Contrast

He called me, asked me to babysit at his house. What a difference a day makes. I felt different this time being in proximity of him. I felt some resentment. He called me because he needed me. He has always relied on me in some way. Yet, he was also so capable of going to court when he and I could have talked and agreed on things regarding our child instead. I feel hurt, angry and betrayed. I feel as though I was never given any regard. I never got to explain the petty disagreements that he penned so fixedly in his documents...where I felt so ganged up on by everyone in the court, including my lame duck lawyers. I have to get past it, have to move forward. Perhaps, this is all good. When the scales are off, I cannot see the very thing that I was thinking before, about anything being resolved in the end. The only resolution is my own, for myself. The thing is, that is enough. I am feeling better and better every day with the things that I set out to do for me. I can see my way forward, and the things I have to do are getting me all very excited. I wrote about my lack of grieving awhile back. I think that I grieve now in increments. I sit with my overwhelming feelings about my past and the love I gave and felt, and I allow myself to feel my heart lurch. I give myself over to its inky sadness. But I can also detach and look at it without it consuming me. That took time to build within me. I think today, I need to realize that feeling the things that I feel are only natural. Who could walk into a house that could have been ones home and not feel something? Who could not pursue a relationship with a multi millionaire and not feel concerned about the possibility that here was another man trying to control me? Or the myriad other things that have made me feel so out of sorts and out of character, and wrong, and wishful, and hurt and hopeful. What I know for sure is that every day, I get up and I push towards what makes me the best that I can be...and I strain myself more by not being satisfied with just one or two answers. I get so many hunches,thoughts running through me, desires to see certain things come to pass. Today I must slow down and honor that in myself. I am still here. I am still planning, and making, and supposing and putting together things. I am still here. I am still here. I didn't disappear.

On a night like this...

I am in a quandary tonight. I am thinking of my ex husband again. I am remembering things from the past that make me smile. The more I think well of him, the more good thoughts flood out the bad. That's a good thing. Except, now I feel very sentimental about it all, and I am worried that now my heart is open when his has seemed to only be closed. In all of these difficult years, he has not once shown me that he can crack or bend toward me except to hurl unkindness. So why am I doing this to myself? Am I some sort of masochist? Why am I still so in need of making him like me again? I like to think and to say that we were once at least friends. We wrote to each other so much. We spoke on the phone constantly...he was the center of my world. Perhaps I am remembering all of this because it is important to remember how lovely love is. I go back and forth so much with my feelings, and it's funny because all of my thoughts about my feelings are anchored onto things that just do not happen. For example...I may suddenly in the middle of writing this, think of frequent flyer and wonder whether he is ok...and then feel torn between thinking that and thinking about my ex husband, when really, neither person is anywhere near me at this moment. They have no say in my life...I am just summoning thoughts. I am trying on emotions...I am muddying my intentions...my energy...because I am missing intimacy. I miss him. I should grieve his loss. Just grieve and get through. But then, I miss everything. I miss all the could have been then...everyone who could have been. But him most of all, because he was important for so long. ...... I wish I knew what I was saying. Somewhere in that muddle lies my intention. I suppose that I am desperately trying to find whether I have any real vantage point from which to act. I have these rogue feelings that I am trying to make sense of. But everything is a phantom because none of it has yielded any prospects. None of it, and I do not have any inkling of anyone new on the horizon to set all of this straight, and nothing seems to be moving to give me any hint of a direction and I feel damn stuck and frustrated...because my feelings are not going away. ........ So, let me try again.mwhat do I feel? An awareness of the beauty of real love with another person...the missing of a shared, adult life. ......... I miss my best friend. .......... Gosh.

Mirror,mirror,mirror

Tonight I did a quick read of this blog over the years. Of course I did not read everything,but I read enough. I did so because I was looking for some patterns of behavior on my part. I did not really see that, instead, I got the message of mirroring. I mentioned it a few times in my entries. But there was something that I did not see until now. If it is always you...then being upset with anyone is absurd. You are always creating a scenario that you created and plan to participate in. The question you should be constantly asking yourself is whether this story you tell yourself in this moment is about enlightenment or sabotage? Are you seeking drama? Tragedy? Thrills? What are you setting up now? Food for thought INDEED.

