648. Postpartum and the Beginning of My Motherhood

After giving birth, it was kind of surreal waking up to a new reality where I became a mother and I now had a child to take care of, I had to be there for her all the time, I am her source of nourishment and have to do so as many times as she required. Sounds like an obvious part of becoming a mother, but living it is a whole new reality that I had to get adjusted and used to over time, as I guess most new mothers have to do, and I’ll share more of how this postpartum experience went for us.

 

I explained in my previous blog how much of a shock it was that the very ‘next day’ after giving birth, I was feeling just ‘fine’ and didn’t take time to sleep throughout the day and eat properly and how that second night with Minerva felt like a nightmare where I was ‘losing it’ as in not being able to keep myself awake and feeling as if I would just ‘leave my body’ if I closed my eyes, that was a scary feeling for sure. But fortunately I realized soon enough how I had to truly take care of myself in order to be able to take care of our daughter. And this is then that principle of being the best for me first to be able to be there for others, similar to why in airplanes they ask adults to put the mask on themselves first before doing so for their children, I hadn’t understood why this is so since my instinct would have been to put it on the child first and then the adult, but! Lol if plane loses pressure and adult passes out, then there’s no life for the child nor the adult.

 

I essentially had to eat a lot more considering I started breastfeeding and this is also – of course- entirely new to me and something I hadn’t really considered or integrated in my system so to speak, simply because of how much of my focus was on the ‘birthing process’ and being able to do it, that I didn’t pay as much attention to ‘what comes afterwards,’ which I realize was a form of shortsightedness on my side.

 

During those first days I sure was sore in the whole pelvic area involved in giving birth, fortunately I didn’t tear but still, all the genital area is swollen and even if I wore those iced-paths after birth to ease the pain and swelling, this lasts for a couple of days and it became uncomfortable to be sitting on the bed, which I did for most of the time.

 

To me the most challenging thing was starting to breastfeed and finding a posture for it and being able to have a good latch as well. Sitting on my coccyx was very uncomfortable as well and that’s essentially what I would do to breastfeed, I was getting the hang of how to carry Minerva – and I can say, I am still earning –  and it was overall challenging how to position her and she was very demanding of wanting to eat all the time, which became also something I couldn’t really fathom at first, I thought it would be once every few hours but there were days when she was stuck on my breast for hours without end. We found out there are these growth sprouts where they eat more or suck more to prepare the breasts for a larger milk demand and so production, but this was quite a load on me at first. I kind of pictured how my days would go with having to constantly feed her. This isn’t the case as much for now,  but she sure demands it quite frequently and I’ll explain why.

 

It was quite frustrating the first days when I only had colostrum and it seemed she was already demanding more and that’s the first time she cried in fact – after her first crying at birth – which made me feel quite powerless about being able to change the situation and my partner resorted to soothing her with the swaddle technique and sleeping with her on his chest while I was still recovering from lack of sleep.

 

Then another uncomfortable thing emerged when the milk started ‘coming down’ as they say and my breasts got very full and my nipples were really sore from all the improper latching which was Minerva just biting them a lot, even if she doesn’t have teeth. So yes, I had some minor scabs and I was worrying if this would be the way my breasts and nipples would feel for the rest of our nursing – which I intend to do for a couple of years at least. Thankfully it wasn’t like that. I was advised by the midwife and my mother and sister  to give myself some really thorough and rather painful at first massage on my breasts during the shower with hot water to unclog the milk canals so to speak, and that worked. It sure was painful every time that Minerva would start eating and I would eat my pain out because nipples were sore and at the time I would still feel contractions while she was eating – this is due to the uterus going back to its original size and position and the sucking assists with that – so, yes, it wasn’t a comfortable or easy time, but I kept at it with knowing that this too shall pass, and this became quite a helpful point to be aware of, which my partner would bring up every time I would go into despair about this kind of things happening.

 

Another challenge is that it was quite a shocker to me getting out of my usual ‘routine’ where I enjoy getting things done and had my schedules and things I would have ‘gotten to’ by certain time in the morning, and… of course the first days this is just mostly impossible to do. With going to sleep either super late or waking up throughout the night to feed Minerva and also with the times when she just didn’t sleep for some hours during the night, I would wake up ‘late’ – in my terms – as in 9 am or so and then it would be a thing to just get to have some breakfast, while feeding Minerva most of the times – yes, it became a food chain so to speak where my partner would feed me and I would be feeding Minerva, and then she would fall asleep after eating and I recall those moments where I was just wearing my pajamas the whole day and having Minerva on my lap – well she is on my lap as I type this, well, half of her since she is 2 months old as of today – and me having this worry and sense of ‘life passing by’ and ‘not getting anything done’ and having this desire to be ‘doing stuff as usual’ while actually realizing and telling myself: “No Marlen, that phase of your life is gone for now, life has changed for you, your most important job is to take care of Minerva.” This was also reminded several times throughout the days by my partner, who became my emotional stability support in this time and I’m really grateful for him being by my side all the time.

 

To me, those first days felt eternal where I was just waiting for some sleeping time,  being able to take a shower and toilet and hurry to get out to a hungry Minerva once again. I couldn’t fathom how much she would be demanding to eat, which was a constant thing for her. We decided to apply the free demand way based on understanding that it is about feeding the baby but also creating the bond with the mother and having that physical contact and connection through breastfeeding. So, with this, of course doing anything else became a challenge as well, and so my life was  ‘reduced’ to doing the basics like eating, going to toilet, showering and mostly staying connected to the world through the phone because, yep, being at the computer is still a complicated thing to do for the most part.

 

This is where I had to realize that this apparent reduction was in fact the most important thing I had chosen to do and it became a challenge because I’m mostly this constantly moving ant that wants to “be productive” and “be doing stuff all the time” and this became a complete halt to most If not all of that, considering I didn’t even have to do the usual chores because of being recovering. My partner became my helping hands and body, along with my mother and father so, I’m once again grateful for them and making my time easier. I sure would have done things differently as I look back into that quarantine. I would let go of my anxiety to “be doing something” and just surrender to just Being with Minerva… I sort of would do it but my rather sickening sense of “duty” became a mental obstacle for this.

 

At times it was even like hard to comprehend that this wasn’t a temporary thing, motherhood. I had to go assimilating during those first weeks the fact that this is a lifetime commitment and this wasn’t going to be ‘something I do’ but something I Am now, which is a mother. I even had a hard time to say “Now that I’m a mother” out loud for the first time as well. But, as with any new thing, any new habit or new relationship, it is a matter of time to get used to it 🙂 and I consider I’m doing better at it.

 

I had to often remind myself that I chose this, I decided to own the decision to have a child as I’ve explained in past blogs, but of course I hadn’t really probably considered to what extent it would ‘permeate’ my life – perhaps this was some nativity for me, but I embrace it since it’s part of how I also give myself the courage to actually do things or take on challenges as well – and now I understand it is a complete point of focus and occupation in that sense, a wholeness, a becoming. Whenever I felt overwhelmed by it, by being constantly ‘demanded’ attention by Minerva and having to feed her all the time, I stopped saying – when my partner would handle her to me- ‘she wants to eat more?!’ to simply saying “come here to eat!” because my question was coming from a starting point of disbelief but also of just not wanting to do it ‘again.’

 

Now, here what was also playing out is that I hadn’t fully ‘surrendered’ to my new place and occupation in life. I was still kind of ‘hoping’ to have some time for perhaps writing or doing some recordings or going to the computer etc.… and it took quite some time – and perhaps I still am working on this – to not be having the ‘next thing I want to do in mind’ while I have to be with and feed Minerva, because that’s what creates the ‘suffering’ so to speak. I was reflecting on that this morning and it reminded me of Buddhism and how they say that desire is the origin of suffering, and in this kind of situation that falls into that definition. If I am constantly desiring to be ‘doing’ something else or going somewhere or having my shower or wanting to go to swim etc., well that creates a constant un-fulfilledness that does affect my ability to be truly HERE and embracing my time with Minerva fully, which mostly means a complete slowing down and halt, something truly challenging to me to be honest, but working on it as well.

 

Another thing that added the sort of experience of feeling ‘trapped’ is that I couldn’t go downstairs for over a week, so it was mostly a stay in bed type of situation right after birth, going to the toilet – which sure is painful the first days- dealing with the bleeding, the soreness in the nipples, having some constipation as well and on top of that being sleep deprived, yep, a recipe for disaster in my body, but then also kept in mind this is part of the process, it’s not forever and this too shall pass.

 

I am eternally grateful as well for the support that my parents gave us during the quarantine. I was also apprehensive about this, I wanted to ‘help’ and do house chores or clean or whatever but nope, I had to once again and for the first time just be grateful for the support and embrace it, accept it and I had to kind of brainwash myself about this, that it was ok for me to essentially ‘do nothing’ because of having devoted a lot of my time to assist others…  yep, I am aware this was perhaps unnecessary, and I could just decide to embrace and be grateful for everyone’s support, from my relatives and their visits with some presents for Minerva, my aunt’s food, my mother’s food and place to stay as well as my father who is the real powerhouse behind it all, and my partner becoming like a personal assistant to hand me basically everything and giving me belly massages and checking out the healing of my sore genital area etc. This whole time made me realize how difficult it must be for single mothers or mothers that don’t have this network of support either physically or financially and this became one of those thoughts I would dwell on, realizing how much support every woman that gives birth in fact needs to be able to Fully be there for their child, and in  stable emotional state as well, which is super important for the child as well.

 

I bring this point up as well because it is at times very easy to say ‘I can do this alone’ and I realized I couldn’t, not this time and it is in fact one of those times when we do need ‘a village’  – as they say – as support to walk through this initial time of getting acquainted with one’s child and walking through the body discomfort that motherhood starts with.

