641. Early Stages of Pregnancy: Doubts, Fears, Worries and Getting to Own the Decision

 

 This is a long overdue blog, but there are a couple of reasons why I wanted to write and share about it once that there were certain points ‘in place’ for me to openly do it. This is about the most important decision I’ve made and am still actually learning to walk in my life and to get to a point of owning it, which will mean stepping into a new phase in my life, stepping into ‘the unknown,’ into what throughout most of my life had defined as ‘the most fearful thing’ I ever could think of doing – or the ‘biggest fear’ that I could name whenever anyone asked me ‘what is it the think that you fear the most?’ and one that I thought myself to be quite certain of when it came to ‘saying no’ to it – and yes, I even may declare myself as a ‘culprit’ for having also at times attempted to discourage people from doing, since I also went through a phase where I considered overpopulation was ‘the problem’ in our world – and not the nature of who we are and so ourselves being the solution, not the ‘quantity’ – but, I’ve learned my lessons and have given myself the chance to evolve from such limited mindset that was part of some brainwashing I went through when being a ‘concerned teenager.’ And yes, I truly thought that it wasn’t going to be something I’d have to go through in life.

Well, as always, Life says ‘here I come’ and change knocks at your door and….! I am now four months pregnant (!) and the idea of bringing a child into this world with the best person I’ve known and have had as a partner is an idea that is now sitting quite well within me and I am embracing more and more as days go by, where there is actual joy and gratefulness emerging as we continue to establish the foundation of who we are individually, what we would like to provide to our child and the benefits that we can create for a new person coming into this world, for ourselves and better so, for society and the world at large… but! This wasn’t my immediate experience and it’s been a process to get to that point – I’d say it still is – so this will be about sharing the experiences I’ve been having throughout these past months.

First of all, I didn’t want to share how fearful I was and still not having walked through those fears in a way that could be supportive for others to read and possibly learn from. So, this will be a detailed explanation of what I went through when finding out I was pregnant and being open about the fears that emerged, the uncertainties, the comparisons, the prejudices that yes perhaps I didn’t even dare to confront within myself, but that I deeply experienced and had to eventually work through within myself with the support of others to as well to it, which otherwise would have probably made this a lot tougher.

I found out in May 22^nd that I was pregnant with a simple pregnancy test. I had my suspicions since I’m quite regular with my period and there was already like a 3 to 4 day delay, and there were other unusual ‘symptoms’ that I wouldn’t get in my regular period. This is not my first ‘am I pregnant?’ type of ‘scare’, but this time I was doubled-troubled about it, I feared it more than other times if it turned out that it could possibly be a ‘yes.’ Somehow in the back of my head I kept the idea of ‘possibly’ perhaps, maybe, somehow having a child later on, but interestingly enough somewhere last year I had made a very ‘clear’ decision to not go into the ideas of having a child – at least for now, or so I thought! Lol. Even though being honest, the thought did emerge based on the relationship I have with my partner, but then I simply went into a more ‘rational’ view that included certain fears about finances and being able to provide for a child up to the time they are  capable of supporting themselves. Yep, since then the money concern emerged as well.

But I have to backtrack a little bit because the whole context of myself throughout this year is quite interesting to look at in what I now see almost as a ‘preparation’ of what would come almost in the middle of the year. I decidedly started the year with what I have defined now as a healing and self-creation process, which involved walking the decision to support myself to work on some points that I had just been dragging around and that could ‘possibly’ be linked to causing some health issues – which were actually intermittently happening throughout the past year – and I decided to look for alternative ways to support myself instead of only resorting to taking medicine and hoping that I ‘eradicate’ it that way. In a ‘shout out’ to get support,  I took the offer from my fellow life-processer walker and sharp-eyed friend Leila to have a Life Alignment session with her for support, and I would say that such session at the end of December of last year  turned my life around for good.

 Leila’s support and session assisted me tremendously to become aware of certain patterns I was still defining as ‘having to carry them’ to finally come to understand, forgive and let go of them, which were most likely the emotional issues causing the consequences I was facing at a physical level. Through opening up all the points that came up in that session and taking the route of the suggested alternative support, I was able to open myself up to a healing phase and at the same time, to really step into a point of self-creation that I had kept ‘on hold’ because of, in a way, still ‘torturing’ myself with the past and not really forgiving myself completely.

So, from January on after that session with her, I visited a regular doctor to find out what I had – which yes had to do something with the reproductive system – and decided to go to alternative therapies to assist with the healing and body balancing process, while knowing that there were very clear points I had to work with and process emotionally as well, which I did as well and it definitely turned my life and inner presence around as well. I started taking Qi Gong classes which I definitely enjoyed, as well as getting to hear these other two alternative medicine specialists on ‘my case,’ which assisted me a lot as well to have that understanding of how I created my own symptoms and recurrent illness – and in a way, reinforce the perspectives that I had been ignoring: being able to self-forgive and let go. Yep, at times we can be stubborn in believing we have to ‘hold on’ to something as some kind of ‘pay for the sins’ – not recommended at all, folks.

I started focusing on what I wanted to create and do this year. I started working on developing a workshop related to developing self-introspection and self-creation through the creation of art. Here my friend and terrific Life Coach Joe Kou assisted me personally with grounding these plans and projects, along with my workshop partner to ground and refine this project we had and getting to define what we wanted to actually give to do and provide to others. I was quite excited about the whole process and I’m still grateful for everything that I got to learn and – most importantly – get to define for myself in terms of ‘who I am’ in my ever ‘doubtful’ type of relationship with art. The project may be on hold, but I’m quite certain that all of these talks with Joe also assisted me to tap more into my personal potential and getting back in touch with my creative capacity again, lol, perhaps the creative capacity emerged just in a ‘slightly’ different way, lol.

I consider that all of these initiatives to support myself and the changes that I embarked myself on at an internal and external level – like setting myself into a point of self-creation and ‘breathing life’ into myself again, gaining a new perspective on life – contributed to ‘opening the gates’ to something else that I had not necessarily planned or expected, lol. Interestingly enough all the alternative support I had was also focused on getting my reproductive organs and general hormonal system balanced out. I also did some changes in my diet, but I still had some deficiencies like feeling sometimes very weak and so on. Interestingly enough, I actually didn’t want my ‘next period’ to come, because of the last massive blood loss I have had, and what would I know? That such period never came… Lol! Well my body is wise after all.