A lot of thinking

Ok, so this week I had some curve balls. It began with a message from Frequent Flyer. ( Yes, I am back to those nicknames again) This had been the end to a week where my ex husband and I had the longest conversation in years. I realize that to get anywhere with him, I have to do whatever I can, incrementally. What shall I achieve? I expect, what I have always wanted to achieve, which is to be able to communicate well with each other, and to make our future more secure, because, so far, all he has managed to do, is to financially frustrate. A very selfish move to achieve whatever he felt was worth what he wanted. But,I continue to even work on not being bitter and angry. I just have to forgive it and move on. It is the wisest course of action. So,I got this unexpected correspondence,and hesitated about my reply, but I sent it on, and then he called me. I was not far off the hunch I had of what he has been soldering through. I had an inkling when we last spoke face to face. This week really got me to a place where some feelings came to the fore that I am still thinking about. You can hold to certain feelings and acts for a very long time. A lot of it is habit. It feels really weird to backtrack on the known. It reminds you how very fallible you are. With my ex,I felt nothing but the shadow of our past together looming squarely from my person. There was also a lethargy. You fight so long, that you feel that everything is stacked against you and you have to think of a deeper, cleaner strategy. One based on revenge certainly isn't worth it. What you want to experience and what is actually happening. So, you use your thoughts, your energies to yet again put forth the strongest and best thoughts....and you just have to wait and see.

Yet again, I had left this page open for easy access and then lost it. I tried to get back to it with poor en tonight I just tried again and got in. Thank goodness. Tonight I feel quite mellow. I have been focusing on my projects and making some headway, and I am very grateful for that. We have had a change of government and my mum has lost an old friend, one I knew my whole life. While my Auntie's husband lost his brother. It has been a very eventful time since my last post. The time has indeed flown. My nieces were here and our cousin from London surprised us and was also here for three weeks. I had been feeling as though I needed a holiday after everything that we went through. Now that I am writing again, I still feel that a holiday for myself is in order.

Excetera.... My ex sent me a long message tonight.it was so bizarre. He actually thought that what he was writing to me was a kindness. But what he never takes stock of, is his arrogance. I needed a few moments before I responded, as I never reply to email that is orchestrated to get an emotional response. I don't know what to make of him? His words were a thinly veiled insult and more so, a mishmash of sincerity, hubris and disdain. He as usual, did not think through that message. You write a long missive, making seem as though you care, but you really don't and yet, you write as though you do for some fucked up reason only known to you. Laughable if it were not so tragic. What a waste of time. I long for the day when he stops in his tracks and feels really stupid for the way he has acted. Gosh! If only!

WTF

Ok, so I have been a hypocrit before. But jeez, I am now officially a sexaholic. Ok, not really, but,I kinda feel like it. Frequent Flyer and I had a torrid conversation the other night. It started out so innocently too. Then all of a sudden, he's probing and I am poking his probing and blam, it's on. It didn't go that far, but the point is that it was both delicious and comfortable. The good thing here though is that I am armed with history, so I think that I can be mindful about this. I need to be vigilant though,

Stop picking

I fell out with The Towers about two months ago. Every time I think about him, part of me wants to patch up the situation. But another part does not want to. That part finds that I have tried hard enough on every type of relationship possible with the man, and we are just not compatible. I have a bad tendency to go over something in my head, as though I need some other type of closure from him. But what sort of closure could I possibly want? This last falling out had to do with him clearly trying to make some sort of demands on me. I felt quite adamant that I was not allowing anyone, any man in particular to ever try to feel that he owned me in any way! So his words just made me feel revulsion. I do not want to apologize. What I do know is that I need to continue to do my work and my projects. I spoke with my sister about doing some business together, and that excites me. The fact that my mind likes to go over beaten down paths and trod ground , I shall just have to view it the way one looks at a scar or a cut.

Wants, wants and needs

My child wanted to hang out with her cousin, so I let her, although it's a school night. I think that bonding is important. When she is a teenager, she will be close to that cousin when she might feel that she cannot talk to me. Life flies by. Each decade brings with it so many variables. Yet one must endeavor to embrace it all. Two people I know have already achieved their goals for the year. I was thinking about my own bucket list. I don't even remember some of the things I set out to do. I love lists, but now, I hesitate. I have made so many over the years....I shall indulge myself nonetheless. . . . . . 1. A week at a Caribbean hotel where massage, sauna and hot tub are available. 2. A catamaran adventure for ten days to The Grenadines. 3. Naked swimming. 4. Beach house with private chef. 5. Fresh flowers all over the house. 6. Two weeks of nothing but the healthiest meals and drinks possible...with yoga and meditative music and great company. 7. No financial concerns to think about. 8. A dinner on the beach with friends with a fresh catch of fish and great wine. 9. An indoor swing and daybed swing with lots of comfy pillows. 10. A bath under a natural waterfall. 11. Lazy, beautiful days without a care in the world. 12. Excellent companionship. 13. Lots of laughs and exceptional conversations. 14. Beautiful crafted items designed just for me. 15. I am a muse to many. 16. My own signature fragrance. 17. My style...distinctive, elegant, sensual, playful and always impeccable. 18. Beautiful books, journals, art, furniture, Crystal, linens... 19. Travel, travel, travel 20. All of this happening.