 

I also had a hard time being able to ‘feel happy’ as such for most of the time. Sure, I felt in moments quite grateful for being able to hold our child in hands, to the point of tearing up a bit. But I also cried at times for feeling inadequate, feeling as if I lacked the ‘motherly’ attitude that I would watch, read or hear other mothers express when talking about their own post partum or motherhood experience, I couldn’t really relate. Also with various situations where I would feel that my partner was more ‘apt’ at taking care of Minerva than me, being more ‘up for it’ and caring or tenderly doing so and how I felt that I lacked that. Well, I talked about it with him and he once again expressed how this was a perception of mine when comparing myself to others, that I should rather embrace my unique way of expressing love to Minerva which maybe isn’t with acute voice talking and that sort of thing, but with a genuine sense of care and disposition to be there for her and with her. I am still walking through this and embracing this aspect in me, as well as continuing to create that point of expression with her which also comes with more ease now that she interacts more with us in the sense of laughing and blabbing and understanding more of our gestures. It sure is nice to see how she smiles when waking up and knowing I’m there ready to feed her.

 

This also reminds me of how relationships are built and how to me it makes sense to get more into this new relationship in my life as time goes by and how it is OK if it isn’t an immediate ‘click’ as they say. My mother also pointed this out how I only smiled several days after she was born, I did feel like a zombie for most of the first week due to the physical strain and tiredness, but also because it was still hard to assimilate the fact that my life had completely and totally changed for real this time. This is also a key point for me in my life and process, to realize how ‘selfish’ in fact I had been when it comes to doing MY things, MY life only and yes caring about others and supporting others but ‘at specific times’ and then being able to do and be wherever I wanted.

 

Several times I had to be reminded that those times were, well, over and gone and that this was a new phase in my life. Yes, I I had to be reminded this, that perhaps ‘should have been obvious’ to most or many, but not to me in those moments where I felt as if the world was just going to ‘pass me by’ as I was laying on a bed feeding my child for endless hours and just hoping to get some proper sleep in the night. It sure doesn’t sound fun and I don’t mean to scare anyone because this is entirely MY experience. It sure isn’t easy for most people to get used to having a newborn at home to take care of, but I am also sure that some may have a better attitude about it than me, lol. I know because my partner is that kind of person that was super happy and laughing at having to change the diaper after we just had put a new one, or having to wake up at night and get her to sleep because I was just ‘out’ by the time, and washing her dirty clothes and doing all of those things that, well, perhaps a lot would see as a chore. I learn a lot from him, still am, and I’ve been realizing how we experience things based on how we decide to Perceive them.

 

He decides to perceive what I would think as a nuisance or a chore with humor and enjoyment, and that surely lightens up everything when in perhaps in a different situation, having a partner with my ‘similar character’ probably would have been a recipe for disaster and perhaps I would have sunken deep into some kind of depression. But thanks to him I didn’t sink that low.

 

I probably felt depressed for all of the reasons I cited above, it mostly had to do with saying good bye to my old life – yes, even that of being pregnant which as I explained before, also became a ‘comfort zone’ to me because I could still be out and about and do whatever I wanted to – and embrace this new phase which I knew was a definitive out of my comfort zone situation, and one that I know is the one I actually needed in order to further my personal development, which to me translates into personal expansion and growth, and that comes with challenges, obstacles, difficulties, etc. So, I focus on embracing this new life now and not reacting to it with frustration, but embracing it as part of the process that it is. My partner explained how this is the moment she will need us the most in her life, how she totally depends on us and how later she will become more independent and no longer require us to be there All the time with her. Again, as obvious as this can be, it was supportive to realize this as well in moments where I sure felt trapped.

 

One of the interesting realizations was about breastfeeding and getting to see how much of a central piece in this whole motherhooding it is. In our case, the challenge was – and still is to an extent really – having too much milk. So, we couldn’t understand why Minerva would get so frustrated while being sucking my nipple and seeing that yes, I Do have sufficient milk because it’s spilling out all over, so, why is she so upset?

 

Well, after doing some research in La Liga de la Leche or La Leche League we found out that her symptoms were probably because of me having too much milk, having a strong ejection causing her to choke essentially, that’s why she has to come off of the nipple repeatedly if starting to feed from the ‘other’ nipple after having drank most of the first one, which we also read could take up to 6 hours of feeding with the same one to ’emptying it out’, which contradicted a common belief of having to feed from one breast and changing to the other in the next feed, which wasn’t working for us.

 

 I’m still doing the several hours feeding with the same breast and only changing after some hours or after I see that she is truly getting upset from perhaps not getting the amount she is expecting once she starts feeding. As my partner and I would conclude, breastfeeding is quite an art in itself, lol, from the various positions that one can use, the latching, the amount of milk, the ejection of it, the density that it goes having during the different stages of development of the child and of the milking process in itself, it’s quite an amazing and complex thing and I recommend watching the series ‘Babies’ on Netflix that explains more about this as well, but one can dive deeper into breastfeeding topics in La Leche League as well.

 

I am still getting used to Minerva simply getting frustrated and sometimes acting rabidly lol when eating, yes, like getting too desperate or frustrated when the ‘thicker’ milk doesn’t come out yet, or when she sucks with so much force that the ejection is even faster and stronger, and me facing the discomfort of soaking my clothes with drops of milk and sometimes spilling it all over Minerva, all because of at times having too much… yep, I thought this would resolve in some time, but it hasn’t, so, I’m embracing it and realizing that as my partner says, nature might have a reason why things are the way they are with our bodies and so, this is the one feeding challenge I face with Minerva. If anyone has any hacks or tips for this, let me know!

 

So yes, the image of a peacefully feeding baby with their mother is just not my case as much lol, perhaps only at night – a bit because even then she does these funny sounds that lol sound more like a drunk man sipping on his last drink before going home, which is hilarious now, but surely doesn’t ‘fit’ into what I thought would ‘be like’ to feed my baby in this aura of peacefulness where they just with ease fall asleep… nope, this is like a constant push and pull type of situation and yes, it can be hilarious to see her getting pissed at the breast for not giving it ‘what she wants’ but, I can’t really regulate the situation, so it’s one of those things that I have to embrace as is.

 

This is also something worth sharing because sometimes we might have this very ‘angelical’ view related to motherhood or breastfeeding specifically, and then it is then to realize that reality works differently and it doesn’t mean it’s ‘wrong’ or ‘bad’ or ‘I’m doing something wrong’ type of situation either. Each child is different, each mother is different, the nature of both is different so, any point of comparison is really out of the window.

 

Another challenge was becoming a mother in the eyes of my mother and doing things that she didn’t agree with. We kind of knew this ‘clashing’ would happen based on how we know she deals with babies and the usual fears around taking care of them, so we went and are going through this and yes, this is also a cautionary tale because things can escalate at times when it can be hard to hear words like ‘you really don’t know how to care for your child!” – or something alike – in one of the most vulnerable moments in  women’s lives when being in the post partum time – or calling us out for being ‘inconsiderate’ for example in the amount of clothes we would attire Minerva with and that becoming a problem for her. We had to stand our ground and it does still happen that my parents think we are deluded about things, but this is part of becoming parents ourselves and if we make mistakes, owning them and learning from them. But following someone’s’ raising ideas out of fearing conflict is just not our style, so this was something to add on to the ‘list’ of challenges I experienced in these so-called quarantine that well, we got to spend at my parent’s house and we are super grateful for the support, but we also wanted to finally get back home to have less of a policing around us when it comes to how we decide to take care of Minerva.

 

This is also cool to share because usually our parents will have different ideas and information on how babies operate so to speak,they were raised in a different time, with different information and so on, so we don’t judge them, we understand them and their sense of care linked to fears, but it then became our duty to inform ourselves on the way we want to raise our child and so have sufficient information and common sense to share our ways and actions that may differ to how they would do things.

 

Slowly but surely, they are realizing that these are different times, new things have been discovered and a lot more has been opened up with regards to taking care of babies such as co-sleeping, carrying them around in our arms for most of the day, allowing them to eat whenever they ask for it, not leaving them crying to make them ‘adjust’ to something, etc.  So, yes, it may create a lot of tension with some relatives – depends on ‘how much’ they are ‘married’ with their paradigm and ideas of how to raise children, but it is also necessary as a breaking point to leave it clear that we will do things differently and that it is not antagonism or some kind of rebellion or a stand off towards other people’s ways, it is simply how we decide to do things whether some like it or not. And sure we are also not blind to realizing we might be wrong, but then we will have a physical consequence or outcome to demonstrate how we were wrong, so that we can change or adjust our current ways.

 

I frankly don’t know how things would have been if I had been entirely alone with Minerva and my partner would have had to be out most of the day. He prepared his finances sufficiently to be able to spend all the time with us for the first months and now with this whole coronavirus thing, it might have to be a bit longer, it depends, but he is so unconditional and willing to be here and support because he realizes this is the most important thing in his life and what he genuinely  likes doing, which is awesome to witness as well and such an example for me where I am still working on that full ‘letting go’ of my ‘old life’ and can be still wishing for that “freedom” I had before, so it is a daily thing to embrace and get used to this new life and appreciate its charms and challenges, but mostly get used to its simplicity.

 

Currently, it is a weird time because I came out of my quarantine and then the world entered its own quarantine, so, in a way it’s ok that I was sort of getting used to being at home most of the time, but I was also already craving to at least go out for some walks which we are slowly but surely doing now with Minerva, but her constant desire to eat is perhaps something that still becomes a challenge to get to do that for longer periods of time, but we will get used to it as we go I guess, or as she settles more with eating more substantially and having more time in between of not eating, we will see, but I realize it’s best to be expectation-less and go with the flow, which is of course a really necessary lesson for me as well with the usual control freak pattern I have.

 

Something I’m currently thankful for is that she does sleep throughout the night, I just have to wake up to feed her which I now do while lying on bed, she eats for some minutes and continues sleeping. I am also now having it easier to fall asleep right after waking up to feed her, which is great, but I still feel like lacking some sleep and I’ll continue to look into that actually since it could be that there are other factors involved. We are sort of getting into a routine, but I am aware that I can’t set it in stone yet because it may still change drastically and I basically have to go with the flow and not expect ‘her’ to ‘adjust to my life’ essentially.

 

Today it was cool because I was able to wake up and do some light post partum yoga practice, which I realized I was missing with all the ‘halt’ of activities that I had due to the quarantine, I am slowly but surely placing myself into more action, which perhaps also played a role in feeling somewhat down during the quarantine, because exercising also supported a lot with my mental or emotional stability and with staying in bed, doing essentially nothing but eat and sleep, it became quite a shock as well to my dopamine levels I guess, along with all the shock that the birthing process was in itself for my body, but hey, it too shall pass and it’s rather important to also be patient for this whole recovery process.

