Loss...

The last decade has taught me much about loss and today I am plagued with an overwhelming sense of it all. Today is not a good day.

I am losing my parents to an awful illness. I have lost my sister to mental illness. I have lost a house, a husband, a family, and I'm losing my dog. I have lost friends. I have lost love. I have let myself lose a couple careers. I lost my innocence. I lost a spark of life; I lost it and it's gone, almost like magic. *Poof*

At one point in time, I even lost my desire to live. Today that feeling has returned. Life feels hard, everything feels hard and I'm tired of losing.  What's the point? Is this drama or Depression? Fact or Fiction? It feels very real, raw and extremely uncomfortable. It steals my breath, crushes my heart and makes every cell in my body ache.

I have lost a buddy, a friend, a confidant, a lover.

I have lost myself and found myself and lost myself....

The Decemberists - This Is Why We Fight

Another year...

So another year has come and gone and here I am.

For me, 2010 felt very fast moving and I feel as though I have quickly moved myself through a multitude of  hard experiences (some exceedingly more painful than others), while at the same time reintegrating myself into life. *Insert personal pat on the back here*

All and all, I think 2010 was a pretty good year. I survived, with grace, my continuing battle with depression, my never-ending family drama regarding my parent's health and my sister's mental health, a painful breakup, a painful loss quickly followed by another breakup, and what feels like hundreds of other experiences that furthered me along on this journey of mine.

In 2010, I came face to face with the ugly, cold and rigid face of 'control' and the behaviors it breeds. Seeing a reflection of myself, by witnessing it in another, enabled me to begin to surrender and let go of this survival tactic.  This was a gift that emerged out of a negative, life-altering experience/relationship, and for this I am grateful. As a result, I find myself more able to be present, loving and spontaneous - which is all good stuff!

From this same person, I learned a hard lesson regarding my personal insensitivity around my vulnerability. I jumped headfirst into 'a relationship' and ignored the warning bells going off in my head the entire way down the rabbit hole. I am not coming down on myself here, merely observing that my vulnerability, combined with an old desire of mine to be safe, or saved, by another - (most simply put) impaired my judgment. This awareness has helped remind me what a powerful tool my intuition is.

I have realized when it comes to matters of the heart - I am a fool - but I'm not sure I would want it any other way. 
I have realized that I deserve to hold myself gently, without judgment, in the areas of my life that I struggle with.
I have realized that I deserve to love and be loved without having to sacrifice myself in the process.
I have realized that the labels, I, and others, have put on me are simply labels, not necessarily the real me.
I have realized that rumination is a dangerous place for me, and leads to dips in my mood.
I have realized that putting on my super-hero costume, actually inhibits the people I intend to 'help'.
I have realized that my desire for organization and control is really a mask for deeper emotions I am trying to keep buried.
I have realized how letting go grants me space to be still and whole.
I have realized that being alone doesn't mean sudden death.
I have realized that my grief is not something to fear, but instead something I can release.
I have realized that negative interactions I may have with people have nothing to do with me, a pattern is a pattern is a pattern, and it isn't my responsibility to clean it up!

2010, I let you go and thank you for taking me where I needed to go, and for allowing me the opportunity to come back into myself: To survive, to grow, to blossom and to let go. With an open heart - I let you go.

2011, I greet you with open arms, a compassionate heart and no agenda. I greet you with joy, melancholy, relief and hope. I greet you with everything that is me and everything I am about to become...

I survive. I grow. I blossom. I let go.

(Bansky - "There is always hope")

A quote:

I'm reading a great book right now called Welcome to my Country, by Lauren Slater.

As I am having problems posting anything these days, I thought I would quote something from this book that resonates with me:

"Imagine to love over and over again, and then to lose the love. Imagine fighting your way through days, sudden spurts of light, and then drought. Depression is a death within, a knowledge--terrifying--that you cannot resurrect yourself. Depression is loss of the vision that lets leaves breathe and fall, that lets the air smell of seed and soil. And there must be rage, yes I think there is rage toward such a severing, such a ragged deep rupture with the world."