The centre is the heart

More and more I am aware, the way one is conscious of a heavy weight, of the power of thoughts on reality. A friend of mine and I had said for years that we were trying to actually see how energies work. It is so funny, you wonder about a thing and one day, it is clear as day. It even sounds odd to state, for surely energies are most obvious. But that is actually not as clear as all of that theoretical knowledge. A reason for God becomes apparent when one tries to hold all of these subtle bodies in the mind. There is the behavior you do not even realize you are internalizing from your family. The is who you think you are. There is the society around you. You are an onion, multi-layered. .................................................... Everything is sound and distraction. I have wondered about past people's, how did they make sense of their world, but I am just the same. Sense is all relative. Thought passes so slowly in the greater scheme of things. What do we actually know? How long will we live? Is our very planet the cause of all that kills us eventually? Have we humans made up everything we know? .................................................... I think that Buddhism is very helpful in this present world. What is the point of worrying about anything? .................................................... Every doubt has been felt, every question has been answered. What is known is that nothing is known. Lol. We are probably both puppet and master at once.

Everyone isn't ready

My experience begs the question of readiness. I was speaking with my sister, and a friend of hers, and I was taken by how much we put out into the man/woman relationship dynamic, and how much is mis-interpreted or just ends up being screwy. For me though,I am minding my own business, and now focusing on enjoying building my best self. The right person will come into my life in good time. I have been so lucky. I have known love so well. I know real from fake. If someone likes you, they call....they ACT on liking you. They make the effort. In fact, what effort? They want to give of themself. it is that simple. There is no need for excuses, half truths and challenges. That does not exist when real feelings are in play. Real love does not feel that lying, false representation, fear of the others opinion and doubt have to be in the mix, so you cannot be yourself. Corinthians is correct about love. I have no reason to second guess myself when I do not feel something that I am supposed to feel. I cannot feel something that just is not there. I really like that I am finally hearing myself again. There was a time when I was so bereft, so forlorn that I felt that it was impossible to even peel back one thin layer of who I had become to please and pas sift others. I remember that I had been reading some magazine and a question came up and I could not answer how I really felt or wanted. It was as though I had a big physical block...and I certainly did at the time. I could recite the things that I arbitrarily wrote as lists. But real questions like what do I need to be happy right now? Now that sort of thing seemed hard to answer. It took time to get that out of me. I compromised so much.Now I know that I have grown tremendously.

What a difference

Where do I even begin? Finally Frequent Flyer and I met. I believe that the last time that we saw each other in person was about two years ago. What a difference time can make when one has to come to terms about feelings. I can state categorically that I have transitioned from what it had meant to me. I will always care about him. But this visit showed me how far I have come. Even my stating here that I will always care, does not feel the way I have usually said it about someone I have an emotional attachment to. I say this, this time in a pragmatic way. My dear friend is behaving in a very similar way to my ex. Not only women carry around a huge measure of the martyr complex. His suffering is as plain as day and I do not know whether he can last a week, month or ten more years! But that is HIS choice. I no longer see myself as having any part of that choice of his. I really do appreciate it as well, because, as happens when you learn something important. I cannot fathom now how I could ever have even believed that it could ever be more? Of that, I am truly grateful. He made promises that he could never have kept and I am so grateful that I acted as I have all these years!

Reading over some of my old entries,one of the things that stands out is what I remember against what I wrote, and in hindsight, some of my writing over the years is based so much on strong feelings I held. I came to this space to make sense of my relationships. Today, I have come a long way from that. I also saw how I made certain decisions and saw them through, or took a bit of time to see them through. It felt good reading them tonight,as I now realize that although I write so much, I do hold on to many of my feelings, making really tough judgements on my character, although I may not show it. But it is there, and I know that it does not just happen to me. It is a pattern of behavior that we all deal with. I think that I shall start writing yadda, yadda when I know that I am holding forth in a very pretentious way that I do instead of focusing on my real feelings. In my readings,I was quite surprised that for once I was not blaming myself for some of my choices, but actually just realizing that the choices produced the outcomes they did because they worked that way based on what was known at the time...the typical, when you know more, you can act according to that new knowledge. Only one yadda here... Not being judgy as I wrote was so good for me. I embraced my history.

Introspection

Some things can only be learned in the moment. At court yesterday I realized that I was focusing on so many small details over the years, and that the law really does not care about any of that.i have never really been given any sound representation from my lawyers. It has taken looking at television court shows that have provided me with real guidance. I know that all of that sounds pretty strange. So, what have they been doing all of these years? I have been in reaction mode. He has always sent me an affidavit. Ill ways have been reacting to what he has written. When you know more, you can act accordingly.