Even if I ‘feel alright’, I cannot really know how my insides are doing, so I had to be aware of that as well and not be ‘overriding’ my actual capacity with a sense of ‘I’m alright’ either.

 

So, I’m taking it easy and it is not like I could ‘do’ much either really, because taking care of a baby truly is demanding, she is with me all the time and even with that, I am actually grateful that my partner is the one that does most of the carrying around because! she is around 6 kgs at 2 months currently so, it’s becoming a challenge for my arms as well, I need to strengthen myself more to feel at ease with that, or find a way that I can carry her around without her feeling trapped and wanting to get out of any sort of wrap right away. We will see with some tips I got from Anna 🙂

 

One thing is certain, and that is that Minerva has come to revolutionize my life in a way I probably didn’t expect and it’s been also great, even if I may not necessarily express it in an open way, I smile and am thankful for having her now in our lives and I am  taking it day by day to also not create ideas or ‘overwhelm’ myself with ‘what ifs’ about our future together and how ‘she will be’ etc. She is already showing us or rather confirming a lot of how I sensed her in the womb in fact, she is an energetic tough cookie lol, showing us back some of our most ingrained patterns like being demanding and obstinate, wanting things ‘right now!’ and quite energetic, which is laughable at times to see that in a baby – and a girl –  but lol, that’s what life is like and so I am learning to ride along with it and I’m being tested precisely on my desire to have ‘the world’ or ‘people’ or ‘things’ fit into my life or schedules… yep, that has to go out of my paradigm for good, which I consider was about time anyways.

 

I also read the book by Laura Gutman called Maternity, coming face to face with our own shadow, which is an awesome explanation of how our emotional state of being is reflected back in our children, including illnesses or symptoms that are actually an opportunity to work on our own shadow or dark side or all of those more hidden or kept under the rug aspects that we tend to hide about our nature, our past traumas or memories that resurface back to haunt us in this motherhood time.  Here is where I give credit to the Desteni Process with which one surely gets to walk a lot of these points and could be essentially considered as a pretty thorough preparation process to be mentally more equipped  and fit to become a parent, since one works a lot with this shadow and learns to face it with more stability and understanding as it rears its head in one’s everyday life. Of course this Process is not only useful to become a parent, dare I say it’s a way to give ourselves a new start in life, a rebirth even if we have walked around in this world with some decades already, so I absolutely recommend anyone to consider walking it, specially if you are aiming at becoming a parent or are already one.

 

I’m thankful for all these learning points thus far and still working on them, there’s lots to keep awareness on. Just sharing how these first 2 months have gone by, and celebrating the fact that she is a big, healthy and strong little lady as well, yay! 🙂

I recommend listening to the Parenting series on Eqafe to prepare yourself to handle some of the basic considerations related to taking care of a child, which relate a lot to one’s own self-responsibility when it comes to a state of being and being the best that we can for our children.

Let’s keep walking

 

 

638. A Redefined Spirituality

 

 The following is inspired by the writings of a life  colleague –  as I am now deciding to define him – who shared a lengthy letter to me as a response to something that I wrote him in an intent to assist in seeing the blueprint of the points that I consider were veiling him from seeing through the steps to get back into an ownership of his self creation and self awareness,  which he has walked in his very own set of paths of ways – but interestingly enough, we have found each other having the same intent and purpose in our lives which we will be joining in an common project where we can share more of our personal experiences and processes with many more that might find themselves in the same kind of ‘holes’ in our creative processes that we have both acknowledged having been limited by in our creative paths of inner and outer creations.  

To give some context to this self forgiveness, this is a reflection of what I see of myself in his words and speaks to anyone that can identify themselves with being ‘a seeker’ or someone that seeks meaning to one’s own existence, to one’s own creation in many ways and paths and if not getting to live their potential, it becomes a source of emotional and detrimental experiences such as falling generally ‘ill’ in the form of lacking direction and purpose, being stagnant in expression, losing sight of the ‘bigger picture’ in life, being veiled by emotions such as dread, depression, sadness, despair and in a way blaming everyone else that doesn’t seem to care for life and the world as oneself as the source for our own apathy and frustration, not realizing we are ‘it’ ourselves too in living out that character of disempowerment and helplessness and victimization.

 To sum up, it reminded me a lot of the path that I’ve also walked and that it’s still part of me and I have not forgotten it, I just have in a way stepped out of the cocoon and see things quite differently now, but it is as if I am embarking myself in this new project and walking with him in this project in this phase of my life because our will was mightier than the limitations that we many times fell into, and I’m genuinely glad and happy to see him slowly but surely realizing these things and taking on his creative path again, which I recognize that I have to do myself in my own self imposed limitations as well, and it’s great to have someone to walk such path with, someone that understands the seemingly ‘similar’ kind of patterns that some of us ‘creative’ people go through, but many often give up half way and get lost in the midst of ‘the fog’ and don’t persevere enough to see through the illusions to remain ‘with the finger in line’ as he says, living one’s expression and will, despite the nature of everything and everyone around us as it currently exists, but being courageous enough to understand things at a deeper level and hold that little flame alive within us no matter what, and let each other know ‘hey I am here, I understand, I walk with, let’s work together’ which is quite priceless and unique to find seemingly ‘out of nowhere’ and here is to say as well that coincidences don’t exist, only what we determine ourselves to be and do which eventually takes us to where we need to be to fulfill that which we set ourselves to live.

I forgive myself that I have accepted and allowed myself to keep quiet and wait for someone else to make the decisions of what I should be and do and within that, diminishing bit by bit my determination to express and take responsibility for the decisions that I make and what I live in my life, which I realize diminished my ability to live me and bit by bit dried the flow of the abundant river that I have always been aware exists as me, as the life that I am.

I forgive myself that I have accepted and allowed myself to neglect myself into experiences of despair and arguing for my limitations in neglect cultivating my own confidence and stance that has always been here as myself, it just got clouded by the emotions that became the comfortable way to justify not living the potential of who I really am as life.

I forgive myself that I have accepted and allowed myself to make of my mind my own obstacle that created shame, anger, despair, uncertainty and sadness which I realize is the way in which I now realize are the ingredients to create resistance,  which my mind creates in greed of energy and in allowing that, I stepped further and further away from actually getting to do what I know and have always been aware of is the truth of my being, what I can and need to direct myself to be, live and express.

I forgive myself that I have accepted and allowed myself to create a comfort zone in remaining skeptical and not want to intervene in my own life in order to not have to take responsibility for myself, not realizing that this seemingly ‘comfortable zone’ led me to sink deeper in a hole where I alienated myself from my own wholeness, from my own power as the capacity to direct myself, to intervene in my own life, to decide to change if something wasn’t working anymore, to innovate in the way that I can decide to live me and within that acknowledging the work, dedication, consistency and will that it will require to create and live myself as the best that I can be. That’s what self-creation is all about.

I forgive myself that I have accepted and allowed myself to be-lie-ve the statement ‘nothing really matters’ as a way to avoid myself in taking action in all the things that I knew I had to take action on in my life to be and become the better version of myself.

I forgive myself that I accepted and allowed myself to have been in great thirst of knowledge and information in an attempt to find a way to change the way that I am and how I see and understand life, not realizing how I only inflated my mind with it, but I wasn’t really learning and applying how to really nurture my soul and being in the daily actions, words and habits that I realize I have to take action on in order to live the best of myself.

I forgive myself that I have accepted and allowed myself to deliberately over complicate myself with theories, ideas, beliefs and philosophies which I realize may assist in our paths, but can also create new excuses where we miss out the common sense that always exists within ourselves, we just have to decide to let go of wanting to ‘seek out there’ and instead start getting to ‘what’s inside of me’ and write myself to see who I really am, what I really want to do, defining my purpose, defining my drive and take the first steps to do so in my reality.

I forgive myself that I have accepted and allowed myself to believe I know many things but not really getting to understand the steps, the process it takes to interiorize, to integrate, to live the awareness of the things I realized in my life. I realize it takes actual change, work and effort to live the words that I get through realizations.

I forgive myself that I had not accepted and allowed myself to realize how ‘realizing’ and understanding something invariably leads to the next step which is to take action on it, to not only be infatuated in an enlightening idea or momentary experience, but to embrace and direct that impetus to create the actual change in space and time and take the necessary steps to do so in order to honor the path that took me to get to realize, see and understand what I now see, realize and understand.

I forgive myself that I have accepted and allow myself to define me and allow myself to be dictated by the construct and concept of time, by the illusion of having to remain ‘current’ according to that abstraction which time is – which we have created in means to control ourselves. I realize we create time, we decide how we live time in this reality, but I no longer allow myself to be dictated by it and what I should feel or experience according to the idea I have around it.

I forgive myself that I have accepted and allowed myself to isolate myself in a bottle of complexities where I believed no one else cared, no one would understand or listen and in that, miss out the many opportunities to connect , share and get to know others, because of becoming my own living judgment of seeing everything as ‘lost and pointless’ and not seeing that in doing so, I wasn’t getting anywhere else but became more detached from myself, from my own reality and from getting to understand ‘the other’ as myself too.

I forgive myself that I have accepted and allowed myself to become lazy and apathetic to continue discovering the wonders of who we are and can be and become, and instead to become sad at the apathy I saw in others, not realizing that in doing so, I became equal to what I was only seeing in them.

I forgive myself that I have accepted and allowed myself to become the epitome of hope in despair, where I gave myself up in the wait for something or someone else to show me the way, to tell me what to do and not take responsibility to be my own director, my own guide, my own master that is self-created – not following, not taught, but simply learning from others’ experiences and making them my own by testing them out to see if they work or not.

I forgive myself that I have accepted and allowed myself to use the idea of lack as an excuse and as a determining factor of my being where I placed myself into a survival mode  that turned me into a selfish and ruthless being, becoming fearful, anxious and angry at myself for knowing that this ‘lack’ is entirely self created and that no one else is doing this to myself, but me.

