I had a consciousness this morning of enjoying my own company.
First time in my lifetime, and I liked it.
I am being here for me.
I am learning how.
I have hope.
I have one dear friend in California who has offered almost without limit or condition her time to text with me. I do that a lot with her. She is married, and her husband supports her efforts to help others, like myself, through life's storms. She has been and is continuing to be a major support.
I have one female friend who is currently being open to spending some time with me, going out for eats, talking, drinking tea, etc. I am not contacting her in between our agreed upon dates to make contact. I learned from some past relationship disasters to not pursue dependency as I always have; scrupulously avoiding that here.
She just now considerately texted me that she has unexpected commitments to do things for two of her kids and the outlook for seeing her today is uncertain. But she then followed up and didn't rule it out completely either. I am enjoying the fact that right now it is working, she is showing a lot of thoughtfulness and I am behaving with more consciousness and less of the old barely hidden dependency behavior. Also, after learning from my hugely painful and embarrassing blow-up with my last month long relationship, I am keeping names and details off of Facebook. Maybe someday I will have the confidence to do that, but right now my relationships are tenuous and a steep learning curve.
I am so glad that I have finally found this new consciousness that spending time with me is beneficial. Wow, what a breakthrough!
Saturday, December 11, 2010
Sunday, December 5, 2010
ten remembrances
I am doing my best to apply what I am learning in the hope that I will begin to establish a virtuous cycle. I have learned that the first step is to stop doing what had been keeping me busy wasting time and getting sicker. Being involved with someone else before I am healed is dishonest to me and to someone else. I am certain that this consists of a shared, complicity of dishonesty, but it is not for me to schedule another person's life realizations for them; it is only my job for me to be responsible for my own growth and emotional/spiritual health.
Is there any difference between the emotional and the spiritual? I doubt that there is much difference at all.
Second, I am learning that it is very productive for me to do nothing at all but feel and observe my emotions. This is the act of my allowing my inner self to be paid attention to, and it is something that I have been hungering for. Starving for. Getting more ill due to its lack. This is the beginning of the process of my cultivation of intimacy.
Third, every experience of my life up to this point has been a partial lesson and preparation which I can draw upon. I learned that the delusion that God can do this for me is just that: delusion. I will observe that back in my days of membership in the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints, my observation that the church attracted the emotionally ill proved to be quite accurate. But imagining yourself in some dutiful relationship with a conditionally loving, exterior deity does not bring healing. My feverish intellectual search of Joseph Campbell's writings freed me from this literalist understanding of an anthropomorphic deity. That realization was an essential step which has ultimately led me to be forging ahead to my anticipated breakthroughs which I am working toward today.
Another example is that I believe that my logical mind needed every unsuccessful relationship of my entire life to fully convince me that I will not find what I am looking for in myself by an escapist relationship with an imagined mother/lover/sexprovider.
Fourth, I am learning that my feelings can get uncomfortable, but I can pause, breathe deeply, have faith that they will transition, crest and pass by, and that I will get past those moments into more livable moments.
Fifth, I am developing the belief, based on my logic, that this is ultimately going to be beneficial to my physical health. I will achieve more integration, more calm, more peace in my soul and in my own company. Maybe I will get better at being with others, but that seems to be a way down the road, because right now that is challenging, especially in person.
Sixth, I believe that I am going to develop some core level trust in life and fate. Prayer to a literal god never brought this.
Seven, I need not compare my story with anyone else's. Mine is mine, and it is good, and I will have much that I have learned from my experience which will cause me to find compassion inside. I will come to know the difference between masked dependence and compassion. I will come to prefer solitude to dependence of any sort. I will only allow dependence which has been freely offered, and proven over time.
Eight, I might find that without the need to continually bribe a date with dinners, gifts and trips that my finances may improve over time, giving me more options to spend my money in ways that I choose to improve my own life.
Nine, I am grateful that I have found a therapist. He is fallible, very human, old and of limited time each week. But he is my therapist, he is extremely experienced, gives me nice positive feedback, and encouragement. He helps me to hear my own voice and my own thoughts.