Now it's said, let me now reach for what is mine. First of all, I must know that I am just as deserving as everyone else I convince deserve the best. My list has been written a long time ago, and I know that it is reasonable, do-able and non evasive to others and no less than what all people want as a matter of course. Yadda,yadda,yadda. Now, to get out of my own way. ..................... First of all, confront fear. It isn't real when you want to move forward and break down walls that always freeze you. The point is to go forward...press forward, know that mistakes will be made.

I have been so focused on things outside my own abilities as somehow superior, that until I started reading the first line of a short story, I remembered that I can look at things according to my own history. I have had so many business plans. Some never get further than paper. But all of them get mental vetting. So, at the beginning of this story, I thought about my dear friend, the one who started his own business and has a staff of five in a lovely area. He also has a wonderful boyfriend whose job is equally fabulous. That reminded me of my own love.It now seems like I have to think way, way back to recall all of that, but I definitely had that. All of that is so lovely and so wonderful. I have had challenges with what I want. I am so pesky with myself, I can only imagine how much I frustrate others. So,anyway,I have gone back and forth about what I can do...always feeling great doubt about my abilities. But yet, equally, I have done things. But my criticism has always been, choose, come on, choose and stick to it. I have stuck to many things, but I have also kept asking, what do I want? What do I believe in? I am all over the place...but I understand why. I am just all,over the place because I do that when I really want to write about the things that made me feel wonderful,but I am nervous about it. The very thing that will make me happy, I fear because it always has felt to me like shoe dropping.So,I have to stop being so anxious of my own life. .........there is so much in the mutual attraction and decision to be together. Then, you enjoy the future plans you make. It is just a great feeling...you feel good about your choices and it feels like an investment well chosen. So ...guess what, you do not realize it, but things are always for sale, and the ego, well, it has been in circulation from the moment you negotiate your first gratification.............. So here it is now. I say to myself and sometimes, not even to myself, I just acknowledge it with my eyes over magazine layouts. Perhaps, I hesitate as well,because it runs into responsibility that I have no idea about and worry that it shall still be a shoe drop. But I would just have to get over that. How silly is that? When I think about it, why fear joy because like life, things change when you least expect it? The point is that when life hurts, you need those good times to hold onto. Constant bad times is so very Catholic guilt! Lol. How is denying yourself joy helping one way or the other? This point must be flushed from the system at all cost! Wherever or whenever it was learned, it must be un-learned.

...and by the way...

The silly name I was trying to remember before was The Towers.mi had not written about him in ages! Then, tonight, after so long, Frequent Flyer and I had a long Skype chat. I took the opportunity to tell him point blank that I have deliberately avoided him for my own self preservation. He chose not to touch that, but he did eat up for what he sees as our friendship. What was good tonight was that I was speaking from my place of comfort for me, and what I think is best for myself as my priority. He may want to think whatever he is going to, including nothing at all. That is not my business.

Feelings

Something was challenging me. Again, it was associating with the NGO and trying to make a go of a better relationship with he whose name I cannot remember what I called him...lol. Anyway, I tried to rationalize so many things that I was feeling. He contacted me, he kept up an online relationship with me, and after searching my feelings, I felt that after we met, it might have made sense to see whether I could make a go at a relationship with him. After the first expereince, I found myself already conflicted about what it meant and it did not take me much more time to cut off any romantic beliefs about he and I. But my feelings were unsettled about having so much in common, and yet, having this one thing that was just not right. In my logic, I wanted to salvage something of it, and he wanted business as usual. To me that was easy to ignore, and a chance at friendship seemed fitting. Things were going well, and we even had a bit of fun, with me making it very clear. That real romance would not happen again. Then, one conversation got me to see a side of him that led me to conclude that yet again, I may have wanted to see what I wanted to see, and who he is, I do not really know, and when I state that,I mean yet again, he seems to create in me an awareness of what I refuse to tolerate, and I do not need to experience many things escalating to know what makes me comfortable and what will not work for me. So, I have to be thankful for that. He is a soulmate. To me, he sent mixed signals about an "us." Then, he reached out to me wanting to become a "true friend" I cannot help but look at myself as well. I have to know whether I attract " what I am" am I unable and unwilling to be a friend, a girlfriend, a business partner and now, unable to simply move past apology? All of that may be so, but it is also part of something more important to me. I as I wrote, am feeling many things, and I am taking the time now to get to know myself better, and this means acknowledging that my growth requires seeing sides that I have always kept at bay. To please others. I felt that that was the only way to be. I feel that I need to confront this now. ...................................................................... I claim in all that I write that I want romance, intimacy etc...yet, I have attracted the opposite. So clearly, I have to ask myself what is it that I cannot move past? Hurt is harder to move past than I thought. While life is going on, it is easy to mask hurts. I thought that I was somewhat healing. But acts actually prove whether that is so. I am hurting. Still...which means that I probably expect fairytale outcomes now...things to be over, things to be so much better that I could feel that I have moved past what felt like deep emotional blows. What do you do when you receive bruises? You wait for healing. I thought that by now I would be able to say that I have moved on. But romantically, I have not really been able to. I have punished myself in some way....and this comes from feeling completely rejected by someone I loved so completely. How could they just arbitrarily change their mind like that? How could they just switch off like that? Well, this was not new behavior, you know he used threats as leverage...and as love. This is not about me. This is about being the victim of a bully. That's all it was...and it hurts, STILL? What's bad with a bully as parent or lover, it fucks up your mind. That person is supposed to protect you, not cause you to have to protect yourself. The child in you needs to know that it is not your fault. ............................................................................................ How do you move forward? You just do. You want pretty normal things. You want to have your friendship, your honesty, love, commitment...obvious things, really. So, the bullies victim must build self worthiness. It is way more important to remember who came first for yourself.....TOU. ............................................................................................ Your mind tells you to trust again, and perhaps others let you down. They have their own demons. The petulant child wants a reward. Will I ever find love again? Did I ever even have it? ............................................................................................. I tire of doubt and pretense. I am tired. I have learned that some things are not complicated. They just aren't. So, with that known, getting over this, is one that I have to be consciously knowing I can achieve...and I must clue myself into the fact that I do. It have to expect remoteness to be my future.