I forgive myself that I accepted and allowed myself to not give me the gift of Understanding another, because I realize that I can’t hate another if I understand how we all have created this in separation of who we really are as life. I now realize that Understanding is one of the most profound and liberating gifts we can give to ourselves.

I forgive myself as everyone else in our weaknesses and fractured beingness because as big as the weaknesses and fractures are, these cannot override the virtues that we actually are and can develop as the new nature of our being. This is self-creation, it is not born from perfection, but from the decision to overcome the complexities, the falls, the mistakes, the wrongdoings, the self-neglect.

I forgive myself that I accepted and allowed myself to neglect the dedication it requires to get to understand how we function in our minds and our being, because that in itself reveals our truth and as such, it becomes the most useful thing to do and dedicate our lives to cultivate.

I forgive myself that I accepted and allowed myself to not continue cultivating my own understanding to direct and create my own healing process and within that, cultivate my own self-awareness,  to no longer be defined and limited by survival in this world as a justification to not live the wholeness of myself in  my day to day and in every moment of breath.

I forgive myself that I haven’t accepted and allowed myself to redefine spirituality as a sincere and grounded way to define and create my own being, to create the habits and methods to continue developing my self-awareness in every moment of my existence, to be in contact with my being, my body and to create an awareness of the effect that my thoughts, words and deeds create in my reality. I realize I can do this without the need of crystalized dogmas and instead can be lived by a simple and consistent dedication in developing these supportive habits of being in contact with myself and taking full ownership of my capacity to define, reinvent, innovate and reconstruct myself, because no one else can do this for me, but myself.

I forgive myself that I haven’t accepted and allowed myself to live determination and do the hard work that it takes to live this process of creating my own life and self awareness, because I realize it requires courage and determination and I believed myself to be devoid of these. Now I realize we all have what is needed, that we all can live these words and that’s the living faith in which I decide to live in, to be the driving force of my capacity, will and determination to do that which I know and realize are the building blocks to the creation of who I really want to be as the expression of the wholeness that I go creating and expressing in my life.

I forgive myself that I have accepted and allowed myself for having been ashamed in being the one that is not following the same path as everyone else, but instead decided  to swim against the flow, going into the opposite direction while everyone seemed to not care or see where they are being led to.  Now I realize, see and understand that this very will, determination and decision to keep going ‘against all odds’ got me to where I am today, where I now open my eyes to see that there is no shame at all in living my own truth even if no one seemed to care or understand, because it’s not about others but about my own decision to live me, to express that care, that love which is sufficient to live the truth of who I am.

I forgive myself that I have accepted and allowed myself to give up many times in the many creative ways that I pursued at some point in my life, not realizing that I can work things, that I can implement changes and innovate in my life to keep that living flame alive even if it only seems to lighten up my own face. I realize that this is what living me and expressing me means, to do it because of myself and for nothing and no one else other than the expression of the potential that is unleashed when one decides to live unconditionally.

I forgive myself that I have accepted and allowed myself to regret the perceived’ wasted time’ when I neglected the essentially creative capacity that I am and that I have. I now realize that such ‘wasted time’ was part of the process and the many roads that have led me to be and become who I am here, that I can start where I am – in every moment, in every new breath – and to realize that in any moment, I can only be the one that drives me or becomes my own worst-enemy and limitation to do this as an expression of myself.

I forgive myself that I haven’t accepted and allowed myself to realize that frustration is a symptom of the incomprehension of my own self movement, and that stagnation is no more than the nature of all sickness that manifests when I don’t allow myself to flow and be the water that flows, that reclaims its natural will to express, to flow, to be, to adapt, to move and embody the realization that its movement never ceases, because I’m not defined by a measure of time – I embrace the creation of the potential that I decide to live and cultivate as the everlasting self that always remains here, just like the water in the world.

I forgive myself for living out my weaknesses and for allowing them to affect others in their own lives. I now decide to work on the changes, the habits, the actions that will turn them into actual strengths.

I realize that I can only get through in my life if I place my own faith back on myself as the recognition of my capacity to change my reality and the outcome of my life through the work that I can dedicate myself to do every day in order to honor the wholeness of my being, to no longer be trapped in the experience of lack and all its unfulfilled concepts that I had allowed myself to believe and be enslaved by.

I now take ownership of my own discipline and self-creation moved by the love that I realize I can express in my work and the enjoyment that I imprint on it and on myself in doing so.  I commit myself to become the author and creator of all of this that celebrates the manifestation of what and who I realize I really am at a fundamental and existential level as life itself.

I understand and realize that time is only a measure of earthly oxidation, however even if I deteriorate, it does not define my stance and who I am as I keep my finger at it, becoming and living the drive that has got me to where I am here today, because no matter what: I remain current.

I decide to trust myself in my decisions, my actions, the paths that I decide to walk, embrace the ups and downs it may entail because I decide to trust myself in being able to learn from it and expand my expression through that, because I realize that that’s what living life is all about.

 

 

 

Join in if you want to start walking your own process of defining your Self-Honesty

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• Desteni Forum : Discuss and share with us

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• Creation’s Journey to Life

631. Notes on Compromise

 

Compromise:     the expedient acceptance of standards that are lower than is desirable.

Living compromise in my case has been existent mostly in the consideration of the relationships that I allowed myself to form in the past. Within the starting point of taking it back to self – and so not focusing on the others related to me this way – I realized how this allowance of something ‘less’ than what I could actually create for me and for the best have to do with a sense of self-deprecation and even ‘worthlessness’ that existed in me, wherein any form of relationships would reflect back what I was accepting and allowing with me. So they all were there in my life in accordance to ‘where I was’ in my life and as such, there is nothing to regret about because I’ve come to understand the process that I took in order to realize what I am seeing now.

We had a group chat on Friday where the point of pleasing people opened up. I couldn’t relate at first to pleasing per se, but I did recognize it in relation to how I would do things, shape myself in accordance to what I thought was more liked by others within a relationship. There were a few wherein I didn’t do it, but then compromise would show in other ways such as deciding to be with people that I thought I could eventually change and assist them in getting to some kind of ‘ideal’ expression or living potential – it never happened because of course, my starting point was focused on ‘them’ and not on being the best for myself, of doing and being those aspects I was seeking to change in others – it is common sense that if you are living the best of you, by default you won’t allow anything less than what you are living in terms of choosing who to share your life with.

I am focusing here on relationships because it is that one point we total choose to be in – well, at least it’s how it goes in most part of the world. So here I’m not talking about the necessary compromise that exists in other aspects of life like jobs and ways to make money to survive in this world, it’s merely about how we relate to others in relationships.

The reality is that when one starts living more of one’s truth, everything that doesn’t ‘fit the compromise shoe’ starts sticking out like a rotten fruit that needs to go – or rots the rest of the fruit. It becomes uncomfortable not because it represents a healthy challenge or an out of the comfort zone point of support, but because one realizes it is becoming a suppressing situation, one where there’s more of a ‘relationship management,’ going on, there’s more ‘lacks’ emerging, ‘longings’ and ‘ideas of how things can be’ and more things that ‘subtly bother me but I let it go by because, who knows? Maybe it changes later!’ or those moments where there’s this ‘slight’ seemingly subtle ‘sinking’ whenever one knows that one is not living one’s full expression in order to fit some kind of shoe we believe we ‘must be in’ to be liked or be okay with someone else in a relationship. Or even to ‘be in a relationship’ in itself, while it’s actually totally fine and ok if one genuinely decides to be alone and step out of the belief that ‘one needs to be in a relationship.’

Sometimes this pattern of conditioning and compromise goes well accepted in our society, simply because we believe we ‘can’t do any better’ or we just have to ‘suck the pain in’ and hope for better times. It has been baffling to me to get to know stories of how far women – and yes also males but mostly females in fact – stay in abusive relationships because of believing that they ‘love’ the other person or that without a man they are nothing, or for financial reasons and many kids in line, they have to stick to relationships that are very toxic. I haven’t been in such extreme situations, but I have been in relationships where I know that I am not living the totality of myself, that I am somehow trying to fit a shoe that doesn’t support me in fact – yet I still have put it on while secretly questioning my decision, and being in constant over analyzing of the situation and desiring for certain changes that I then go into hope and expectancy that ‘the other’ person eventually gets to in their lives and so consequently, in the relationship.

 

How I see it currently is that the creation of a relationship that is supportive comes along with ‘where we currently are’ within our lives, comes along with the kind of principles – or lack thereof – we are living in our lives. In essence, the ‘who we are’ is then going to reflect the kind of people we choose to be with. Many of us have gone into relationships out of need, out of wanting to ‘fulfill’ some aspect or some ‘existential void’ with a relationship and that is simply  meant to fail, because one is not entering a relationship as a fulfilled being, but seeking the comfort and dare I say ‘fulfillment’ in another. Well, I’ve been there myself a few times in the past and it’s a recipe for disaster.

There have been other times where I believed I was quite fulfilled within me and didn’t need to be with someone to represent that ‘fulfillment’ for me, but I still allowed myself to be in situations where something inside me knew things could be better, and not in the sense of ‘without conflict at all’ or being ‘better’ in an idealized way, but more in the sense that there is this untapped potential within me that I could in fact develop with someone that could be ‘ready’ for that. So, this is where the point of letting go of compromise comes as an understanding really. It is not about dismissing situations for seeing them as ‘less than’ but perhaps as being in different stages in life where personal development can be either diminished and suppressed or catalyzed in certain relationships or living decisions.

This is also where it enables me to see that if I live what’s best for me, it in fact becomes best for all. I’ve seen how in accepting and allowing compromise in me, it invariably affects the other person and everyone else that could be affected by it, because I’m not living my truth, the potential of who I can be and that becomes a series of diminishing steps that don’t support life in fact.

In terms of relationships, it’s about wanting the best for everyone involved. If a relationship is clearly not supporting someone, if it becomes something that is more about ‘managing’ one or the other, or about seeing ‘what the emotional experience is in the other’ or fearing certain attitudes in one another, or being over-vigilant about what the other one might be thinking, or how things are not working, or how things don’t seem right, or how I ‘should be in order to keep him/her happy’ then what do we know? We are compromising ourselves, we are not living our truth. It’s also about self-honesty and asking these questions not within the starting point of leaving ‘all the work’ to the other, but being honest about doing what it takes to make something work as with everything else.

