, but I fear the department of redundancy department. A link from FB to here would work. Not that whole note thing that copies the text directly and ignores paragraphs.
...
When we started 2010, I described my new year’s “word” (cos resolutions suck) as unlimited. I stole it from the song “Defying Gravity” from Wicked. (Oh how I love that show.)
Interesting to find myself 3 months into the new year with a lot of thoughts and journaling and therapy conversation about change.
Obviously, they’re connected. Once I opened myself up to being unlimited, I opened myself up to change. It wasn’t an intentional act of vulnerability. I suppose I like the idea of being unlimited, of having the potential to be unlimited, of deciding that I wasn’t going to limit myself anymore. But the actual act of unlimitation leads to the actual act of change. When I stopped just using words and started living them, I discovered that change was inevitable.
therapy last week was a mild journey into the land of change. I’m scared of change. (And I am.) change scares me. (um. I just said that.) what if I change, and... (what if?)
The consequences loom in all of their black thick cloudiness. How can i begin to live in a way so unlike that which I’ve been living for so long? What will I lose? What if something beautiful and amazing emerges? What if everything falls apart? What if I don’t know how to start over? What if I become unlovely? What if I allow myself to feel loved? ...
Obviously I have changed before.
I change almost daily. This cognitive therapy stuff forces it. You change at your root level. Your thoughts. Perceptions. Opinions. Self-conversation.
I’ve been making these changes, but they are small. Let’s change this one thought..., I would say. And when I did, it was an accomplishment. A party. A star on my chart.
This other change I speak of, this BIG change, is a series of deliberate choices. I am going to believe that it’s not my fault. … I am willing to believe that I didn’t deserve it. … I am deciding to accept that I am not worthless … It’s choosing to redefine a great lot of what is just rote acceptance, and jump into the unknown and the different and the possible. I’m thinking about changing what has limited me - what I have accepted as acceptable. Deciding to dig up all of that engrained, determined bullshit and replace it with reality. Deciding to fight that old determined engrained BS as it lingers, floating over the facts with a hazy, lustful ‘come hither’ and an “it was much easier my way.”
It’s going to hurt like hell.
I know this. I’m not kidding myself.
This is rebuilding a person kind of stuff. Foundational basics of self-invention. A whole new realm of self-acknowledgment and self-designation.
Of course it’s going to hurt.
The thing is… I already hurt.
I already hurt a lot. My pain resonates through me in spite of my attempts to make little changes. It is alive, this pain--active and sneaky and coiled. In the midst of this, what’s a little risk? Or a little more pain? Or a little fear?
(It’s actually quite a lot).
How will my change affect others? How will others have to change in response? What does it mean for “the way things are”? or “the way things have always been”?
… I have no answers. I’m not as brave as I sound. I just know that I’m battling this idea. This thing that has suddenly become a choice (how did that happen? finally?). This life-altering new way of viewing myself is really actually suddenly within my reach, and I am terrified and excited, wondering what in the world I have gotten myself into and hundreds of other thoughts and emotions jumbled together into a heap of heaviness that weighs on me with its possibilities and its losses.
I know it won’t be just one change. Not a flick of a switch or a turn of a knob, but a constant willingness to keep choosing change. An exhausting, engaging dance between what was and what can be. It will be work. Hard work. It will take time, energy and deliberateness. It will be difficult and my depression will still bang it’s massive head against me and scream to be heard. I will still fight the demons I currently fight. In the midst of this, I will keep choosing change. I will keep fighting for newness, for the metamorphosis, the butterfly, the dragon, the phoenix.
Life from ashes.
Living in the present, unfettered.
Being truly alive.
....................
posted by: renee
on Mar 08, 2010 :: 9:08 pm | [3] comments |
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Mar 02, 2010 :: 8:01 pm
comments problem
hi.
For some reason the comments are being weird… BUT you *can still leave a comment*.
Clicking on the comment link will cause the comment page to open in a new window or tab.
… then everything is as usual.
....................
posted by: renee
on Mar 02, 2010 :: 8:01 pm | [1] comments |
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today
I haven’t written in a fairly long while, at least nothing of true substance. but here are someone else’s words…
The Journey
by Mary Oliver
One day you finally knew
what you had to do, and began,
though the voices around you
kept shouting
their bad advice--
though the whole house
began to tremble
and you felt the old tug
at your ankles.
“Mend my life!”
each voice cried.
But you didn’t stop.
You knew what you had to do,
though the wind pried
with its stiff fingers
at the very foundations--
though their melancholy
was terrible.
It was already late
enough, and a wild night,
and the road full of fallen
branches and stones.