Ten, I can accept my own strengths, be humble and private about them, and give myself credit for them.
Is there any difference between the emotional and the spiritual? I doubt that there is much difference at all.
Second, I am learning that it is very productive for me to do nothing at all but feel and observe my emotions. This is the act of my allowing my inner self to be paid attention to, and it is something that I have been hungering for. Starving for. Getting more ill due to its lack. This is the beginning of the process of my cultivation of intimacy.
Third, every experience of my life up to this point has been a partial lesson and preparation which I can draw upon. I learned that the delusion that God can do this for me is just that: delusion. I will observe that back in my days of membership in the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints, my observation that the church attracted the emotionally ill proved to be quite accurate. But imagining yourself in some dutiful relationship with a conditionally loving, exterior deity does not bring healing. My feverish intellectual search of Joseph Campbell's writings freed me from this literalist understanding of an anthropomorphic deity. That realization was an essential step which has ultimately led me to be forging ahead to my anticipated breakthroughs which I am working toward today.
Another example is that I believe that my logical mind needed every unsuccessful relationship of my entire life to fully convince me that I will not find what I am looking for in myself by an escapist relationship with an imagined mother/lover/sexprovider.
Fourth, I am learning that my feelings can get uncomfortable, but I can pause, breathe deeply, have faith that they will transition, crest and pass by, and that I will get past those moments into more livable moments.
Fifth, I am developing the belief, based on my logic, that this is ultimately going to be beneficial to my physical health. I will achieve more integration, more calm, more peace in my soul and in my own company. Maybe I will get better at being with others, but that seems to be a way down the road, because right now that is challenging, especially in person.
Sixth, I believe that I am going to develop some core level trust in life and fate. Prayer to a literal god never brought this.
Seven, I need not compare my story with anyone else's. Mine is mine, and it is good, and I will have much that I have learned from my experience which will cause me to find compassion inside. I will come to know the difference between masked dependence and compassion. I will come to prefer solitude to dependence of any sort. I will only allow dependence which has been freely offered, and proven over time.
Eight, I might find that without the need to continually bribe a date with dinners, gifts and trips that my finances may improve over time, giving me more options to spend my money in ways that I choose to improve my own life.
Nine, I am grateful that I have found a therapist. He is fallible, very human, old and of limited time each week. But he is my therapist, he is extremely experienced, gives me nice positive feedback, and encouragement. He helps me to hear my own voice and my own thoughts.
Ten, I can accept my own strengths, be humble and private about them, and give myself credit for them.
Sunday, November 28, 2010
Good things occurring on schedule. I will comply with whatever this schedule reveals.
I want to do a current status report.
The most important item is that I called someone (L-Joliet) who lives in Joliet that I had met in September 2010. I didn't start it off right with her back then. I did my regular thing of sex or close to it as soon as possible. Then I blew her off and went into a different direction.
I subsequently suffered a very painful rejection and ending of a month-long relationship, and also failed in a week-long rebound from this rebound.
By the time I had called L-Joliet fifteen days ago, I was nearly at the point of learning my lesson, that I would never attempt to establish a physical connection without a thorough building of friendship first. I didn't call L-Joliet back until yesterday morning--not for reasons of newfound autonomy, but because I had again taken the easy way out and pursued someone with which I thought I might have a quick reward relationship. That was my week-long rebound from the rebound to which I referred above. It also ended painfully. The lesson had finally been learned.
L-Joliet texted me that she had gotten my message, she was at the gym, and could she call me when she was done? She texted me and invited me to meet her for lunch. When she arrived, I complimented her on her prettiness, but did not reach out for any physical contact whatsoever. We sat and enjoyed lunch, and talked nonstop. She accepted my invitation to go for a walk afterwards to walk off the calories. We went into her house where she looked for a hat. Then we went for a leisurely, long walk and sat on a bench. We continued to talk, and I never reached out for any physical contact. She invited me in for tea afterwards, and we sat leisurely drinking our tea. Through it all, I discovered that she is way smarter than she makes obvious, with appreciation for finance, computer code, free enterprise, an ability to conduct as an amateur her own legal case in court and win, physical fitness, a love for the poor of all races and ethnicities, an appreciation for my talents and a dedication to her role as mother to her three daughters. After five hours together we agreed with her need to do some other things, and I went home. She is focused on a court case which reconvenes this Wednesday, so I promised to attempt contact next Thursday, and I will not make any contact until then.