So back to the point of finding out ‘the news’ and how this time around I felt very different to go and get that pregnancy test, I was actually fearful, I even got a bit pissed on the way back from the pharmacy which is a pattern I ‘thought’ I had already ‘nipped in the bud’. I recognize that I was simply quite fearful. Well, I came home, did the test and hoped that the faint line that appeared was simply a mistake, that it wouldn’t mean a POSITIVE result. See, I actually thought I was having some delays because my body had been quite wonky in the past weeks prior to my ‘period date,’ or I thought that all the homeopathy and acupuncture sessions would be destabilizing my period a bit, but it wasn’t like that. I asked Leila about it and well yep, she let me know that even if the line is faint… it is a YES. Lol, I had not read the pregnancy test instructions properly either it seems, since I later on read that was a common thing to happen even if it was ‘very faint.’

I called my partner right after I found out. I was quite shocked and didn’t know what to do, it’s almost as if I just wanted to ‘go back in time’ and avoid it all. We decided to talk it out at night when he came home. And his response – as always – is that of taking absolute responsibility and supporting me in whichever I decided. Yep, this was tougher in a way because he said he would be ok with whatever I decided – to have the baby or not – because of me being the one that would actually go through the whole physical process of birthing the baby, and yes understanding the role of the mother in it all. He stood firm in his disposition for whatever I decided, because he simply wanted me to be ok with it.

But, as he explained this, I saw that I just didn’t have it in me to say ‘no’ to this – and his calm and assertiveness to receive the news definitely gave me an example of how one doesn’t have to ‘freak out’ as one may expect.  This is where the notion suddenly hit me: a new LIFE is taking place now in your body as we speak and this is not a matter of chance. This is a result of me also having a relationship with my partner and acknowledging that, ultimately, there’s always that chance of getting pregnant even if there’s protection involved. And at the same time, I knew that it was only what I in the moment called ‘the worst of me’ that would say ‘no’ to it, which were a bunch of fears, self-definitions, comparisons, self-doubt and general uncertainty that would prevent me from saying ‘YES, let’s do it’. In other words, I knew that only ‘the worst’ part of me – or the weakest one – would say ‘No,’ because everything else can be worked out, like in terms of finances which was one of my biggest ‘fears’ around the idea of having a baby, but that has also changed as time has progressed and we’ve both opened up this point and I am very much learning from what I could say is more like my ‘partner’s process’ which has everything to do with entrepreneurship and financial education – which actually also touches on very similar principles that I’ve walked on for these past 11 years.  Money hasn’t been my ‘forte’ but I am learning a lot from how my partner currently approaches it, therefore I am learning to not only see fears and lack in my relationship with money, but rather learning HOW we can make things work and genuinely decide what is of real value, which we both agree on is not a ‘ton of material things’ in that sense, but rather seeing the actual wealth there is in the education that we can provide for the child as well.

Before this moment condensed into a reality, I actually have had a dream on April 16^th where I would realize I was pregnant, and it felt extremely real, or dare I say ‘frightfully real.’ I would think something like ‘Oh oh! I’m pregnant, this is actually happening’ and I would kind of move to making a decision about it and I would think to myself: ‘Well, I guess it’s time to grow up now’ And my presence and nature would be that of embracing it, of actually accepting it and being ok with it. Only afterwards did some financial fears emerged about ‘how I would go on about it’, which I guess is one of the most common fears that emerge whenever you start planning to have a child or are already pregnant. I woke up from that dream and said  to my partner ‘I had a nightmare! And proceeded to share what the dream was about, Lol! But I let it go and didn’t make much of it.

So once that we were discussing about the pregnancy that night of the day we found out, I remembered that dream and how I had afterwards assessed that it had been ‘the best part of me’ that had stood up in the dream to be ok with it, accept it and embrace this maturity or new phase and ‘letting go of the childish me’ so to speak, which I know is also quite the problem in my generation, which involves not really wanting to take responsibility for ourselves, and ‘worse off’ not for any other either.  I also knew that in a way I was holding on to this belief that I had always said to everyone when asked about wanting or having kids and always saying ‘No, no, no… Me? No! that’s not for me, I won’t have kids. That’s the most important decision in life and the most important job in the world, and I respect parents a lot, they are really brave, hat’s off, but that’s just… not for me.’ But deeply inside knowing this was in fact cowardice and so in a way I realized that the time had come for me to face one of those ‘greatest fears,’ which I opened up about – to a certain extent – to my partner.

There was a sense of responsibility as well but also of understanding how I just was very scared of assuming now my decision and responsibility. I can definitely say that such discussion was assuring for me from the perspective that he assisted me to dispel some of the most immediate fears around money, about ‘not being capable’ of doing this and rather seeing the possibilities and how this kind of challenges would actually support us to grow more and to give ourselves another purpose to our lives together and in our personal development. I realized later on that, as he said, this was our chance to actually create some change in the world, which it certainly is. I’m glad as well how this is something I came to understand some years ago where I went from seeing kids as ‘a burden to the planet’ to more like the opportunity actually change the current state of affairs in humanity over the generations, and what a better way and opportunity to do so than with being able to raise a child.

At that moment I decided to say ‘Yes, let’s do it’ but it wasn’t a FULL decision made with the wholeness of my being. I still had the fears, the uncertainties, the fear of losing the baby in those first 3 months of gestation, the fear of going through problems that would not enable the proper development of the child, fearing that my body wasn’t ‘fit for it’ yet, etc. These fears plagued my head for weeks – and yes I accepted and allowed it. I knew that I had said YES and went on with it, but a part of me was simply fearing that ‘it would not happen,’ that my body was not ‘at its best’ to be carrying a baby. I also feared letting go of the plans I had recently created, I feared letting go of the ‘ME’ that I’ve known and the idea of just having to ‘do what I please’. Yep in essence, I did go through a mourning process in a way of having ‘my plans’ changed and then at the same time not having anything certain yet – nothing is, still – but in my mind at least it is now ‘safer’ to say that I am pregnant because of the amount of time that has transpired and because I’ve seen the baby developing really well in the womb J Who knows, yes anything can happen, but then I also walked another point that I will describe later on in terms of not being defined by the outcome, but walking a decision regardless of it.