I can say I have had compromised in every single relationship in the past. I have only now discovered and come to understand what it is to actually live me, be me with all my ups and downs, my qualities and my defects and not have anything to hide towards another, because that’s how I live my truth and now I know there’s people that’s up for taking that in, yes, that ‘intensity’ that I can be in my openness and not having any qualms about things, and how demanding I can also get to be – which yes I know I need to work on, but still, cool to know someone can understand such demanding nature as well. I enjoy the support that I can get from another that has a similar personal stance with his own life so that we don’t take bs from each other lol, it makes things fun and supportive in fact, because we don’t take things so seriously yet we point them out, because we know that our willingness to transcend the momentary bs is far greater than remaining ‘stuck’ in it or in an ‘experience.’

But I realize that as ‘easy’ as it might sound, it isn’t. It’s not like I got lucky only. Everything was a series of decisions that I took to get to where I am within myself to then decide to be with someone that supports the best in me, because this implies I am first doing and being and living that best for me. And also, it is not ‘honey over chips’ in a relationship where no compromise exists in such terms – of course there IS compromise, but it’s things that simply come with the living together of two individuals and what one is willing to live with – but to me the aspects that are relevant in relation to personal integrity, living habits and expression, are a supportive platform for me to live on currently.

It is only now that I can look back and see to what extent I ‘went’ to be liked, appreciated, to ‘fit in’ according to what I believe would make the relationship work, what I was willing to do in order to ‘make things work’ etc. The list goes on and the details are not even relevant because it is about the action, this ‘lesser of me’ being accepted where I know I ‘chip off’ a bit of myself and in that, it becomes a point of compromise.

Who knows if I am speaking from a place where I can still be living compromise and not be aware of it? But as I said before, I will eventually know as I continue deconstructing this personality system within me and continue focusing on self-development and self-creation. For now this is my current stance and I found it relevant to share about it because perhaps someone is going through similar experiences, having thoughts like ‘this is as as good as it gets’ when it comes to relationships, but I am now aware that you can indeed be with someone that is there ‘walking with’ side by side with you, instead of feeling like one or the other has to ‘drag’ the other to get to the top of the mountain. I did that in the past, but can’t also judge me for my choices because as I said, they reflect who I was at the time and that’s how I can now simply look back and forgive myself for it, because I know it is entirely ‘who I was’ in relation to ‘relationships’ at the time.

For now, I see that there is a foundation built for me to be the best of myself and a relationship can’t be ‘it’ for anyone. It is a companionship, but the rest is entirely up to me. Before I would take the relationship in itself as ‘the project’ to focus on, and it doesn’t have to be that way, that I don’t have to accept compromise, to have that ‘sinking’ feeling when being with someone, to fear losing someone, to fear not ‘being the best’ with another or to be in all kinds of fears and paranoia of ‘where they are at’ in their minds and lives, or expecting others to change. It then becomes another burden or ‘point to work through’ rather than being a platform of self-support and self-development.  It becomes much easier to be with someone that has a similar standing in life, because then the focus is on the mutual support to learn from each other, live and grow – not on managing ever present emotions or subtle experiences and frictions… Now I see how it feels to be living in compromise, and perhaps one can only realize one is living compromise when you step out of it and look back to realize how such compromise existed. At the same time I’m learning to focus on the present, on what’s here, on what I can be grateful for creating for me in my life and choosing essentially that which is supportive for my being.

It is ok to realize that not everyone can simply ‘bond’ with someone else based on preferences or similar mindset. Now I realize that perhaps it is the seemingly opposite worlds that complement themselves the most, because it’s not about having similar preferences, but principles, not similar personalities but similar disposition to learn and change in order to make something work like it is within a relationship. It is another kind of compromise, with ‘concessions’ where acceptances and allowances are made on both sides, in aspects that do not affect the main principles in which a relationship is built on, but adjustments that are meant to be there based on living with another person and embracing them as part of your life.

It takes two to tango, can’t expect things to work if only one is having the disposition… or perhaps it can, it really depends on what each person is willing to live with – accept and allow – I now know what is possible and what I see works best for me. This is what self honesty is, this is where I can’t make rules of this, because this is my current truth and stance – who knows? It can change in time, but for now I check within me and I’m clear, I have nothing holding me back in relation to the place where I’m at in terms of my life within a relationship – it’s the other way around for me at the moment, learning a lot each other, it is as if I at last I have the opportunity to be supported by another in a genuine way, instead of placing me on the supporter role only. Perhaps this is also a perception, but! I also have to be less apologetic in the sense of not wanting to sound ‘too dismissive’ – it is what it is really – and if it is best for me and others, I am sure this is what we all want for each other person, to be able to live their truth and be the best they can be no matter how or with whom. So this is also a cool note about compromise, where we believe that we are doing something ‘good’ for another by sticking with them even if that implies not being the best for ourselves…. Wrong… that invariably leads to their compromise as well one way or another, so best for all means, not accepting any lesser that what is possible for each one at any given moment in life.

 

There are a bunch of other things where I know I am compromising myself as in not living the best of myself and that’s where instead of focusing on ‘the lack’ I will be focusing on how to create, otherwise it again becomes a point to ‘fulfill’ through something/someone in separation of me.

 

Ok thanks for reading  

 

Join in if you want to start walking your own process of defining your Self-Honesty

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• 7 Year Journey To Life Process : People Sharing their Processes of Self-Forgiveness and Self-Correction

• Susan Spies – The Physical And I Exploring the Innerverse

• Get Real with Cerise

• Destonians

• Desteni I Process

• Agreement/Redefining Relationship Course

• Desteni Forum : Discuss and share with us

• Desteni Español

• Creation’s Journey to Life

 

 

624. Getting Off My High-Horse

get off (one’s) high horse. To stop acting as if one is better than other people; to stop being arrogant or haughty.

 

A lot of what I shared in my previous blog was also inspired by listening to the recent Eqafe recordings called When the Honeymoon Phase is Over  and After the Honeymoon Phase because it describes really well one of the main patterns that I have lived for a long time in my own mind where I have become very picky, deterministic and absolutist when it comes to creating a perception of ‘perfection’ existing in another that stands in the ‘position’ of being ‘my partner’ and creating this high standards about how the person ‘must be.’ In a way, I’ll be describing the creation of this ‘high horse’ character where I have been experiencing a sense of superiority and comparison towards my partners where I have been quite quick to determine what ‘is acceptable’ and what ‘isn’t’ based on forgetting  and not considering a few things that I’ll be sharing here.  

Even if I knew that I am changing this at a knowledge level when it comes to not judging people based on the emotional reactions they may have, but rather step up to create space for understanding them, placing myself in their shoes, not judging but instead, look back at how I can relate to the creation of reactions and how I have supported me to walk through them, I have at the same time held a very blind spot when it comes to the person that ‘occupies’ the role of being ‘MY partner’ and in that almost creating a separate ‘grading’ system for them, because of thinking a bit too high of myself and so considering that ‘they’ should be ‘up to my standards’ in a way, and so I’ll be sharing how this is quite consequential and the lessons I’ve learned by identifying this within me through the support of that couple of Eqafe recordings.

I can totally relate to the description in the audio recording of being almost like this king with his whole flair and absolutist power to simply say ‘No’ to something and make it unacceptable and create zero space for a second consideration about someone or something they are deciding on. This is in relation to how in my relationship there was a moment where I decided to question certain reaction in my partner which wasn’t really ‘new’ because, I had been aware of it since the beginning. The important point that I’ve shared before is how it has been me all the way that decided to polarize the idea or image of the other person into a positive way where all the actual characteristics that I could have ‘questioned’ from the beginning, were shoved aside. This is where I had to realize that there was no deliberate ‘hiding’ from my partner about those aspects before, I was the only one that decided to blur them, place them aside and keep sugar coating those reactions whenever they would come up, in essence, not taking it seriously.

Yes, this is part of what is commonly known as the ‘honey moon phase,’ but it is definitely something I created in my mind where it was only now after several months that I decided to question certain reactive pattern and take it ‘too damn serious’ to question him about it, which was of course a bit ‘out of nowhere’ considering this wasn’t something new in our interactions, it was just me that in a moment decided to get on this high-horse of questioning in a very serious tone how ‘bad’ such reaction is and if I may be able or capable of continuing a relationship with someone that is having this kind of reaction towards other people in a certain moment of frustration.

Well, here is where I need to explain what this ‘high horse’ character entails and what I’ve realized from the moment I’ve been able to hear it in the recording and, to be honest, as I was translating such recordings, I had to laugh a lot when it was described, because that’s exactly how ‘I feel’ inside myself when having this ‘serious questioning’ about someone’s reaction and getting into this absolutist throne where I can put my thumb up or down to say yay or nay to continuing an entire relationship just because of getting to – or deciding to – question a pattern that I had simply left aside, not opened up and not even reacted to before. But based on my own shared experience in that moment – which yes was also that of being fed up by a certain situation that was ‘out of our hands’ I decided that what he said was ‘too sensitive’ and required attention and needed to be opened up.

This turned out to be very cool because all in all, regardless of my high horse stance or not, it was a reaction that assisted us a lot to get to talk about many other things to settle where we’re generally ‘at’ with each other in the relationship. This assisted me to refresh my memory of how I was in that moment projecting ‘how I want him to be’ – which is yes, a very common pattern in me that I haven’t totally changed, I can see that – and forgetting in one moment about the totality of who the person is and the noticeable mutually supportive aspects that we’ve developed in our relationship together.

Yep, it can be a bit baffling how I can get myself in that ‘zone’ where I just zoom-in one single aspect that I find simply ‘unacceptable’ in a single moment and suddenly decide that this is ‘so questionable’ that the entirety of who the person is becomes questionable. This is a common pitfall that I can see becomes like a tunnel vision where one can spiral almost out of control and losing sight of the reality of the person that we are judging and creating a problem about in our minds.