This outing gave me much renewed hope that I might find success in developing a healthy, functional relationship; it also helped me understand way better how to do that, and avoid sabotaging it. I also learned from it that all of this alone time that I am spending is indeed helping me grow.
I have been possibly, somewhat disappointed in my therapist. If I don't have time to make a business phone call during business hours this week (a highly likely situation) then my appointment with him this Friday will be the last one of the year, and I will ask him what the length of one session is and set my iPhone alarm clock to make sure that we do not exceed the time limit, so that my six free sessions will have been completed, and I will cancel at that time my last remaining appointment, because we burned through multiple sessions on two occasions when he extended the length of my appointments.
I attended the Universalist-Unitarian Church of Joliet this morning and thoroughly enjoyed myself. I hadn't been there in over eight years ( funny what a coincidence that this coincides with the beginning of my relationship with Elaine ). I am back there, and need to stay there, even if/when a new relationship develops, instead of morphing my identity so that I think I am safer from losing the new relationship. That is another of my longstanding dysfunctional tricks.
I don't know when my next relationship will work. I will continue to be with me, and try to learn everything I can about me until then.
The most important item is that I called someone (L-Joliet) who lives in Joliet that I had met in September 2010. I didn't start it off right with her back then. I did my regular thing of sex or close to it as soon as possible. Then I blew her off and went into a different direction.
I subsequently suffered a very painful rejection and ending of a month-long relationship, and also failed in a week-long rebound from this rebound.
By the time I had called L-Joliet fifteen days ago, I was nearly at the point of learning my lesson, that I would never attempt to establish a physical connection without a thorough building of friendship first. I didn't call L-Joliet back until yesterday morning--not for reasons of newfound autonomy, but because I had again taken the easy way out and pursued someone with which I thought I might have a quick reward relationship. That was my week-long rebound from the rebound to which I referred above. It also ended painfully. The lesson had finally been learned.
L-Joliet texted me that she had gotten my message, she was at the gym, and could she call me when she was done? She texted me and invited me to meet her for lunch. When she arrived, I complimented her on her prettiness, but did not reach out for any physical contact whatsoever. We sat and enjoyed lunch, and talked nonstop. She accepted my invitation to go for a walk afterwards to walk off the calories. We went into her house where she looked for a hat. Then we went for a leisurely, long walk and sat on a bench. We continued to talk, and I never reached out for any physical contact. She invited me in for tea afterwards, and we sat leisurely drinking our tea. Through it all, I discovered that she is way smarter than she makes obvious, with appreciation for finance, computer code, free enterprise, an ability to conduct as an amateur her own legal case in court and win, physical fitness, a love for the poor of all races and ethnicities, an appreciation for my talents and a dedication to her role as mother to her three daughters. After five hours together we agreed with her need to do some other things, and I went home. She is focused on a court case which reconvenes this Wednesday, so I promised to attempt contact next Thursday, and I will not make any contact until then.
This outing gave me much renewed hope that I might find success in developing a healthy, functional relationship; it also helped me understand way better how to do that, and avoid sabotaging it. I also learned from it that all of this alone time that I am spending is indeed helping me grow.
I have been possibly, somewhat disappointed in my therapist. If I don't have time to make a business phone call during business hours this week (a highly likely situation) then my appointment with him this Friday will be the last one of the year, and I will ask him what the length of one session is and set my iPhone alarm clock to make sure that we do not exceed the time limit, so that my six free sessions will have been completed, and I will cancel at that time my last remaining appointment, because we burned through multiple sessions on two occasions when he extended the length of my appointments.