Love

Charles Bukowski - The Laughing Heart

 

 

The Laughing Heart

your life is your life
don’t let it be clubbed into dank submission.
be on the watch.
there are ways out.
there is a light somewhere.
it may not be much light but
it beats the darkness.
be on the watch.
the gods will offer you chances.
know them.
take them.
you can’t beat death but
you can beat death in life, sometimes.
and the more often you learn to do it,
the more light there will be.
your life is your life.
know it while you have it.
you are marvelous
the gods wait to delight
in you.

-- by Charles Bukowski

Robbery!

When I was a young girl I fell in love with the movie Space Camp, and after watching it I decided 2 things: I wanted to be an astronaut and I really really wanted to go to Space Camp. I told this to people and they laughed at me and told me I could never and would never do either. So, as a result, a little part of me died and I formed the necessary scab and then scar to heal the wound.

Remember this? Pure awesomeness, no?

"The stars belong to a new generation." Too bad I wasn't part of it.

When I was young girl I wanted to be a model. I was always told what a pretty girl I was by all my parents friends, so why not? I was told I was pretty, I thought models were pretty, so I thought this would be something cool that I could do.... And then the bomb dropped - "Well", my friends pointed out, "you aren't pretty enough and you have too many beauty marks on your face. That isn't the way models look." Strike 2 for me! So, another little part of me died and I started making a list of all the things I couldn't do because of my deficiencies - and to my horror - there seemed to be a bunch of them. Please bear in mind I WAS A YOUNG GIRL!

Maybe if this had been a theme in my childhood things

would have been different.

 

Fast forward to my mid-teens when I was awarded a scholarship for a summer dance program called CanDance. One of the classes we took was Kinesiology and it was love at first sight for me. I decided then and there that I was going to become a Kinesiologist. Cool right? When I shared my exciting news with my friends and parents I was told that I probably wouldn't be able to accomplish this because I didn't have the strongest "science skills" and "wouldn't I be better off focusing on something that was 'English' related? I was good at English." And then my response, "of course, how stupid of me." *giant head smack*

When I was young, I unknowingly gave up on my dreams and the possibilities of my dreams. When people asked me what I wanted to be when I grew up, I decided I would start answering "a nurse," because that is what my mom was. It was safe and people didn't seem to have a problem with it.

After people stopped asking me this particularly traumatizing question, and after I let go of the ridiculous notion of being a nurse, I started waiting for people to tell me what I should be doing because they obviously knew better than me. For example - my girlfriend was a student of the Ryerson Dance Program and thought I should audition, so I said, "okay, why not? I'm not doing anything else at the moment and I know how to dance." Off I flew to Toronto, where I was granted another scholarship, and picked up some mad dancing skills.

It is no wonder to me why I am, the way I am. I can see now that this is why it is hard for me to listen to my authentic voice. I can see now, why it is hard for me to make decisions around what I want to do and what I think I would like to do. I was taught that I wasn't good enough, I wasn't pretty enough, I wasn't smart enough and most importantly -  I didn't know the answers. So I limited myself and lost myself all at the same time.

I was robbed I tell you! Robbed!

Now as an adult, I find myself on the treasure hunt of my life, or more truthfully, for my life. I'm searching dark cobwebbed corners and attics for the things that were once rightfully mine, but were taken from me. Sometimes I stumble across my treasures (and I mean this literally) even though their presence is invisible to me, and the only reason I notice them is because I have tripped on them, fallen, and hurt myself. When this happens their invisibility starts to lift and I begin to see them. I see them and wonder - "is this really a treasure of mine?" and after close scrutiny "well, maybe this is mine, for a second I thought it belonged to Megan," and then "oh".

For the most part, this reclaiming of 'self ' is very difficult for me; however, there is the odd time when I stumble upon a fragment of my lost treasure and know, at once, that it is mine. When this happens, I can lovingly pick it up, cradle it in my arms, and quietly rejoice in our reunion, and (in the words of my friend Ani) send out blessings like butterfly kisses....