I read somewhere once that the biggest cause of grief is comparing yourself to others. I understand that fully tonight. My child tells me, when I am trying all sorts of pep talk to get some sort of compliance from her that I am trying to change or criticize her, and I know that in a way, she is right. On so many levels, I feel that she is doing exactly what she needs to do to be who she is, and that I and so many others like me, stifle who she and her generation shall become by placing labels on what they will come to know as possible. But moreso tonight, the understanding is about me. I caught myself thinking about my ex and got into a monologue as I always do in my mind about a conversation I would like to have with him, if only we could get along. Last week I did very well. I concluded that I have to accept that he would treat anyone else as he treats me and that I am nothing special in the bad treatment department, it is who he is. Now, I can add to that and say that, here I go again, being chained up by the belief that things MUST have some sort of order or pattern to work, and that is simply putting myself into another habit that will lead to frustration. There is nothing wrong with ambition, challenging yourself etc....but this is not about that. This is about wanting to control something that there is no way to do. I have felt soooooooooooo many leagues better since I just finally put down the gigantic weight of feeling that everything my ex did somehow was a stain on me, and my character was somehow impugned. He is really worse than voodoo, because I have let his words determine my progress. I woke up a few days ago resolute in the knowledge that this birthday coming soon,and right now, and every now, is an opportunity to start following the very BEST me, all of the time. Listen to my own plans and dreams, hopes and expectations in the knowledge firm knowledge that I will succeed because there is nothing else but success that I see.

How it goes

Sometimes I think that too much is going on for me to ever see my life from a better place. The more I try, the more things challenge my best intentions. Now written, I feel a bit better for having stated that. It does not feel as challenging. What it is, is the overwhelming sense that I get sometimes that nothing is giving in my life. There sometimes feels like there is no corner for adult joys. There is nothing that I am doing for myself that sets a moment apart where I am induging myself in something just for me. Lately I have been going back and forth on my feelings for my ex- husband. I lament from time to time. It isn't that unusual, after all, I was with him for two decades. I sometimes feel tired, wary, hurt still! Still reeling from how much more effort he seems to put into disliking me than he'd ever put into liking me. But that is a bit of an illusion. He has done this to both of his parents as well,so I am actually in an elite club. I miss him sometimes. And by miss, I mean the person that got me to love them. I miss that guy. Our child does not know that guy, I don't think. He only projects some of that person to her. Again, it makes me feel wary to think about that. I need distance from these feelings....but I wanted to at least not this down.

I have decided to love my life no matter what. I have decided to accept myself. I embrace life. I give thanks for every moment. I am grateful. I will look at life with the knowing that I am moving forward as I should. That all perceived obstacles are there for my best experience. The sooner I know this, the better I am not here to hold on to bitterness and pain, even when I feel it as the only emotion. I am here to make much more use of my mind. I am here to go beyond the taught boundaries, societal boundaries. The only limit are the lists I put on myself. I have experienced so much that I am now here. I am now knowing that I have lead myself here.