I attended the Universalist-Unitarian Church of Joliet this morning and thoroughly enjoyed myself. I hadn't been there in over eight years ( funny what a coincidence that this coincides with the beginning of my relationship with Elaine ). I am back there, and need to stay there, even if/when a new relationship develops, instead of morphing my identity so that I think I am safer from losing the new relationship. That is another of my longstanding dysfunctional tricks.
I don't know when my next relationship will work. I will continue to be with me, and try to learn everything I can about me until then.
Thursday, November 25, 2010
the power of silence
I am overdue to post here.
I made it through Thanksgiving Day and I should be proud of myself, the day having the emotional potency to be difficult to traverse.
I discovered that spending my time in silence at home had a very positive impact. It is a way of displaying to my inner self that I have a strong determination to listen; my inner, wounded child is comforted by my paying attention to my feelings without any interrupting distortions from a television, radio, etc.
Off to bed. More tomorrow--I hope.
I made it through Thanksgiving Day and I should be proud of myself, the day having the emotional potency to be difficult to traverse.
I discovered that spending my time in silence at home had a very positive impact. It is a way of displaying to my inner self that I have a strong determination to listen; my inner, wounded child is comforted by my paying attention to my feelings without any interrupting distortions from a television, radio, etc.
Off to bed. More tomorrow--I hope.
Monday, November 22, 2010
getting help
Oh my God, I am so afraid of being alone. Alone I am; even Mary, who I wasn't much attracted to, rejected me, even as a friend, because my house violated one of her dealbreaker filters for a prospective relationship. I had thought that I would try pursuing her after Lisa crushed my heart by walking off with another man, after she was involved with me. But even trying a pursuit of someone that I wasn't attracted to did not work.
My son, Gabe, has pointed out that I have a too broad filter of requirements myself for a potential mate, and that if almost anyone begins to start seeing me, I want to very quickly brand it a relationship, and I start showing much intensity, too soon.
It is obvious that this comes from my inner desperation, which is fueled by strong inner anxiety.
My daughter, Natalie, called today and I had the best conversation I have ever had with her. She told me that she longs to see me happy and content, in an alone state. I have had others on Facebook agree that what they see me attempting here is the right thing for me, at this time.
I took a break from writing this, and in the interim, set up my first four sessions with a counselor. My first twelve sessions will be totally free under my benefits; after that there will be a $10 copay. My counselor is a 75 year old man, who strikes me as of Indian descent. I think that I am going to like him, and that he possesses wisdom from which I will benefit.
My son, Gabe, has pointed out that I have a too broad filter of requirements myself for a potential mate, and that if almost anyone begins to start seeing me, I want to very quickly brand it a relationship, and I start showing much intensity, too soon.
It is obvious that this comes from my inner desperation, which is fueled by strong inner anxiety.
My daughter, Natalie, called today and I had the best conversation I have ever had with her. She told me that she longs to see me happy and content, in an alone state. I have had others on Facebook agree that what they see me attempting here is the right thing for me, at this time.
I took a break from writing this, and in the interim, set up my first four sessions with a counselor. My first twelve sessions will be totally free under my benefits; after that there will be a $10 copay. My counselor is a 75 year old man, who strikes me as of Indian descent. I think that I am going to like him, and that he possesses wisdom from which I will benefit.
cry house
I just got done crying my guts out.
I wish there were a clear measuring stick or mileage marker to indicate that I am making some progress.
I wish I understood better why I am the lucky guy who gets to go through this.
I hope that I am learning something from this.
This was a rough ending to the night.
Are women who are obviously clueless regarding their own financial lives giving me good advice when they say that I have to upgrade my housing in order to have a relationship with a woman? Would that produce the results they promise? Maybe that is all a woman is about?
I hope I find someone with more to them than that.
I wish there were a clear measuring stick or mileage marker to indicate that I am making some progress.
I wish I understood better why I am the lucky guy who gets to go through this.
I hope that I am learning something from this.
This was a rough ending to the night.
Are women who are obviously clueless regarding their own financial lives giving me good advice when they say that I have to upgrade my housing in order to have a relationship with a woman? Would that produce the results they promise? Maybe that is all a woman is about?