So for me in general, finding out that I was pregnant, that WE are going to be parents and bring a human being into this world wasn’t immediately met with enthusiasm, happiness,  joy and jubilee – as I had perceived ‘I should have done’ but why? Because of my fears, mostly of the pregnancy actually ‘not sticking,’ of my body not being ‘fit’ enough to develop another life within me, not having ‘what it takes’ to bring a child into this world. These were mostly the fears that became an incessant type of doubt and uncertainty throughout most of the first weeks. And the fears then sparked up more and with some pains I had that demanded me to be ‘taking it easy’ most of the time and minimize my activity – like barely going out for 3 months – and then on top of that the nausea started kicking in… I just felt like in a limbo. That’s all I could say to my partner for some weeks ‘I feel like in a limbo’ of not being able to truly say ‘this is certain, we are having a baby’ or not, and yes there is that ‘weight’ over me to in a way ‘make it happen,’ but fortunately enough my partner was always supportive and considerate and not really concerned if it couldn’t get to form and ‘happen’ as expected. But he also taught me to stop expecting ‘the worst’ all the time, which I am still learning and frankly once again getting to step out of, since it’s almost as if my old-age pessimism kicked back in.

The nausea so far has been the worst of the pregnancy process up to now, I mean I don’t want to discourage anyone with saying this, but I do want to be as realistic as possible because this is my experience and I really felt like a zombie, like constantly ill for weeks on.  I also felt ‘odd’ for not being so ‘happy’ about the news at first  – even though when sharing the news to those closest to me, it felt like there was a sense of joy in it, but that I couldn’t just for now ‘take it for granted,’ so I would just go back to the limbo-phase of smiling but deep inside me, not really being certain of what I was ‘getting myself into’ nor if it would physically ‘work out, or that I had ‘what it takes’ to pull it off.  

I must say that abortion (miscarriage) had not been in my mindset or radar before, this I mostly got as a ‘real scare’ because of knowing of a situation from someone I know that went through it and that kind of placed it in my awareness and, yes, what can I say? I moved the least I could because, it would hurt and be painful to just go walking to the store close-by. I felt like crippled because of not having my ‘me time’ every day to just go out and about with my long walks and generally longed for ‘feeling fine’, but I also realized this was part of a process and decision I had agreed to go through and that I had to actually care about another’s life developing within me, one that me and my partner had planted as a little seed. And because yes a 20 minute walk ‘at my usual pace’ had detonated a pain that actually got me in pain and therefore in crying and fearing that I would be placing this baby’s life at risk, I decided to keep myself resting and that was definitely a tough time where even writing became very repetitive and somber with describing only the worst of the experiences, and found it difficult to see any ‘light at the end of the tunnel.’ I knew that this was taking a toll on me, so I reached out for support again.

Once again, it was through Leila’s support with her Life Alignment session that assisted me to actually open up this ‘limbo-mindset’ and get to face it, even though I had seen the fears moving in my mind and me demonstrating it and acting them out in what became, I would say,’ the pessimist me’ that was ‘waiting’ just for the time to pass so that I could have ‘some certainty’ of actually being pregnant, actually having a baby or not. More like desiring to have some ‘control’ over the idea of being pregnant or not.  Through the session I was able to face and open up the fears about ‘it not really happening’ and I actually allowed myself to realize I was in fact fearing not having the baby, and that I was at the same time in a way mourning or letting go of ‘the old me,’ and I got to see the ‘big’ point that I’ve seen comes up in my life when having to take care of another being: selfishness. And that whole idea of ‘me, my time, my life, only doing what I want and what I like’ and having that self-definition printed on me like my creed, a very limiting one to be honest. I actually cried out when realizing through the session how I was in fact preventing me from embracing, being happy and joyful about the pregnancy because of not wanting to create ‘a bond’ with someone that I could ‘lose’ or see not ‘happening’ if something went awry.

I’ve also taken this as if Life was also throwing this ball at me kind of like saying ‘So you speak of supporting life, and life in equality, and wanting the best for all eh? But you don’t want to actually have a child and see what it takes to actually care for another life as yourself?’ Well, this is my characterization of it lol, but I saw my own principles and words ‘staring back at me’ and this also led me to see that it was – again – only the worst of me that could be fearing stepping into a new phase in my life. Leila assisted me to realize there was a mourning process of letting go as well of ‘the me and my life that I’ve known up to now’ but most importantly, I was able to admit to myself that I actually wanted to have the child, I just feared not having it and having to go through the loss and the pain that goes with it.

In a way, I was creating a detachment  as a defense-mechanism to the whole idea of being pregnant because then my logic was ‘If it doesn’t ‘stick then I would not feel ‘attached’ or already ‘hyped’ with the idea and having let everyone know about the news.’ It became something like a ‘safe spot’ to be at, to not be so defined by the idea of having a child, because I still ‘could not be certain.’ Well, it then became obvious how then how my decision to say ‘Yes, let’s do it’ contained this whole point of uncertainty and fears in the background – and selfishness as well, making it about ‘how I feel’ instead of actually rooting and being up for giving it my all and being my best at it for something that I am deciding to do along with my partner.  So this also took some time for me to assimilate and actually open up to the new and actual change in life.

What opened up in that session also enabled me to discuss these points with my partner, and he was able to understand what I meant when I would say ‘I still can’t believe we are going to have a child’ – which he would understand as some kind of pleasant surprise statement, but to me it was a real ‘I can’t still be certain of it’, I still can’t ‘wrap my head around it,’ and also because of the early stages of it. So that was yet another very supportive talk we had, where we got to open up one of my most ‘ingrained’ traits, which is yes, pessimism and almost expecting the worst of all things to happen at any moment. So I got to open up about these and other fears, which is also where I got to see how my own mindset was generating this sense of uncertainty and fear, and how I wasn’t allowing myself to fully LIVE the decision of having a baby and instead, being almost like ‘leaving it at the hands of life to decide what would be or not be.’ And here it’s very relevant to make a distinction as well because sure, it could have or could still happen that it doesn’t work out, and that then would be something for me to get to understand, learn from, embrace and move on with. But I no longer fear having to go through it as I did at the beginning.