Yesterday I practiced something I only use from time to time, and that is to allow a completely different outcome from my expectations of something to play out in my mind. I had quite a bit of fun. I imagined my ex husband as I would really like to see him. It felt really good. I used that a few years ago for someone I felt intimidated by. Their reputation was such that I would get awkward in their presence, and I would be doing something with them for over a year and had to break the feelings that came over me. It worked very well, and it was very freeing. It worked so well, that about a month into the stretch, I actually forgot that I used to feel the way I did. Of late I have been giving much thought to my attitude and all that I find I have spent my mind on, while everyone else has been having family lives. I feel as though I have been more unhappy than happy, although I know that that is not the truth. Everyone goes through difficult times. I am just most aware of mine. What I have to start doing in earnest is tracking my own goals and my happiness. My ex certainly got to me. I must admit it. We are connected by a thread of unpleasantness. I have not acknowledged it, but he seems to inadvertantly get me to join him when I am made to visit court or my lawyer. It has become trying and tedious and I must now watch very mindfully for my own wellbeing. This is why I am writing tonight. I have to start to look out for myself, or what would my life be?

Two in the morning

I have been dealt a blow, and I have to decide what shall happen next. My ex husband has caused so much damage, and keeps smelling like a rose. Yesterday I had to sit and watch someone take his side and tell me some unsubstantiated things against me, trying to couch them as blameless. It was so absurd. I feel as though women keep dealing me blows. The judge is a woman, his lawyer is a woman. This person is a woman, and none of these people seem to see him as I do, no matter how many emails I show them, or texts, or statements I make about his verbal abuse...it is as though I should see that behaviour as normal and stop harping on it. I did not plan to write, but the way I have been treated woke me straight out of my bed. I am unsettled. I want to be optimistic, but it seems that this bitter experience over-rides everything else. I shudder to think how people feel, who are mis-understood, mis-diagnosed and mis-handled in their cases, whether it be health, work or what I am going through.

So great

I have stated before that I make lists. I especially make lists about my plans,wants, stuff like that.I am so good at it that I even believed that they were reflections of what I thought of myself. The truth is that those lists were shallow. They did not go into me where it counted, but I never really saw this until I started asking more from the lists. An example of that is my list regarding what I am looking for in a partner in my life. Long ago, my list would say, very logically, an honest, caring, respectful, attractive man. Now, my list is nothing like that. My list now starts with a real friend. Someone who is willing and able and wanting to be in a committed relationship. Someone who is genuine about what he wants for himself and the person whom he wants to spend his time and life with. Someone who understands what friendship, partnership and love is all about. For this person to be in my life, he must really enjoy being with me. We should be for the other, the person that we want to be with, to spend time with, to laugh with and of course to be deeply attracted to and want to connect with. That makes sense to me. My views on my career has changed, everything has altered considerably actually. When I think of what sort of life I want now, I realize that it is not the way that it has been going. I was vague, unsure and unaware of the process of reaching for the dream. Or at least I told myself that. Some sort of learned helplessness. It all looked hard as hell, and guess what, only people who agreed seemed to be around me. There is always better in the world. There are always ways to get things done. One has to keep ones eye on the goal. It is that simple. Things can turn around in the blink of an eye. One moment life seems to be failing you and the next moment, you can be riding the wave of ultimate success. I was reminded this week that it is definately up to me to know that my life can be great, and I am so relieved.

Deja vu Le vu

Tonight I was listening to the radio and looking at an old movie on Netflix, Kate and Leopold to be exact, and these two things began to oddly take my mind back to my college years. Years when I was so in love with my boyfriend who would become my husband. I recalled the freshness of my thoughts back then. The unknown. I wondered about what I was going to do. I was not even certain that he and I would end up married, but I hoped for it, because of the way I felt. Tonight, for a moment, it was as though I could lift those emotions and run with them anew. In a way, I felt as though I were getting an introduction to myself. What would I do if I felt that sense of new horizon, without the burdens that I perceive now? ...................................... I would see before me the clues that I have left behind...that list I made this year of goals to fulfill. I would see that whatever would bring joy to my child is what I want to pursue. I would see that nothing really can hold me back And, I would see that the black hole of fear would close in behind me and disappear. ...................................... I would take a long look at myself and start plotting my steps. I would know that whatever I focus on, would multiply to the skies and be good. I would remember myself, and laugh out loud Because I had never left. I was cloaked behind all sorts of subtifuge...flotsam and jetsum. ...................................... I would awaken, and see the green, lush world, beyond all the noise and fear, anxiety and present world expectations. I would see my path having no present world eating into it, because I am not of it. And I would smile Because that is how it is supposed to be.

Also...

The realization now is that the first person to admire is the one behind my eyes.