The high-horse character also implied that I was not seeing at all ‘my problem’ or ‘my personality play-out’ at all, because in my mind, I was in fact like this royal person that decides that this/that is not acceptable in MY life. I felt that superiority stance where almost ‘nothing’ or no one would ‘ever’ be ‘up to my standards,’ which means that somehow I have been regarding myself in a very ‘superior’ stance that I tend to mostly compare and project to the partners that I’ve had in my life. I tend to be more considerate to everyone else BUT! Holy, if it’s the one person that becomes ‘my partner’ it’s almost as if they had to be the premium gladiators to be ‘up to the standard’ of what would be somewhat similar to how I am or how I see myself.

Here, there needs to be some point of equilibrium because I’ve been in both polarities where I’ve disregarded myself in the past where I had no self-worth, self appreciation or self love and I went looking for all of that in relationships that, for the most part, were no-good for me – and were quite compromising in fact – which has been a lifelong pattern to be honest. That’s been kind of my weakness, because I believed I could ‘change them’ and within doing so, create ‘the perfect partner’ IF only they could ‘step up to my standards’ – yep, wanting to change someone or asking someone to change in order to be in a relationship is just a No-go, ever. It’s unacceptable.

Even in the most subtle things where one is compromising oneself to do certain things to please another and knowing within that ‘it is not you,’ I now realize that is just a no-go and a recipe for disaster if one starts compromising with certain things to ‘fit’ into a relationship. 

But that’s something I have only been able to see and realize now where I am with a person that accepts me as I am, even with the worst of the aspects that he also points out about myself. We recognize them and I’ve asked him to assist me when I am showing that worst of myself like the control freakism pattern I’ve shared about before and also whenever my ‘subtle ways’ come out to have him ‘be perfect for me’ type of thing, which is unreasonable and absolutely unacceptable, because it would only be about creating ‘my perfect partner’ and have this ‘perfect robot’ that doesn’t get to challenge me or question me at all. Man, that would be awful, because there is something that I am extremely grateful for which is the feedback and support that my partner provides in being very frank about the stuff that I do, how I do it and how it comes through in a moment, because let’s face it, not many people stand in such position in our lives to do that. In my life it’s been mostly my mother, some of the closest people I talk to from the Desteni community and my partner.

So getting off of my high horse happened while opening up the whole questioning of such reaction to him, where I got to actually realize that yes, I was again being too exigent, projecting ‘my ideals’ and only focusing on ‘how I think things SHOULD be’ and in that, yes, getting reminder that no person will be ‘equal to me’, nor should that ever happen because we are all individuals and part of the actual enjoyment in life is to get to know who we are and how we can decide to interact, live and coexist with a ‘world in itself’ in the shape and life of another human being.

One thing that baffles me as I said above is how much I simply became possessed for a moment about this questioning of a reaction, where I stopped considering the totality of the person and all that he has shown and lived with actions – not just judgments or backchat that he may speak out loud from time to time and yes, it was a frightening reminder of how ‘easy’ it is to fall into this pathological way of thinking where one simply focuses on ‘the worst’ of someone in one single moment and starts piling up stuff that one hadn’t worked with/looked at before and suddenly build up this whole sinister story about someone. It actually reminds me of those Thriller books I used to read as a child, where the story goes fine and dandy and then it gets to the climax where all those details and seemingly subtle points through the story build up to expose this huge problem and sinister case about a murderer or a psychopath etc. lol

I mean, really, I saw how in my mind it can easily go into that if I don’t ground myself in the basics. So that’s how what was supportive for me in that moment is to have a moment for myself to let the emotion out in crying and then realizing ok, yes, this is an emotional reaction though I know emotion and victimizing myself right now is not the way out, not talking about it is not the way out. This needs to be talked through and gotten to a point of understanding because! I already know how we are both quite level headed and there’s really no further problems between us where ‘big’ emotions emerge that could make our dialogues impossible, so that was also a grounding point to know we could simply talk about it and realize the many points that I had missed from my sight, where I went into my ‘high horse’ and create deliberate ‘sugar coatings’ as I explained in a blog about memories before. That way he could see where and how I am having a different idea of ‘how things should be’ that he simply takes as very normal stuff based on ‘who he is’ and ‘how he is’, which he has been and expressed from day 1.

So, in a way I realized I created my own storm, but it was beneficial to talk it out because it assisted me to realize how much I was not focusing on the reality of things, how I was holding on to a polarized version of him and of who he is – as I had mentioned some time ago, seeing him in this positive light only – and also how he had no clue of my relationship to certain words and attitudes and what it meant to me, while for him it was frankly normal stuff that ‘everyone does.’

This is where another aspect of the high-horse character comes through where yes, I realized that I forget that I’ve been learning how my mind operates, questioning, observing and working on myself, my reactions, my habits, changing ways in which I would ‘naturally react’ and re-wire myself on a day to day basis for over 10 years now based on the principles I’ve been learning and applying from the Desteni material.  I do realize that because of how easy it was for me to understand myself with my partner and see that he was quite principled in a natural manner, I kind of created the belief that such principles would expand on to ‘changing’ certain reactions within him, certain ‘traits’ of character… and in that forgetting that nope, having such values/principles as a person does not mean that he is working with the totality of his nature to change it.

In fact it is only now through the relationship that we have, that he is becoming aware of many things that he didn’t even question before about himself and his way of being, because of being quite a ‘man to himself,’ meaning where he only would have to ‘respond’ to himself and not having developed any real deep relationships with any other person that could get him to open up about things that he hadn’t questioned or even seen about himself, and I find that fascinating as well! Because I tend to forget who he is, his personal history, the way he has lived for most of my life and in that compare me and ‘my process’, ‘my ways’ to his and create this sudden ‘nah-uh unacceptable!’ finger-pointing type of haughty attitude to something he had not even seen as ‘a problem’ within him at all. In this I also realized the ‘disconnect’ we can create when not sharing and communicating about the way that each one of us sees certain actions the other does, which is something he has done about me pretty much from the beginning, which has been great because that’s what I wanted, a point of honesty that leads to realizing the ‘worst’ of myself that few had dared to question or point out and now I get to be with someone that won’t take any shit either lol, so we are two very ‘peculiar’ beings so to speak where each one of us has very cemented principles and ways of being that at the same time are learning to create considerations for the other and create a middle ground, which is definitely doable, even if we are both very stubborn at times lol. We totally make it fun to do this kind of things, mostly because we love each other and we realize what it entails to live with another. May sound cheesy but! Omg, it is true! haha

So! to make it simple: the opening of this situation where I was able to get off my high horse, realize I was imposing/projecting my own process to my partner – who is not walking this process or the tools I use for self support – and in that, I was in fact not living the words that I’ve committed to live with any other person, like getting to hear them, to consider them, to place myself in their shoes, to understand they are not yet knowing ‘how’ to deal with their reactions and reminding myself that I can only be an example and share how I’ve walked through similar things myself. I was almost like creating a big deal about it as if it was a person that would already know ‘how’ to use tools like self-forgiveness or being in the path to change those aspects within him. He is not, and this is something that I am also fine with, because in general the person that he is, the words he lives, the way he lives and the challenges he represents for me in my life as well are what I need at the moment.

Something that I’ve realized is that it makes it difficult at times to really get to know How to talk to ‘regular people’ out in the world so to speak, because they don’t speak your same ‘lingo’ as when being with someone that walks this process. Not saying this should be ‘the way’ when it comes to relationships between people that walk the same process or people that walk with someone that doesn’t have the same background, but I find that this is specific for me, because I definitely have realized how much I lost ground and ‘contact’ with reality when being too focused on my personal process and only relating to people that are also walking this process. So, this year has also been a testing ground for me to realize in many ways where I am living only as a ‘preacher’ but not really living what I THINK is common sense, and bam, that’s just what I needed to realize as well. While at the same time also seeing how I’ve been able to change many aspects which surely make my current relationship possible.

Part of the ways to get off of my high horse was to focus and remind myself of all the words that I wrote out about him and the reasons why I decided to be with him, which have proven to be a great pillar of support that I’m quite grateful for. I may sound too laudably, but, that’s the reality based on what has opened up for both in the relationship. It’s quite something and I definitely have to create a flag-point whenever I see myself going into these tunnel-vision points where I lose my ground about something I define as ‘negative’ and ‘unacceptable’ in a very absolutist way. I have to take a moment by myself – which I did then – to slow down, let the emotion out so that I could then sit with him, eye to eye and talk about the whole situation which was one of the moments that definitely strengthened our resolve to be with one another, and this is priceless and definitely recommendable to do, because I got to understand much more about him and consider things that I had completely forgotten about in one single moment of reacting to his reaction.

This is one of the many more reasons why I recommend getting to listen to Eqafe recordings in your day to day, like the ones I mentioned which were definitely spot on and very timely for me to look at how I was stepping into this superiority pattern that was preventing me from SEEING reality and was blinding me with this kind of ‘perfection’ light that is definitely not realistic when we are talking about a relationship with two very real and direct people that don’t hold back about things. If anything, I actually appreciate he is ‘speaking his mind’ even if the things that come out are not ‘angelical’ lol, it’s at least commendable that there’s still people that dare to say: yes this is what I thought and yes this is who I am as well, and yes I know it’s not nice or pretty but never said I was. Because it is true, so many people only fake and paint a nice image of themselves in the first phases of a relationship that lead to the inevitable ‘monstering’ phase as some say here hehe where people show their true colors and so the relationship ends around that time when they start seeing the reality of themselves.

On my side, I have to remember my process, especially when it comes to the ‘standards’ I have created towards ‘my partner’  as if that was this very ‘difficult shoe to fit’ and as I mentioned in my previous blog, it sure is, I’m not an ‘easy person’ for most of the people really, lol, I am quite exigent to myself and so to that person that is closest to me. But fortunately I found someone that also has his personal exigencies very established as well, which is why I guess we get along so well. And even if we differ in many perspectives, ways of seeing or understanding the world or in how we deal with our own problems, I’ve also come to realize that such mental-aspects don’t really matter for me. What really matters is the conviviality, the habits, the livelihood and coexistence with a person that lives with personal integrity. I appreciate more that there is no presentation or attempt to ‘fake’ a certain idea of himself to ‘be liked’ or accepted, because he wasn’t seeking that at all, which have created a very comfortable space for us in the relationship, because no one else gets to see us as ‘we truly are’ and say what we truly think to anyone else.  And her by comfortable I don’t mean, ‘easy’ because it’s not challenging, I’d say it’s the other way around, and it is paving a nice space for me to learn how to best relate to people ‘in the world’ in fact.