The main point here is how I was creating this whole fear and uncertainty because of not realizing that I could decide to be OK with either/or scenario as well. I was defining myself already by the idea that ‘losing the baby’ would be a bad, negative, painful process and that would ‘define me’ somehow – so that’s how I then would ‘prevent’ going through all such ‘negative things’ by remaining in that limbo = not being truly standing in and as my decision to have the child, because then logic said “If ‘something happens’ = It would not be something that I was already ‘attached’ to, or future projecting about.” Well, this was quite revealing to me in how I was in fact standing only in fears and prejudices. I had to stop. My partner was awesome in discussing this with me, he is in fact the most supportive partner I’ve ever had and has been an exemplar pillar of support for me since day one, and he was able to assist me to face these points and to realize that I didn’t have to be defined by either outcome, that either way: Life goes on and we will be fine at the end of it all.

An interesting thing though to realize is that at that stage and having walked our first months with the pregnancy together, I realized that based on how enthusiastic he was, how he pushed himself to from the get-go get himself ‘moving’ to do things he needs to do to have sufficient time and financial support for when the baby arrives, and how every single day he would wake up with a smile in his face and saying ‘we’re going to have a baby!’ that even if this didn’t ‘happen,’ I would still go through the whole thing again to try it again. Lol! I can’t believe my words, but it is so. Based on the values that we share, the ‘who we are’ that we can share with a new being definitely becomes an attractive idea that overrides everything else that I also feared like the actual pregnancy and birthing process, the incessant crying, the growing pains, the discomforts when they are little babies etc.… that goes to a secondary stage when placing ‘what we both have to offer’ to a child, not to mention that he loves children and is quite a natural with them, treating them the same way as I do, not from an ‘I’m an adult and you are a child’ type of starting point, but one of equals and talking to them as the fully formed beings they are. And so that does fill my heart with joy in a way, to work together now on someone else based on seeing how well we get along and how supportive and loving we are to each other, as in really assisting ourselves to be the best that we can as individuals.

What has emerged within me therefore is an actual gratefulness of this opportunity to bring a child into this world and I basically turned my stance around from indecision, fears, what ifs, future worst-case scenario creations to rather being able to trust myself in this, to know that we can together handle this because we got the foundation that’s most important – from my perspective – a solid, supportive and loving relationship where we each have demonstrated each other to support ourselves to live the best that we can be, and that we haven’t ever ‘pushed us down’ to become the worst of us, but quite the contrary, and this has been a daily living thing, which has shown tremendous results in both of our lives.  

I am not fearful or ashamed to say that this time around, I wasn’t the ‘strong one’ with this whole new path and decision in my life, I wasn’t the one that would ‘help the other’- as I was used to – to come to terms with something. I was definitely the one that was supported by my partner who stood solid and quite optimistic about the whole thing. It was definitely another point of ego for me to let go of, because I had always believed that in my relationships, I’d always be the one to ‘help the other out,’ and I am actually glad and grateful to be with someone by your side that is there to support you when one is crumbling in fears and in a general low. So, it is also safe for me to say that as much as the decision was placed ‘on my plate,’ I knew that this decision would not only impact me of course, that this was part of my partner’s life process and a point that was opening up for both of us in the path we decided to walk together J And I couldn’t be happier about it now that I’ve come to assimilate it, embrace it and root for it as the days go by. 

But, who knows if I haven’t had a supportive partner or someone that was as pessimist as I was, or as fearful or only focusing on ‘financial problems’ or seeing it as a ‘load’ or doubting themselves in not being able to ‘pull it off.’ I guess that things would have been a bit different, but this is also a general point to become aware of when being in a relationship and not having a super secure method to avoid pregnancy – if not desiring to have any children –  to be aware of the possibilities of getting pregnant and making sure that one is in a supportive relationship, that one can actually step into that possibility of having a child together and know exactly where each other stands in it. Otherwise, this is also a problem in humanity where people just ‘get together’ because they ‘like each other’ or have some ‘fun together,’ but have no idea of where each one stands in the ‘hypothetical’ yet very possible scenario of having children which it surely is a life changing situation.

In my case, that is something I considered, I observed and assessed and ‘tested the waters’ on with my partner to know where he stood in such potential situation. It would have been quite different if ending up pregnant with someone that perhaps really dislikes children or wants to just have a partnership relationship forever. So even if this wasn’t planned, I sure knew where my partner stood about it and now I embrace that unconditional support that he has become for me in my life and receive it in gratefulness, instead of perhaps going into regret for not having stood up and being ‘my best’ from the get go – this is part of the things I probably had to learn and experience firsthand to then be able to root or ground myself in this life changing decision.

There are so many other things that have opened up in relation to walking now into a bit of a more ‘certain’ phase of the pregnancy, like looking at how it will change our lives, the ‘letting go’ of ‘me/my-time’ for some years, but at the same time actually being glad about it because it is in fact an opportunity to test myself in a whole new terrain, to learn more about myself, to learn to work in a team with my partner, to learn to live that unconditional love and care towards another being, and be that which I would want every newborn child in this world to have: a supportive environment, a supportive family, a pair of individuals that are preparing themselves to do the best they can to bring up a life in this world that can continue our individual paths to become better human beings in all that we do. It is fascinating how to me this is what excites me the most and knowing that this is a child that will contain both of our lives and paths to in a way, re-birth ourselves into the best, to assist in the process of possibly getting to correct the things that we both know is the worst of us and to be able to in essence create – perhaps – a better version of ourselves and of our parents in this forthcoming phase of our lives.