Thank you

I am so over all of the people I obseessed about. When I think about it, it seems really embarrassing. But, it was how I felt for a good number of years. It defined how I viewed romance and even sex. It seemed so external, the person appeared to represent what romance was or could be. I have to acknowledge an indoctrination. I remember asking a friend what she thought about a boyfriend I had when we were in our early twenties. I remember her asking me why I saught her approval. At the time, I had a great come back answer, I stated that she had asked me the same,many that it was normal to want ones friends to like the boyfriend one picked because of all the time that would be spent with each other's friends. I am not writing this this morning to criticize myself, but to observe how dramatically some things change. My last encounter, I stopped it cold because I realised that I was following expectations that were not really mine exclusively, and the person could not be even remotely what I would ultimately want, even though so many things make us compatible.this is a major thing for me, because I had to confront the possibility that I was not moving forward because I might be still hung up on my ex-husband. I now know that what I was actually doing was growing closer to myself and my idea of intimacy, and in a way, I mean an intimacy with myself. The men all had something that captured my interest, of course. Now that I think about it, I believe that a large part of compatability lies in someone saying, me too, I like that too, or finishing your sentence or laughing at your jokes...those things make you feel a closeness and as though that person is so much like you...after all, they like the same things, but they are apart from you. That is where projecting starts. You are always looking for yourself within another person. When they click with you, you are projecting your most favorable traits. When they war with you, they are connecting your most challenged issues back to yourself...because it is always, always...YOU. You fall in love with your reflection. So in a way, everyone is homosexual. Lol. My neutrality on those people that I inprinted my affection onto, could have gone on forever, but it has ended because I have challenged it. I felt it's faulse facade, it's weakening walls,as it were. I think it became apparent when I chose to pull back my expectations and observe the people individually for themselves. Who was really pushing an ideology forward? Who was really trying to work on something lasting? No one! Not really. This was most acute with frequent flyer who made me feel that he was making a big step and then just stopped talking to me about it, and never saught to tell me anything. That one is really awful. There is a wonderful saying by Bob Marley about playing with a woman's feelings and then not really wanting the woman at all. It really did a number on my ego. But on closer observation, I have experienced a lot of that. Men who tell me all the right things, appeared to be part of my mirror, but really, they had no fortitude to save their lives. I asked myself for a long time, did I create that scenario? Was I sub-consciously sabotaging my good? I thought that I might have been? But that was only the tip of the proverbial iceberg. I was creating a pattern based on my own Mirror...a deeper archetype as it were. One where I set up an admiration, not the pedestal that I have to my ex-husband, but one none the less, because I held my breath and expected them to be beguiled,to want to form something more concrete with me, although I knew that somewhere down the line, they would not satisfy my real expectations. They wouldn't because the dynamic has always been as my child mentioned to me today... A superficial one..a gut reaction..an alleged chemistry. All of this needs to be looked at even more closely. Now that I know that I am no longer tethering myself to something that is so shallow, even though it lasted over a decade, I am now more interested in seeing what this breakthrough will do for me.

Revelation time

There have been a few regrets stewing inside me, that I have found it difficult to transcend. Tonight though, I think that I got a handle on one big one. I have felt that other peoples' lives are somehow a testament to better decisions than my own. I felt this acutely when my neighbor kept waxing philosophically about her ex in a way that practically sainted him. She went on and on about what good choices they made for their children, and what a great relationship they share now...it was a bit hard to take, when she has nothing good to say about my ex at all. Not that I hold her as a standard of virtue, or as someone who has made amazing choices...but I do not want to get side tracked...her opinion led me to think about the things that I believe I have not had the opportunity to experience because of the things that have happened in my own relationship. I feel as though I have lived with more misery than joy. But then, the turning point came for me when a series of small things occurred....sending a message to a few people on Facebook.looking at so many " friends" looking so glowingly happy with their significant other in heir costumes for Carnival, and my little one watching Superman and telling me that this is the new interest for them. It dawned on me that I have the liberty,and the power to make my life my own,on my own terms. It woun't look like other people's lives. But I can certainly fill it with love and anticipation, beauty and my idea of success. I almost laughed out loud. Of course. It was so easy to be dragged along by what the world insists is the way that things should go. But is that really the only way? Of course not.

Of late

Thinking on my mistakes is something I do often. Of late, I have been looking at people in the street, friends, acquaintances, and pictures online, on Facebook and elsewhere, questioning my own expectation for a good life. So what is a good life? It is a simple answer for me. It is a life where I am either doing everything I could possibly want to do and be financially secure. Or, if there is someone in my life, that that person is so in tuned with me that thinking on their issues make me feel that I am part of something that is also of value to me. I still feel a bit queezy to admit that companionship and love is something that matters a great deal to me. But enough of that, I am writing about ambition in this entry. It's time to focus on ambition in a way that I have not. I have of course had goals. But ambition...apart from my college dreams that I fulfilled, I do. Ot think that I have thought of myself from a position of superlatives that I want to tick off on a notepad. I have been so fed up, that it has become easy to say fuck it all. I must create and now, if I don't agree to it, I may as well be dead.