I hope I find someone with more to them than that.
Sunday, November 21, 2010
Stop running and stay with myself
Can I survive without being in a relationship? The fact of the matter is that, deep down inside, I never have answered that question for myself. I have always believed that finding my next relationship could kick that can down the road, and provide an escape.
I have arrived at a difficult dilemna. Enough women have called my house a dump and told me that no woman would ever be in a relationship with me. I have been told that I am unbalanced and that I focus too much on saving and investing. As a result I am thinking that it might be wise to attempt to stop trying to find another relationship.
An alternative, of course, is to make sweeping and drastic changes to my finances and housing. Alternatives include pouring money into rehabbing the entire inside of my house, or selling my house and making the correct guess in choosing a small condo that a woman would enjoy with me, in the right location, etc. The problem with those options is that I would be doing it fully with the intent of pleasing a hypothetical woman into joining me in my life. If I am the same deperate and pathetic half-person waiting for a relationship to give me what I lack, I doubt that the finest mansion would keep a woman with me.
I have also had enough women flee from me, usually in the arms of another man, that I am losing my belief that a new relationship can save me. I am beginning to believe that relationships for me right now only delay my chance for healing.
So--what and how do I do this? I think that step number one is to stop looking for a relationship. Step number two is to make this a significant time commitment, and see what happens to me on the inside. Spending much time alone, observing myself and blogging about what I see may help me to get to know me, understand the riddles, wounds, and unmet dreams and develop the courage to act on it, no matter what that may entail.
I might even stop doing stuff which hasn't helped. I have poured thousands down the drain of relationship bribery: dinners, flowers, drinks, entertainment, vacations, presents. Where is the love that all that supposed 'generosity' purchased? No one is here by my side; all I have is a self, which has been unknown all these years. I might as well not spend the money on all of these love bribes. Maybe I will be able to afford and choose to spend it on myself---just as soon as I can figure out what I want, what I need.
And, not to mention time. If I am not chasing a relationship, I have time to spend with myself. Not that I haven't been willing to give that time away, but I never have been willing to give it to myself. What might I find? I don't know, but maybe I ought to give myself a chance and see whether there is anyone there.
I have arrived at a difficult dilemna. Enough women have called my house a dump and told me that no woman would ever be in a relationship with me. I have been told that I am unbalanced and that I focus too much on saving and investing. As a result I am thinking that it might be wise to attempt to stop trying to find another relationship.
An alternative, of course, is to make sweeping and drastic changes to my finances and housing. Alternatives include pouring money into rehabbing the entire inside of my house, or selling my house and making the correct guess in choosing a small condo that a woman would enjoy with me, in the right location, etc. The problem with those options is that I would be doing it fully with the intent of pleasing a hypothetical woman into joining me in my life. If I am the same deperate and pathetic half-person waiting for a relationship to give me what I lack, I doubt that the finest mansion would keep a woman with me.
I have also had enough women flee from me, usually in the arms of another man, that I am losing my belief that a new relationship can save me. I am beginning to believe that relationships for me right now only delay my chance for healing.
So--what and how do I do this? I think that step number one is to stop looking for a relationship. Step number two is to make this a significant time commitment, and see what happens to me on the inside. Spending much time alone, observing myself and blogging about what I see may help me to get to know me, understand the riddles, wounds, and unmet dreams and develop the courage to act on it, no matter what that may entail.
I might even stop doing stuff which hasn't helped. I have poured thousands down the drain of relationship bribery: dinners, flowers, drinks, entertainment, vacations, presents. Where is the love that all that supposed 'generosity' purchased? No one is here by my side; all I have is a self, which has been unknown all these years. I might as well not spend the money on all of these love bribes. Maybe I will be able to afford and choose to spend it on myself---just as soon as I can figure out what I want, what I need.
And, not to mention time. If I am not chasing a relationship, I have time to spend with myself. Not that I haven't been willing to give that time away, but I never have been willing to give it to myself. What might I find? I don't know, but maybe I ought to give myself a chance and see whether there is anyone there.
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