So in essence, now that the nausea has subsided, now that I’ve seen how the baby is doing, there’s more of a sense of certainty around it. And even with the process of planning, placing ourselves in the position of ‘preparing’ to the next year when baby arrives, is opening up so many cool discussions between us where I get to be more and more certain and actually quite happy and grateful to be carrying a life that contains my partner’s life as well, because he is quite an extraordinary human being that has demonstrated, in a rather short period of time, to be able to turn his life around in ways that few people I know have been able to. That assists me in my own trust and confidence to walk into this new phase in life.

It’s also very relevant for women to have that kind of support in a partner considering that I have seen how there are emotional upheavals, there are changes one goes through in the body and that having a partner that doesn’t react to my ‘emotional upheavals’– but understands it’s part of the process –  that gives comforting words and caresses, that doesn’t judge my body as it goes through its changes, that helps me to see that the discomforts and so on is part of the process for something better to come is something that I am truly grateful and learning from, and absolutely relevant and a great example as well for me to see how it is possible to face even the ‘difficult parts’ with a better sight on things to come. So if you are a male reading this, it’s best to also do your part on getting to understand what women go through in pregnancy, which is what my partner has done in his spare time, even to the point where he has now gotten to explain certain things to me, because he’s made the decision to be there all the way to support me and wants to be, what he calls, a ‘second mother’ lol, and not be the typical father role that is portrayed in pregnancy books-  or at least the older ones that I got from my sisters J

So to me, as important as it is to be taking physical care of myself, having proper nutrition – after a few of the rather not so supportive ‘cravings’ I gave into in the first weeks – gaining more confidence in going for walks, stepping out of general fears and doubts of ‘being able to do this,’ and more like embracing the being that is growing in me it is also important to have that equal stance from the other in the relationship. So as with anything, I guess for anyone reading this my suggestion is to yes prepare the body and one’s mind as much, but to also fully, fully disclose and talk things out with your partner first and know ‘where he stands’ in it all, because it does require great courage to embrace this in the best way possible. Sure we all got our points to walk, but that’s where having that support in one another comes in to face such experiences. Well, I say this, but I bet my partner would simply say that any challenge in life is an opportunity to motivate himself more, a challenge that makes him just push himself and see the benefits that it creates, which become a well-rounded purpose in life and that to me is quite an example I am learning from and grateful to be walking along this new path with.

To me this whole process has taught me how I don’t have to play strong all the time, or still fall into the belief that ‘I am the one that should save or assist others,’ but rather recognize my own weaknesses and be ok with receiving support from those that are around me and to ask for specific support when needed, otherwise, who knows where I would have been without the support I got from my partner, my immediate family, Leila, Joe and the people that directly worked on myself and my body with the alternative therapies, which I am also grateful for having the opportunity to have.

I realized it is also OK to not be initially happy, ecstatic, joyful and jumping up and down about the idea of being pregnant. I understand that I don’t have to compare myself to how other women – specifically – have faced their pregnancy or motherhood process, and I kind of knew that I set myself up to this kind of uncertainty and fears because of me having fed the fears of ‘having a baby’ or ‘becoming a parent’ for most of my life, it was ‘THE’ most feared point in my existence, and I held it as a very ingrained belief. So this is another learning point to become aware of what we say ‘never to’ and realize that Life may have a different plan for us and that we may actually end up facing such things we ‘fear the most’ and that it is actually not something to fear, but to rather take on as a challenge, an opportunity for growth, for change and to embrace the opportunities and paths that it will entail.  And that it is ok to not be all smiles about it, but take it as a very physical process of growth and development that it is and eventually as the very real responsibility and opportunity to challenge myself that it will represent with all that entails to be a parent, and be definitely fully UP for it – or at least knowing that I can trust myself to work on the bits I may go facing and being uncertain of, or the mistakes I may make. It’s all part of life.

I wake up every day aware of being pregnant and that is quite something to see growing in my body, but more so enjoying as well how this has opened up so many potentials in our lives in how we can best support a new child coming into this world, how to best prepare us, how to be also OK with making mistakes and facing the unexpected too, to not try and have everything ‘under control’ or attempt to ‘know as much as I can’ either. I am also allowing myself to simply take it easy with it, focusing on our physical wellbeing and continuing building the bond with my partner through it with the expectation of a third person coming into our home J He says we will be having so much fun, and I’m so glad he sees it that way because it is contagious how he can talk about what I would’ve defined as ‘tough things to go through ahead’ and he’d see it as something funny to go through, something challenging that can push one to the limits of seeing how much one can stand through. Lol, anyways it has assisted me a lot to have a different outlook on the idea of becoming a mother, becoming parents and yes, why not, also leaving that ‘selfish-me’ phase behind, which sure might be challenging, but hey, this is what Life has now placed on my plate, so that means I’m ready, I can take it, let’s do it J

Thanks for reading if you got up to here! I’m open to any feedback, questions or comments – or any topic that may require going into some depth.

For Spanish speakers, I’ve been sharing my weekly process within the pregnancy and reflecting back on how things apply to anyone else in their lives in my Encausarte Podcast from Episode #23 on.

Recommended series! Parenting on Eqafe.com

 

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612. Self Appreciation and Self Acceptance

 

One of the gifts from walking through the specifics to see what is behind the pattern of assuming and projecting what I am thinking and experiencing onto others is being able to see what I am still thinking, perceiving or believing about myself. The overall character within these assumptions has to do with ideas of me not being good enough for certain standards that I believe others have upon me, not being able to fully embrace me and particularly my creations and instead cowering up and preferring to not show anything because of still giving into all of these ideas of others being able to determine how good or bad something that I do is.

This is so particularly in the realm of showing artworks, and it’s similar to what other people that perform would experience as stage fright, that moment where one fears what others will say, how it will be criticized, judged, but never realizing all of that is self-created, it exists within me as all the thoughts, judgments, beliefs, ideals I’ve imposed onto what I create.

