Wednesday, July 22, 2009

One of Those Non-Humorous Self-Awareness Posts

There are things that you learn as you go along. Some of them are innocuous, but helpful; putting a little oil in a pan and rubbing it in with a paper towel will 'season' it, and you won't need to keep adding butter as you cook your pancakes... and others are simply notice as you go; a two year old will watch the same movie over and over and over loving each and every moment, while even a great movie viewed that many times by an adult will make their eyes bleed... and still others are revelations about yourself that allow you to progress to the next phase of your life.

With any luck, some of those self-revelations come early enough in your life that you don't pass their effects on to your children... but, whatever the timing, these Ah-Ha moments tend to change you forever. Because we, as humans, can't un-see what we've seen, un-learn what we've learned nor un-hear what we've heard.

The other thing that happens with a self-revelation is that it will start uncovering other things in it's periphery. Entire chunks of time or similar life experiences will come back to you even if you haven't thought about them in 20 years, but now you'll see the correlation. Things will make sense now that made no sense whatsoever at the time, or you will find out about a different perspective, how it looked to someone else back then that backs up what you have only now come to realize. It can be amazing. It can also be infuriating. And sometimes, it makes life as you know it, and are currently living it, all but intolerable.

As you may have guessed, I'm not just waxing poetic over here. I have had one of those revelations recently. Brought about by a picture of myself when I was seven and a couple of 'remember when' conversations with my sister... the kind that started out talking about Ann Rule books and serial killers and somehow coming around to knock hockey. Actually, I know how that subject shift happened. We had a mass murderer in our neighborhood growing up. I actually played with him as a kid, on the rare occasions that he was allowed out to play.

Anyway... that's so not what I was getting to, even if that's more interesting. Thing is, you never know what someone is going through... and that someone may even be yourself. Because our psyche tends to lock away the toxic waste of our past so that we can't look at it directly, even when it seeps into the soil and alters the rest of our life tree and how it grows and what it finds acceptable and even nurturing in other areas of our lives. I know you want the juicy details, but they're unimportant. This kind of thing happens to everyone with any shred of self-awareness.

The thing is this. Be kinder to yourself. Treat yourself like you matter. Don't be so hard on yourself. Give yourself grace. Do for yourself as if you were one of your best friends. We usually don't. We may put ourselves on the list, but it's so far down behind other people or other priorities that we get overlooked. We need to be in the top three always. Seriously. And I'm not talking about the kids starving so you can go get your mani/pedi. I'm talking about balanced, non-narcissistic self-love. There are several sayings covering this, so I'll throw a few out there for ya.

If you don't love yourself... how can you love anyone else; how can anyone else love you; how can you find or follow your calling? You can also put the word 'respect' in the place of the word 'love'. Do you do both (love and respect)? Do you do either? If your best friend's spouse treated them the way that you treat yourself, would you advise your friend to leave their spouse?

These are the things I've been dealing with lately. For the moment, they kind of suck. Big fat festering wounds don't heal overnight. They stink, literally. They need antibiotics. They require painfully removing all the nasty infected parts. Then they need to be dressed carefully and changed often to ensure proper healing, otherwise they fester again. I suppose it would be easier to simply put the flap back down and not look at the current mess. However that would stunt my growth and my personal value.

Cause once upon a time, I was cool. I got told so. I choose to believe it, and I choose to make it my reality.



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4 comments:

Dee at Pedestrian Palate said...

Yup. Lots of truth in that post.

The Retired One said...

Aria,
Sounds like you are going through a lot of self introspection and looking at all the status of your present life.....in addition to comparing them with past life patterns.
This is never easy.
What is even harder is to clearly see the Truth and then have to act on it.

I don't know if this means anything related to your husband and your relationship, but it sounds like it, if I read between the lines and read your frustation seeping out in your past posts.

I could be totally wrong, but you sound like the responsible one in the household and you give and give and work and work...and he has been passive, letting you do it and playing video games and not being a full partner in taking care of your son or you. (If I am WAYYYY off base, I am apologizing right now).
If I am on base, you have two choices.
You can sit him down with the serious: 'We have to talk' time and tell him exactly how things have to change (from that second forward)
or
you have to tell him he has to leave.
Neither will be easy, but to find yourself again, you will have to do it immediately.
If I am totally wrong and it is something entirely different, than I hope you can face it and the change that needs to take place with urgency and strength.
Your friends will be beside you cheering you on!
Take care, and know you ARE worth it and you ARE worth love and respect.

Angela said...

This was my first visit to your blog, and I'm so glad that I stopped by! What a wonderful post, and one that I needed to read right now. Thank you:)

Take care

Aria said...

DG ~ Thanks, it can't all be giggles now, can it?

Angel ~ Thanks for visiting. Hope it gave you what you needed & glad it helped... honestly, sometimes I think I'm just rambling... :-)

Retired One ~ Well, m'dear, in some ways, yes. My particular revelation did make me look at hubby. At why I was in this relationship, along with the ones before it, and seeing it with fresh eyes has made it a little harder to be in it, but the relationship itself was not the revelation. As far as my being the responsible one... I used to applaud him for being exactly that and trying to keep up my end of the bargain by being responsible about our home front; without him working, it seems very much so like I'm the only one being a grown-up. And yes, it's frustrating as hell! But know this, sure as you're breathing, if I decide this relationship needs to be dissolved, he can keep this little run-down trailer; I will be the one moving out! ;-D Thanks for caring. Love ya lady!