But little by little,
as you left their voices behind,
the stars began to burn
through the sheets of clouds,
and there was a new voice,
which you slowly
recognized as your own,
that kept you company
as you strode deeper and deeper
into the world,
determined to do
the only thing you could do--
determined to save
the only life you could save.
....................
posted by: renee
on Mar 02, 2010 :: 7:23 pm | [2] comments |
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Feb 23, 2010 :: 10:11 am
LDG5: Day 6
1. finally falling asleep last night (@ 2 am) by putting my hand on the cat and breathing with her.
2. a lovely afternoon yesterday
3. our car continuing to work even tho the maintenance light has been on for a couple of months
4. ampersands
5. phyllis tickle
....................
posted by: renee
on Feb 23, 2010 :: 10:11 am | [1] comments |
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Feb 20, 2010 :: 12:48 pm
LDG5: Day 4
1. J exceeding my expectations and being delightful to watch in the process.
2. crossword puzzles
3. writing I need to do, and what I can learn from it
4. the digital piano we own that feels (and sounds) just like the “real thing”
5. playing the piano, losing myself in it entirely / the healing power of music
....................
posted by: renee
on Feb 20, 2010 :: 12:48 pm | [2] comments |
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Feb 19, 2010 :: 9:01 am
LDG5: Day 3
These were actually written at 2 am this morning. dumb insomnia.
1. Really amazing friends who love and encourage me.
2. The last brownie in the refrigerator
3. Some great time with J last night
4. The funny book I’m reading: “Trespassers Will Be Baptized”
5. Defining and shaping what “safe” means (and can mean) to me, and doing what I need to do to feel/protect/honour it.
....................
posted by: renee
on Feb 19, 2010 :: 9:01 am | [1] comments |
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Feb 18, 2010 :: 10:38 am
LDG5:2
1. my therapy session last night and a teachable, flexible, but firmly boundaried therapist
2. the funky colour my toenails are painted right now
3. 2+ months without ECT
4. bedtime stories told by my imaginative husband
5. “Ride of the Valkyries” by Wagner
....................
posted by: renee
on Feb 18, 2010 :: 10:38 am | [1] comments |
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Feb 17, 2010 :: 4:36 pm
ash wednesday and me
i have so much i want to say about loss and redemption and ash wednesday and lent and liturgical stuff and my completely non-liturgical background, and yet i just don’t have the energy to write it all out right now.
i’ll just say that one of the things i chose to do for (at least) the next 40 days is to have a daily grateful 5 list.
here’s today’s:
1. The people that I know I can trust and be myself with.
2. Therapy that kicks my butt every week, and a really good therapist.
3. My husband, and his love, tolerance and patience.
4. My daughter, in all of her uniqueness and struggle.
5. My pajamas.
I’m tired. I’m going to therapy in about an hour.
....................
posted by: renee
on Feb 17, 2010 :: 4:36 pm | [4] comments |
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Feb 12, 2010 :: 11:01 am
twloha 2010
I’ve had a long-time problem with self-injury.
I go through periods where it is the only way I know how to deal with anything. In between, are the rather infrequent “I just need to get through this day” events.
As my depression worsened a few years ago, I remember going to a staff meeting, a meeting with my boss, or finishing a big project, and then running into the bathroom to cut myself. I carried a complete supply kit in my purse. I had portable neosporin packets, bandaids, gauze and bandages, tape, alcohol cleansing things, and steri strips, just in case. Of course, all of that only balanced out the exacto knife blade or other weapons I had stashed in a pill bottle behind the zippered part of my bag.
It was the only way I could feel like I was functioning. The only way I could allow myself to acknowledge my pain and yet push it away at the same time.
Sad to say, in the past few weeks I have resorted back to that way of “functioning.” I’ve told my therapist about it, but my husband didn’t find out until yesterday in the middle of my doctor’s appointment.
I know it’s a serious problem, and that I fall into the depths of it when I am feeling out of control and hopeless and terrified, and a zillion other complicated things, but there are times I feel as if I just can’t NOT do it.
I got “the talk” from my therapist on Wednesday night. The beginning part, where the therapist says, “if this continues, it suggests a lack of control and a confirmation that you aren’t making progress anymore...” (My secret decoder ring knows that this eventually means, “and since you aren’t making progress, I don’t think I can help you any longer. ...bye.") The last time we had this talk (this same beginning part), I ended up having to have ECT again. (shit!)
Today I am celebrating to write love on her arms day. It is a fabulous, fabulous organization, and this day is one of my yearly favorites.
Still, I have been struggling deeply with this again, and thought I’d mention it, in case anyone would feel called to pray for me in this area. Also, my hope is that if you are a person who self-injures, you will know that you are not alone.
....................
posted by: renee
on Feb 12, 2010 :: 11:01 am | [9] comments |
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