It has taken me some time to start breaking through it, and it also required this point of inner conflict for me to see to what extent I was holding myself captive with these beliefs about it. I also knew that just writing about it won’t sort it out, because I understand in theory what self acceptance is, what embracing myself means – but in terms of doing and living that in relation to my art, it had to do with actually taking the steps to show it. Art is meant to be seen and shown – yeah some people might say it’s not true, but here I focus on my current relationship to it – it’s a visual thing, it’s something that’s meant to be shown and so by preventing me from showing paintings for example, I had to confront the truth of why I wasn’t doing so, and that has to do with insecurities, ideas of my stuff not being good enough or creative enough or expressive enough – interestingly enough doing this within the realm that has very subjective and movable standards though.

This year has marked the return to creating art in general and that means painting for me, and walking through the plethora of judgments that I had imposed onto the process of creativity over years which led me to stop and give up on it for some time, holding a conflictive relationship with it all because of the judgments, the limitation, the standards, the ideas I projected about ‘how it must look’ and also trying to please people with it, within the consideration of also being able to sell it.

That’s a whole different point as well though where you have to make stuff that others can like in a particular market, but I’m sure that there can be different kinds of people for different kinds of expressions, which means that the real problem isn’t about ‘having others liking it to buy it,’ but it still had to do with me being able to embrace my creations.

I’ve spent many hours listening to creative individuals, mostly movie directors and artists that have gotten to a point of success because of standing behind their creations, completely embracing them as themselves, ‘sticking to their gut’ as they say and with that being able to persevere, not give up, embrace their mistakes and not be afraid of showing their creations to the world even if to them were ‘aberrations’ at first. I laughed at myself a few times while listening to them, it assisted a lot to know how it’s not easy to embrace something you create even for very successful people in the business and how everyone goes through this trial and error and dissatisfaction phase – even in a constant manner throughout their career – with their creations and how all that it requires is to keep at it, to keep moving, to keep testing.

Something I did differently this time around is to not say ‘no’ to doing commercial paintings involving themes I would have ‘never’ dared to paint before because of thinking it would go against my personal preferences. However it is through having said ‘yes’ to those things I resisted doing that I started breaking through some of my core limitations when it comes to creation and self-beliefs, which has been quite supportive.

Also on the practical realm, it assists with practicing stuff, being able to test out techniques and ways of painting I’ve never done because I had always only done ‘stuff I like’ which I’ve been able to still do and test out, but I’ve been mostly spending my time with fixed commissions which has assisted me to get comfortable and back into the practice, into the actual ‘doing’ that painting entails.

As part of walking the process of correction for these fears of judgments and comparison, I decided to start sharing and posting my paintings online on my Instagram page, because I had refrained myself from doing so throughout most of the year, so now I’m sharing some of the ones I made this year.

It is now the moment for me to test who I am within sharing: am I looking for recognition? Am I looking to be accepted by others or have positive feedback from others? And in that I decide to make it about sharing, unconditionally showing because that’s the key point I had been struggling with, showing my stuff. And yes it’s crazy because as simple as it can be for many to share stuff on Instagram or Facebook, to me it’s become a source of nervousness that I have to step into and simply direct myself to share and walk through the nervousness and insecurity in a moment before posting and then it’s done, it’s out in the open.

I realize that I have to continue developing the habit of sharing and walking through those moments that to me feel like taking ‘leaps of faith’ where all that exists is trusting me, being able to stand behind my work and let go of ‘what ifs’, it’s there, nothing more and nothing less. 

So the overall outcome of this is realizing how I can only be the one that can stop me from creating judgments, standards, ideas or beliefs of how something must look, I simply have to be there every step of the way it takes to create something and that then becomes the accumulation of me being able to stand behind my creation in whichever way it results.

This reminds me of how unconditional I used to be when it came to art creation before, I was unable to destroy or get rid of anything that wasn’t ‘good enough’ because I understood it as part of my creation process, a part of me. That might sound a bit ‘too much’ but in principle it assisted me to be much more unconditional when it comes to sharing/showing my stuff, I didn’t hold a ‘high regard’ on it or anything, I had no standards and that’s what I want to go back to again.

I also recognize how preposterous it is to compare ourselves to someone else’s expression. I definitely agree how the process of comparison is one main distractor that keeps us from genuinely focusing on our own expression, weaknesses, talents, strengths and the rest of it.  So this is an active process for me, it’s probably one of the most ingrained things along with judgment, and that means that I also have to realize that what I do as art or creativity is not all that I am as a person, it’s a part, an expression – but at the same time realizing there’s much more to share, give and express as myself beyond creative expressions, which to me has a lot to do with being able to share, coexist with others and that’s basically one of the points where this self-acceptance and embracing myself has become a more settled aspect of me, and getting to enjoy that individuality that I represent, just like anyone else does.

So I have to essentially apply the same process to my creative process and results thereof, where I have to be the first one that has to stop nullifying myself by fearing showing myself to others in whichever form or way. What’s the worst that can happen?  If any criticism, judgments, dislikes come my way, that’s then a cool aspect for me to face and confront in my life, which would only allow me to know where I am still fearing to not have a ‘spot’ in someone’s preferences, where I still as a weakness, where I am still defining myself based on others’ preferences or judgments or where I would be measuring myself only according to certain traits or characteristics and diminishing myself to only that one aspect, while neglecting the rest of the person that I am.

What I mean is that it is also totally possible that even if we embrace our creations and stand by them, If we want to make a business out of it and people are simply not buying it, it doesn’t mean that everything I am is ‘lost’ or ‘a failure’ either. It would mean that I have to keep testing out ways to see what works with others in terms of selling it. And if not, I also realize this is not the one and only thing I’m able and willing to do in my life, so in this it also points out where I have to expand my horizons and not get fixated only in the idea of ‘having to be a selling artist’ in order to survive and develop myself in this world. This is something I’ve also been considering and yes, it exists as a point of awareness and consideration, yet in practicality for now, I am dedicating myself to it, because it is only through doing this that I can face many points I had neglected to look at before because of fears.

This is also how I’ve been able to stop judging doing artworks as something ‘menial’ or ‘unimportant’ for the world, because I stopped wanting to save the world or change other people’s lives. I want to focus on developing myself in whichever shape or form I can when it comes to art, relationships, work and in relation to how I interact with other people in my reality and see where I can give the most of myself, where I can contribute the most to make something work or be taken to the next step of functionality and success.