To me, this is supportive because he is quite an example that I definitely lacked when being in relationships in the past where my starting point was that of lack of personal appreciation, acceptance, self-worth which would reflect back on the people I would decide to be with. He is definitely the opposite of that, which is an awesome example to also take on, where is not in ‘need’ of a relationship, but sees the mutual benefit of it, he is not in ‘need’ of love because he lives that for himself, and yep to be honest I’m learning more about what it means to love oneself with actions, not just fluffy self-positive thinking. And! sure thing I’ve also been able to create an impact on the relationship he has with himself and his self-care too, so all in all, a very supportive and complementary process.

It is as simple as this: I would not have been able to be in this relationship if I had not worked with my own patterns and usual behaviors in relationships. This is STILL work to do of course, which is also cool when being with someone that has no past relationship history, so for him it’s a whole discovery process in itself that I’m quite happy and fortunate to be a part of.

And that’s how the story ends, where one moment of reacting to ‘character flaws’ and deciding to talk and open it up led to having a very supportive and vulnerable conversation that got me to realize ‘Oh fuck, I did it again!’ with being really inconsiderate of ‘where another is’ and ‘how they see things’ and imposing my own ‘change’ and even ‘my process’, instead of really considering the totality of who he is, the life he’s lived and get to also focus on the words, the actions, he has lived throughout the time we’ve been together.

I hope I didn’t spill too much honey here, hehe, but that’s what opens up within a relationship when transforming a moment of reaction, confronting it, opening it up, discussing, getting to understand each other and create a ‘new’ approach to things, which became another level of depth in the relationship.

 

Ok thanks for reading! And if you want to read a very supportive chat I had with fellow Destonians about this situation I share about here, read this chat transcript: Being in a High Horse: Becoming Aware of It and Looking at Corrections however you’ll have to sign-up to destonians.com to be able to do so, which I recommend because there’s no other group in the world where we dare to be that vulnerable in sharing the ways that we are being challenged and how to support each other to face ourselves and create the best version of ourselves. We always learn from each other.

 

 

 

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524. Redefining Routine

Or The Gift of Responsibilities and Discipline on a day to day basis as a point of stability and consistency in my life

What I’ve discovered more and more through this process is how once that one decides to walk through an experience and does all the necessary work to see behind the ‘veil’ of such experience, what one will finds is oneself, the potential that we have to be in fact ‘here’, directive, content, grounded, stable and embracing the walk of life even during seemingly difficult or tough times.

What I looked at today was the benefit of having responsibilities and getting to fulfill as a point of stability in my life which I am in fact grateful for, as well as self-discipline that can be applied to taking on responsibilities and fulfilling them – but I also see discipline more in the context where one doesn’t ‘have to do something’ as an obligation, requirement or commitment with a second party, but discipline in things that we decide to do for ourselves, for the benefit, enjoyment and self-expansion of it.

An example can be how I know that it sucks whenever I over sleep and I’ve ‘squandered’ some 1 or 2 hours in sleeping over the usual time, which has happened after going through somewhat emotionally charged days or extensive physical work which doesn’t really happen in my life currently but has in the past. I generally dislike that experience and as much as I’ve stopped being moody about it, it’s one of those things where one simply didn’t get to use that time of the day for what was planned because of ‘oversleeping.’

So, a simple point for me can be to be diligent in waking up, sometimes reminding me of how I dislike the experience of missing out those hours of the day, sometimes because I enjoy waking up before the sun rises and I enjoy going out for a jog during the dawn and enjoying that there are not too many cars, that there’s not a scorching sun upon me and that there’s the chilliness of morning times, which is a constant here no matter what season we’re in. I discovered I genuinely enjoy doing this because I get to go to the park and be in such an environment even if for only half an hour a day and then I come back and feel content with myself, satisfied that I was able to wake up and direct myself to do that and can continue with my day which I also like to see as this continuation of activities – from one to the other, to the next – and sometimes fitting them like a puzzle according to the day, the plans that I have and making it work, which usually works but sometimes there are things that come out of nowhere and I also have to learn to be more flexible on that and not lose ‘track’ of myself that way, which I still have to work on.

So, in a way I am finding how doing seemingly ‘simple’ things as part of my day are quite grounding, supportive and a point of stability in my life – to me schedules work as an integral part of who I am in my day, I plan instinctively but in the sense of fitting things in certain timeframes and according to the set-times for certain meetings – and I am the only one that would be causing myself an ‘overload’ or delay of something if I don’t simply direct myself to do it as it is required. Of course procrastination is still something I have to work on, especially in doing things that I believe they have no ‘value’ for myself, which I will be working on fairly soon as well and challenging such rigidity in myself.

I personally enjoy going out for long walks when it’s windy and sunset time and I don’t know what it is but there’s nothing that is more enjoyable to me than that, it’s just feeling the wind and walking and if I’m listening to music it creates a complement where I get to enjoy the moment for and as myself. Same if I decide to go to the movies and watch a movie that I can reflect on for myself or enjoy for the visuals of it – I’m more allowing that to myself after having lived some years of almost no movies. I truly was living a little bit like a monk, which was ok to test out my relationship with things like music and entertainment, but lately I’ve been reincorporating more of this in my life because it is part of the things I can enjoy for myself and that I can do within my current life situation.

Of course all of this integrated with the rest of my day to day responsibilities and routines that I have to say in my case, have been a point of stability, of consistency that becomes more than just a ‘doing’ or ‘getting something done,’ but more of a way in which I am able to now approach a ‘routine’ not with the eyes that I used to before in the sense of going ‘oh no, not again the same, sameness, same old, ah, I need change, need a break’ or any of that –

interestingly enough, by now if I had repeated that kind of reactions every single day, today I was actually reflecting in how even the simple movement of coming to the computer and turning it on by now would have been something I would be physically rejecting or reacting to do, if I had continued to build reactions towards my every day, including daily self-care tasks which yes I had a time where I was reacting to the very fact of having to go to the toilet or having to eat, having to do all of these things on a daily basis. It may sound strange to some, but if you can relate to it: been there, done that and I had to stop my reactions, realize I am the only one creating them and instead embrace physicality, embracing the physical routine because that’s quite a certainty of our lives, day followed by night completing a day and ‘repeat’ the next day – that’s also a point of stability in fact, and I’ve learned to see it as such rather than ‘predictable’ and ‘boring’ or whatever else.

So what changed? Certainly not the length of day and night or any of that, but myself, entirely deciding to live my day to day in a way where I can be stable throughout it all, no matter how many times I will ‘rinse and repeat’ the same thing, because I stopped projecting ‘the future’ and my life based on the amount of days I believe I will be doing the same (or the amount of years I will get to live, because who knows! We don’t even have the next breath assured, really) but instead have actually learned to live a day and giving it what I am capable of in that one day, dare I say I am not yet in that ‘fullest potential’ for sure, and that’s what I’ll continue working on.

This also comes back to something that I decided to live on from when I was in junior high school and I read somewhere a quote along the lines of never losing the ability to be astounded – but I saw it not so much in terms of the ability to react in wonder or amazement or a ‘high’ experience of sorts, but simply in being able to rediscover oneself every day, by developing self-awareness. I’ve heard so many people say that they get bored, and I used to as well, but since I got to be aware of this process, there hasn’t been a day I have defined as ‘boring’ because there’s always something to do, we  simply got more than enough to ‘do’ with getting to really know ourselves and ‘debunking’ where our lies hide and getting real and honest with ourselves to change all of that which we dislike in ourselves, what we know will harm us and eventually destroy us or sabotage us.

I understand that initially it may seem – and I repeat SEEM, because it’s always an experience, therefore it’s only energy – as if it was difficult to get to a point of clarity in relation to something, to even wake up with a ‘clear’ experience to start your day, your ‘routine’, but all I can say is hold on to yourself and stick to the wheel, keep driving and navigating yourself through the seemingly stormy weather, it too shall pass and if you don’t give up or recoil back to fear during a storm, you will get to see the skies clear up and you’ll see yourself remaining standing. And that is something I can call a genuine strength, a perseverance and consistency, a result of discipline, clarity and stopping participation in reactions to our ‘day to day’ living – we decide which words define us – I personally prefer to keep cultivating discipline, consistency, perseverance and dedication rather than any other emotional outburst that I know will only drop me back to ‘square one’ in whichever development I am attempting to create in my life.

A last pointer here, to not get lost in the experience, but to get active and ‘on track’ on a day to day basis, this is the best gift we can give to ourselves on a daily basis, to dignify our lives with the responsibilities we have, with the care that we can give us because the moment we go into an experience about doing these basic things in our life related to physical care and work, responsibilities, relationships or anything that we know we have to face day by day, we are only preparing a road full of reactions and endless sources of Inner-conflict – because it’s not about ‘the world, the people, the relationships or the tasks’, never – it’s all about who we decide to be in relation to it all.

I suggest to rather consider or ‘keep in mind’ the potential that is right here as ourselves, in our very physical body that is being powered breath by breath – if we simply decide to do it, to move through the storm and stick to moving ourselves by living principles, continuing to clear ourselves up with writing, self-forgiveness and laying out corrective applications, then we will see the benefits of this process and understand what I mean here.

All I can say is: this works, if we make it work – it’s up to each one of us to tap into such life and consistency that is always here as ourselves if we decide to live as it and stopping getting ‘lost’ in the experiences towards a self-created doom.  

I decide to see every day as one more chance/opportunity to live, to learn, to expand, to explore myself, to re-discover myself, to challenge myself – yet keeping it simple – Simplicity is the key, as B would say

Thanks for reading

 

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521. The Invaluable Benefits of Self-Writing

Or how journaling and blogging have saved myself from my selective-memory deciding ‘who I was’ at a point in my life and instead, look back and see the reality of myself in my own words.

I was quite amazed last night when reading some older readings in my personal journal and be able to see with my own words and handwriting the reality of myself in past months.