Triumph

It has been a long road, but this time, it is set off on with me feeling truely that what is up ahead is set up by me. For so very long, I looked at life from a place of pessimism. I did not intend it. But there it was. So I would make plans, make great, detailed lists. Always hopeful, but deep down, I would be Squamish, I would be doubting. It took as I said, a very long time to move beyond that. It took lots of reading spiritual books, articles and notes I have made over the years to get here. It took disappointments, it took having good things happen. It took my observations of what was going on in my life. Not just writing about it, but analyzing what I was feeling. It took many low feelings. It took grief. It took pains of all types. It also took great anger, despair and need for rest. I am so happy to finally know that my journey is mine. So what this says now is this....L I F E. I. S. B. E. A. U. T. I. F. U. L. My interest now is to watch myself think and believe that I am in control and then watch how life unfolds. This does not mean that I do nothing. I have my goals. Over the last few months, my list is my goals that I write over and over again. I do this to keep it at the forefront of my mind. I stray...I focus on my goals. The focus is extremely helpful now, as what is focused on does promote more such focus. I see and feel the pleasure down to my bones. my timeing is getting better. Stronger. The mist is clearing. I can see way beyond whatever the fuck was keeping me stuck. Mute. Paralyzed with fear. Once. Once, I needed a label to put on what I wanted to be doing. I kept looking for validation. Even when I was making things independently. There was a want for approval. Thank goodness I had the instinct to create anyway. Thank goodness it was always inside me.

Nearly fell off the world

If I were not vigilant I would nearly have found myself going down the deep end of becoming an asshole. Simply put, I was so much in my own head, complaining about something I had very little control over...that I began to hear myself become someone I would not want to talk to. A complainer, a shiner, a bitter sort. I have good reason.but that is not good enough. I do not want to go down the road of the aggeaved. I know what it's like. I hear it in others all around me. I am so much more mindful, more conscious of late of what is better in the world. I am so much happier to know that there is so very much more to want to build and enjoy thn break and destroy. So, I took a look and I turned around,ms tarting with curbing the need to spew verbal diarrhea and then, to give a moment to what runs through my mind. To find the triggers that lead me to negative, predictable behavior. I have had enough of it. More than my share. I am in control of me. I am in a space in my mind now where I want to watch and enjoy how I am going to make my life over in the likeness that I know best.

Faith to think better of yourself is what I need every day. I got the chance to swim and play in my field yesterday. I indulged up to my hair in joy. It is an effort to keep my focus, but when I do.....I am fierce about holding onto it. There is so much to write today. So I shall do so in stages.

The recording that I play constantly in my mind, I know that it is neurotic, and somewhere I feel that there is some religious or psychological pay-off to punish myself. This keeps me from laying down my true feelings and desires from time to time. I am now at a place where my old habits make me tired and conscious of a need to see better, stronger results for themselves. I am so glad for this mostly private site. Sometimes you just have to save your own life, go to bat for you.I feel like a traitor to the amount of progress that I know I have made.I just have to face my contradictions now, or else the overloaded emotions that seek me out late at night will break apart all of my work over the years. So what is this big thing? When I see what I consider upheaval in the last few years, I see no reward to my child for it. There are moments when I think that I want my family back, and I know that my child feels that way. I have felt such defeat, and I admire the lives of my family and people I have known and admired, who faced so much, much more with grace and aplomb. Despite my early ramblings, I know that my feelings are not unusual. What having admitted it aloud in writing has now done for me, is clear some space around something that felt tight and unmanageable. I came across something I think the Buddha said, it was about death. The statement says that man is afraid of death, no matter how much he may pretend to take it lightly.we all want good lives. I feel that way. My ex husband has written me more than once telling me that if he cannot be happy, then he shall make sure that I am not happy either. Now this is a semi threatening boast of a bully. What is required of me is a restructuring of my beliefs and priorities. Thank goodness that I never had such a etched in stone vision of what I expected my life to look like. Or perhaps the fact that I did not is exactly the problem. Whatever it is or was, I am here now, and I must evaluate where I am and where I am going. I have had the best intentions, but I have not felt like I have made any progress. When I speak like that, what I am really saying is that i have financial challenges that have come from choosing the job I have had for the last few years. I do not want to weigh this entry down with negatives and I am on the look out for placing doubt like salt, everywhere I tap my keys. Perhaps if I were feeling that I was meeting my personal targets in every other part of my life,then, I may not be as concerned.so, again, what this is telling me, is that my ex husband's voodhoo has some legs. I have been dealing with that for some time. It is in my power to change that because it must be done. Not because I want to proove anything to him, but because I have felt so hurt by so many things because they seemed to set me back. Again. I might be rambling. I think, my goal now is to accept what I have not been able to change. Accept that I have made mistakes that have made me feel less than satisfied with myself afterwards, and in a few instances, even slowed down my idea of progress. I am clearing all of this out of my mind today to give myself the start I deserve.