That’s also been a major shift for a while in my life, which in turn doesn’t mean I become inconsiderate towards the world or others, it simply means I stop neglecting my life, my creation, my potential and instead of trying to sort ‘everything and everyone else out’, I now focus on creating and developing myself, because through doing that and being the best for me, I am best for all at the same time.

So, I’ll keep focusing on these aspects in my day to day

I recommend listening to these series which was also supportive to walk through these points of comparison and stepping into self-creation and self-acceptance in it.

Monsters Born From Comparison

Stopping the Comparison Monster

 

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585. Drawing Inspiration and Living Inspiration

Or  learning and be triggered by something/someone to ignite a spark within oneself that can be used to live, create and express in our unique ways

Inspiration is one of those words that I had certain conflict with in the past, because of how I had defined ‘inspiration’ as something that would be given to me, either through the interaction with certain people, through having certain life situations or events – even the idea that ‘suffering’ was part of the great catalysts to be inspired in life, to having the effect on weed or through the idea, belief or perception that it was something even given through a form of ‘divine presence’ at some point in my life, which yes is kind of laughable but understandable based on the mindset I was in some ten years ago where I truly thought that my life was being ‘directed’ by some higher force, not to realize that it simply meant pre-programmed/pre-ordained and it didn’t meant the end of the world to me, but that’s a different story I’ve shared before.  

So, all of these ways in which I separated myself from inspiration led me to create an idea, belief or perception of being ‘dependent on’ all of these things to be inspired, to be creative, as in having to ‘feel’ something or get an idea, image, picture of what I wanted to create and then get a form of ‘feeling’ within me as an indication that I was ‘ready’ and so expecting this experience of ‘feeling like doing something,’ which at the time I truly thought it merely ‘arrived’ to me, instead of seeing how I in fact was in all of those moments making a decision to do things.

Once that I started working with developing self-awareness through this process with the Desteni living tools – working with self-forgiveness, writing and all the mind processing – it became obvious how I had separated myself from inspiration and turned it into an experience in separation of my directive will and action as in simply deciding to do or create something, decide to practice, to open up ways and means to express myself, not only in arts but in many other aspects in my life, including the continuous ‘inspiration’ that I’ve seen I can nurture myself with on a daily basis, which I’ll describe later.

I was also the kind of person that waited for some kind of ‘sign’ to act out on things, mostly calling it a ‘hunch’ or a ‘sudden drive’ that would apparently would have to ‘come to my awareness’ and I never really understood how everything that I ever created, experienced or decided to act on wasn’t being ‘guided’ by something or someone external to myself, but had and has always in fact been just me, and how this inspiration has always been here as a potential of myself, which means I simply disregarded this self-creative authority because of being essentially ‘waiting’ for something or someone to kind of ‘knock on my creative doors’ and spark that fire in me.

Now, that doesn’t mean that I don’t get ‘inspired’ by others these days, I do, actually a lot in fact and that’s what has assisted me into changing the way I see people and people’s expressions and creations in general. I’ve described how I used to be a kind of misanthrope in my life, even if not at a superficial level, at a more ‘deep’ level within me and to me it’s been quite a radical change recently to see people with a different set of eyes which are the eyes of wanting to ‘get to know’ how people came to be, seeing each person as a very unique compound of life experiences, expressions, words they’re living and I do see that a lot of my approach has been broadened through my exposure to life and people in this world through documentaries, which I am quite grateful for having the opportunity to watch them and even more so doing so in community, where I definitely have come to appreciate the ability to gather with a large group of people to watch it, which is something I would not have said or experienced before, at all.

This change of approach is the result of doing quite a bit of self-processing or de-cluttering, as all the ways in which I had tampered this inspiration point through judgments, beliefs or ‘religion of self’ points and any other ego aspects that I was holding on to, in essence existing in separation of myself and so in separation of others wherein instead of being able to ‘draw’ inspiration from others’ expressions, lives, creations, I would compare myself to them and then decide that ‘they have done it all’ and give up on my own process of creation – or go into an inferiority and superiority towards them and leave it at that. So, even if I could recognize that I could take an inspiration from what I see in others, I would ‘shut it down’ through reacting to it in the mind and not actively acting on it, living it, taking the next step which was to rather see what can I learn from them? What words are they living? What is it that ‘moved me’ to be inspired that I can now integrate into my own creative process? Of course here also considering one is actually aware of one’s creative potential in every moment as well, not just doing something ‘external’ but in our capacity to live and redefine words that we would like to in fact live and express as a way to change all of that of ourselves that we are aware is not being beneficial for us and consequently for others.

So, lately as I’ve shared with the points of attraction or in my mind having misinterpreted many times being attracted to many people – well males in my case lol – was based on recognizing something in them that I wasn’t yet living within me, which is so nicely explained in the following video by Sunette Spies for Self and Living Understanding Attraction which is a must-watch to understand how this works. I re-listened to it this morning where through doing the practical work mentioned there – which I’ve shared a couple of months ago as well – I’ve been able to start ‘discovering’ all of these words and expressions that I was ‘drawn’ to in others through creating an energetic experience of desire or idea of relationship towards them, instead of seeing how can I actually live these words or how am I even already living them and believing that I would want to ‘have that particular expression for me’ in some kind of possession/ownership delusion that is usually translated as ‘desiring to be in a relationship with someone’ which Matti also explains quite well in his following vlog, so check it out: Social Media and Impractical Relationship Fantasies – YouTube

 

Walking the process explained in both videos with various people in my life – or people I get to know through the internet or biographies or whatever else – has been very supportive for me to, in my case and specific situation, take back to self the word ‘inspiration’ and ground more what I can see is defined as ‘being inspired’ by others to THEN proceed to live inspiration as myself. Because I’ve definitely been there done that many times where I can see something, be ‘inspired’ by someone’s creation or expression and only be moved in that moment, but I’ve also seen how it all can quickly ‘die down’ if I don’t continuously act on it and decide to integrate it as part of my living-words arsenal so to speak or give a continuation to an idea/project/point of self-creation that may have emerged through being inspired by others in a moment, which is something I still have to work on for sure.