I started writing for myself around the year 2000, I found it cool to keep a record of my every day, lol whether it was only describing what I had watched on TV or the new music I was into, the books I had read, the friends I would meet online… at the time, keeping a ‘record’ of myself throughout those teenage years became a way to describe some of my ‘growing pains’ and a lot of emotional personalities that I actually remember ‘solidifying’ and ‘fueling’ through my own writings – and surely that’s not the way to go through writing in the context of self-support as I do it now, but! I will apply what I wrote some blogs ago to not go into my own intellectual arrogance and dismiss all of those writings, because one good thing I did create for myself as a habit is that of self-writing and enjoying writing for myself, which yes over the years has transformed into this self-support tool that I very much have established as a foundation to create myself, to see myself and from there integrate self-honesty and self-creation into my day to day living.

When I started writing in 2008 with a new approach – which is within the context of this process of self-honesty, self-forgiveness and pushing to see the truth of myself – I found it was comfortable to do this in my personal journal and initially publishing it in these blogs as well at the very beginning but, lol, I also got to understand that self-honesty is not about ‘exposing’ oneself to others, but exposing myself to myself, first and foremost. Therefore even if throughout the years I have kept this blog as a more of a public record of things that I work with in my life, I also have had actual journals at the same time, a series of notebooks that I’ve been keeping throughout the years and it’s always kind of amusing to randomly open them up and see ‘where I was at’ 3, 6, 8, 15 years ago or! Where I was a couple of months ago, aha!

And that’s what I was reading last night at and I found something very revealing about how I – and probably we all in our minds – function when it comes to our memories and creation a notion of ‘where we are’ and ‘how we really are doing’ deep within ourselves.

So in this journal I was reading back on pages written 5, 3 and two months ago in a random manner and I discovered that I had created a sort of ‘ideal’ vision in my mind of ‘how I had been doing’ in those months and how I had been experiencing myself all of that time – painting it in a relatively nice manner so to speak, mostly handpicking ‘good times’ and ‘favorable moments’ where it’s as if in my mind, if someone had asked me yesterday before I actually went and read my journal ‘how I had been in the past months within myself?’ I would have said, “well, quite fine, all fine just going through some events and situations that shook my reality recently, but overall was quite well before that.’ 

That’s an example of how in our minds we like to stick to a minimized, very synthesized version of ourselves where we don’t actually see the truth, the nitty-gritty details of our experience as in who we have really been in those moments where we are alone with ourselves – devoid of nice words to describe it better than it actually was. Now, when I started reading through these pages I noticed that I was describing doubts, questioning my decisions, ‘sucking in’ some experiences as in suppressing actual things that I was noticing and that I was being too hopeful that would change in time, or where I describe how I had not been doing like physically well because of being drained by particular emotional experiences in me – losing ‘my footing’ at times and giving a hope to the next day getting better and that kind of stuff.

So it reminded me a lot to something I got to be aware of 10 years ago where I went through a year of really being ‘out of myself’ completely, there was like a veil upon all of that time where the distinction of days was like completely blurred and I was on a literal high of focusing too much on ‘who I wanted to be’ as an artist and completely losing ground in who I was becoming in the whole process. Back then in 2007 I wasn’t aware of this process yet and I was about to ‘step deep into the rabbit hole’ when I found Desteni in January of 2008, that’s when I literally saved myself with it, but that’s another story I’ve shared before.

Fortunately, the only way I have a recollection of what really went on within myself at the time were those journals where I would get deep into my own depressive and emotional ‘nature’ back then even though if someone would ask me how I was doing at the time I would have defined those years when I got into art school as ‘a really good year in my life, best times and all’. But the truth of myself through my own words and laying out all of my emotional turmoil, I was quite a mess to be honest. I was quite confused, accepting and allowing shitty situations for myself, being constantly seeking ‘something’ superior to myself, being very depressed, not being in the right company, being so out of my own two feet, holding friendships that at the time were mostly enhancing my own delusions and in essence I consider I would not recognize myself as in ‘who I was then’ to where I am now, but hey I am actually able to live to tell this and honor my decision to support myself.

The point here is though how in my ‘selective memory’ I had defined such years as ‘great times, fun times, expressive times’ – but, when reading the truth of myself in those journals where I made it a point to be real with myself, to lay everything ‘as is’ no matter what, I was able to remember how I really felt through it all and how it wasn’t at all a ‘fun time’ except for a few moments ‘with other people’ or in certain relationships or experiences with others, of which of course throughout the years I’ve also learned to see the ‘good things’ I could learn from others and integrate into my life, not all was ‘plain bad’ because it had to do mostly with how I was emotionally doing within myself at the time. The truth of myself is that I was an emotional mess and that writing  my woes and hopes out didn’t do much but at times reinforce those ideas of myself only, which is quite a world apart from how I use writing nowadays.

I also find it interesting that it was that time when people considered I was the most creative and expressive, and seemed quite successful in what I was doing at the eyes of others – but I definitely do know it was quite a ‘show’ for others in my pursuit of happiness, while the truth of my experience was a completely different story, which demonstrates how I was mostly ‘giving a show’ to others to hide from the truth of myself, painting a picture of success, dreaming big and hoping for the best but within myself, there were a lot of fears and discomforts and general self-abuse going on at various levels in my life.

 

So with this, I want to share how in these journals that I’ve kept throughout the years, I’ve made them my personal spot and space where I write for myself only – no one else – and that very private self-writing has enabled me to not censor myself, to keep ‘track’ of myself in a way that I by now know my limited memory would not enable me to recall the detail of all of those actual challenging experiences in me, the discomforts, the ‘down’ times, the doubts, the fears, the desires, the questionings in my decisions, how I truly observe situations in my life, how they impacted me in a nutshell, how I truly experienced myself in relationship to others and so forth and that’s been very cool and a supportive point for me to not only ‘keep track’ of myself, but also integrating it in my day to day life as the habit of ‘writing myself.’

And one pointer here is that they are not these super long entries like I sometimes do here lol, I might do at times some 5 minutes of writing and get to register some  ‘daily essentials’ to look at, which is from where a lot of the points that I then share in blogs open up. Sometimes I am able to open up a point ‘in a blog’ here, but sometimes I first have to get ‘deep into seeing within me’ within that journal, and that’s also cool how I have my own ‘spot’ that is quite physical and has my handwriting, very personal I’d say and that’s something I’d definitely suggest to try out.

It’s the development of that self-intimacy in my writing that I’ve come to savor and enjoy as well, because I’ve been able to debunk my own ‘lies’ within my selective memory of ‘how I was’ in a particular time in my life and where I tend to paint it all ‘better’ than it actually was – yet when reading those entries, it’s quite surprising even to myself when I get to see the truth or reality of me in a particular time or moment and then get self-honest about what I need to change, what I need to do in order to genuinely be standing, be clear within myself, which is the actual process and challenge that I continue to place myself in and walk in this lifetime.

And here it’s not like I’ve been super consistent with writing throughout these ‘17’ years of notebooks. I have definitely forgotten about it for months at a time, resulting in complete ‘blackouts’ of where I was at the time and usually yes, I can see I might have been too focused ‘in a relationship’ for example or in a complete new environment where I kind of ‘forgot’ about myself – all my decisions of course, but it also becomes a point of regret in terms of stopping that self-communication for ‘whatever reason’ I formulated for myself, an excuse really because over these past months and keeping a more consistent writing for myself both in these blogs and my personal journal, I’ve been able to debunk perceptions about myself, my life, my experience even from two months ago (!) lol, I truly was amazed at myself at how I wasn’t seeing the whole picture of me when thinking that ‘I was just fine and all alright’ – when it is in fact not so.

What are the gifts from writing myself unconditionally and in an uncensored manner? I’ve developed an enjoyment of ‘getting to know myself,’ seeing myself, recognizing what kind of experiences I had throughout the day and at the same time, it’s made it easier over time to be true to myself, to be honest and give that step into self-honesty, to actually make decisions of where and how I am going to create a point of change in my life, or where I require to stand up – as well as recognizing where I am genuinely enjoying something, changing at something, owning my creation.

It also becomes very clear where in my journal I am kind of kidding myself or hiding from sharing ‘the real truth’ which is kind of interesting because it would be ‘me hiding from myself’ which I know what happens afterward, there’s a ‘lag’ of suppressions that I eventually have to take out of the laundry bag to do some washing, lol. It’s all there, it’s all me and I am the only one that can push myself to  ‘get real’ with myself in those writings, which is something I’d recommend anyone doing if your thing is not yet to ‘publish blogs’ for the world to see, but you still want to write for yourself.

Get yourself a notebook or even build your own – I buy my journals from colleagues that make them and sell them, so they’re ‘handmade’ and custom – and get to taste the enjoyment of sharing yourself to yourself, seriously! I could not believe my eyes today when I read someone at the Desteni Forum saying they had not written out their thoughts in like 10 years (!!!) I probably would not be here sharing these blogs if I had not continued to write myself, to support myself through writing and learning how to do that with the tools at Desteni and the Desteni I Process, best gift ever for anyone that is serious about living life and supporting oneself to change themselves and so the world, taking one’s life in one’s own hands and directing it to a best for all outcome.

If you want to start online and doing it bit by bit, there’s also the DIP Lite Course, designed specially to get to integrate the habit of writing as part of your day to day living.

Now this is the benefit of this process, it’s something you can do for the rest of your life, by yourself, and even if or when you cannot write for whatever reason, you can still sound yourself, you can speak to yourself in a directive manner which I also enjoy doing these days, having conversations with me where I dig deeper into myself, look at things within myself, lol get real with myself – but the ‘down-side’ is that there are no records of that and it’s prone to be forgotten an hour later, so that’s where the documenting of all of this process through writing or vlogging comes to be so valuable and I’m thankful to myself that I have continued to do so even after those long ‘halts’ and losing track of this basic and most valuable self-support: writing, writing yourself to freedom.

Do it! Test it out! I don’t ask for much, just write with intent and starting point to get real with yourself, see what you find out, get intimate with you, this is also a very cool step into developing a relationship with yourself, which wrongly many times we go seeking ‘out there’ and forgetting we’re always here with ourselves first.

 

Enjoy : )

 

 

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