I’ve been learning to appreciate more and more in my life the ability to learn from others, to be inspired by and through others’ expression, work, ways, actions, ways of living and words they are living. So through this ability to be inspired by them and at the same time rekindle my relationship with fellow human beings, I’ve actually come to enjoy learning to embrace another’s expression, to be grateful and appreciating them for living such expressions, such words, to be ‘themselves’ in their uniqueness that at the same time reminds me of doing and continuing to develop that for myself as well, which is also in a way how I’ve turned the previously described comparison, going into jealousy with/towards women or desire/attraction towards males and instead turn it into a ‘seeing’ of the person’s expression for what it is, which is as I’ve mentioned before, quite liberating and expansive.

That’s how being inspired by others is something that can happen in any given moment that I decide to see through the eyes of acknowledging another being in their expression, seeing who they are which yes, if the opportunity is here, I start getting to know them better within this same starting point of getting to understand, to ‘see’ a person in a less superficial way, which I also enjoy doing through communication.

I can also consider that this kind of inspiration is not only gotten from fellow humans but with nature or certain environments or things for some, though I can only speak from the human-relationship at the moment and how instead of only leaving it at the level of getting a fleeting sensation of ‘recognition’ in another for who they are and what they express, I decide to take on the next step of getting to see what words they are living, what of their expressions do I see as something that I enjoy and therefore see if I am living that as myself yet or can be something I can expand on in my life, in my context, in my individuality as well – of course within the consideration of self-honesty and what’s best for everyone, not for self-glorification or ego-building purposes, but as a potential of expression that one can create in any given moment.

And this has interestingly enough become a process to develop a more ‘humane’ living in me, where I no longer misinterpret these reactions towards others either through a form of comparison in what others live, express or do in their lives, but rather get intrigued and enjoy learning about others, living curiosity in a way where I am rather more fascinated at times by the processes, the things that people had to go through to get to do and live what they do, rather than only focusing on ‘the final product’ they create in the end, which sure is also enjoyable, but I’ve also seen this in my approach to creative people for example, where as much as I can watch a film or documentary or a piece of art from them either visually or sonically, I am definitely equally interested in getting to know them as a person, which I’ve recently been doing in order to see ‘who am I’ towards these people I’d used to be ‘drawn’ to in an energetic form as an ‘attraction’ and how I see them currently through doing that self-work of identifying which words I see or perceive they are living and doing and take those words back to myself, to in a way nurture myself from their examples.

I’ve drawn inspiration from others many times even if they are not ‘self-honest’ examples, I draw the essence, the drive, the motivation they got to do, be and live something and see where and how I can live that in my reality at the moment, which has been quite an enjoyable process as well and that I had completely kind of shut myself down from doing because of, as I was sharing with a friend today, yes, being like ‘constipated’ in my reality lol, kind of holding on to a limited version of myself through a lot of rigid structures that I have been also slowly but surely taking apart within myself, which at the same time has opened up within me what I’m sharing here today.

Also something that opens up with inspiration and ‘being inspired’ from others is gratefulness or gratitude in what these people express and live, which I definitely would not see or regard before. This at the same time goes hand in hand with changing my approach or moving from ‘comparison’ or an idea or perception of ‘lack’ within me into a point of creating for myself that which I see in others and test it out within this consideration of how every other being is in fact another aspect/expression of ourselves, so this is more of a process of embracing and integrating something within ourselves as part of that recognition of being in fact equals, made of the same, coming from the same – yet in unique individual expressions.

So, inspiration also leads me to see the word in one of its meanings which is ‘inhalation’ which is both a literal taking a breath to make a decision to ‘integrate’ certain expressions, words that I see others are living – and at the same time giving it back, just like exhaling, where whatever I take or ‘be inspired by’ does not only remain as some kind of ‘hoarding’ for myself and invested into an ego-building process, but also give back as much as I have taken or received from others – directly or indirectly – to support me, to express me and share myself back which activates the possibility of others being inspired by what I decide to share and express and so others can eventually do the same in their lives towards others, and so the chain of ‘moving it forward’ expands, which is the ultimate goal in this, nothing is only for personal benefit, but always within the context of how I can learn how to expand myself so that I can share how I’ve done it and others may do it in their lives as well.

So, it’s interesting how then there’s a two way process to being ‘inspired’ where inevitably as with taking a breath or inhaling, we cannot just hold that breath forever ‘in’, what comes next is a natural movement of exhalation, a ‘giving back’ process so that the cycle may continue. That’s the natural expression of our physical body which means, I have to keep in mind doing this so that we can expand and not ‘hoard’ only these things to myself and I’ve been considering this a lot in how every time I get inspired by various people and their creations, I say to myself how I definitely want to do the same, be the same source of inspiration for others as well, because I see how relevant it is to keep being examples for each other in many ways, aspects, things of expertise, because that’s how we go kind of pushing the envelope for ourselves a little bit more at a time, which is great! And that’s also how I’ve come to be more and more grateful for people’s creations, people’s existence which I had completely and utterly taken for granted before in my delusional egoism.

Is doing all of this process worthwhile or enjoyable? Absolutely, I had not been aware of how limited I was by thinking that I could only ‘draw’ inspiration from others or through a particular substance or company, or a particular environment only, etc. We all ‘got it’, it’s a matter of deciding to act on it, to decide to open up the door and walk all the way through it, it’s about deciding to make that connection or ‘approach’ towards others, to be intrigued by the way others live and express and see what I can take from them that can benefit me in my life and consequently that of others.

This definitely expands the ability to be ‘inspired’ by virtually anything and everyone in day to day living, because it’s really about how we decide to see things, people, situations, the environment, reality… and so, this is what I’m busy developing and learning to live within me.

Lastly, please check out this awesome video by Sunette as well Why Don’t You Feel Inspired? Which assisted me in being able to ground this post and point for me as well today which is a word that I have been looking at lately and today is the day to land it back to self and share it.

 

Thanks for reading and ‘happy creations!’ lol

 

 

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