Today I was faced with some serious thoughts about myself. I don't really have a strong sense of self worth, and I think it's causing me to shut down emotionally. Instead of crying for those I care for, I'm becoming more and more apathetic. Can't say it's something I'm proud of. In fact, I might even go as far as to say that it's quite shameful. Where is that warm, mushy feeling I used to get? I miss that. I miss crying over a good, heart-wrenching moment. A REAL one. I cry more when I watch TV or movies. In a word, ridiculous.
It's easy to blame him for a lot of my pain, but I'm scared of what will be left after I lose that excuse. What validation will I have?
It's becoming absolutely unbearable, living like this. So much of my life is a lie and it always comes back to bite me...ten times over. I'm beginning to wonder if I'll ever be able to break away. I'm just tired of being miserable. I'm doing all that I can do to fight it, but what more can I do? The happy times are short, superficial, and fleeting at best. Before I have time to marinate in the joy, it's gone. Contentment is a perpetual tease, leaving me feeling unfulfilled, frustrated, and all the more deprived.
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I just had to come over here and say wow, thank you for the compliment! I honestly wasn't sure if anyone was reading. I was writing with the notion that if nobody ever read it, at least I would have it as a kind of personal archive.
I read your blog(s) and you write very well. I'm sorry to hear your 2008 has not been going as well as you had originally hoped.
If you don't mind some words from a stranger, it sounds like you've run up against the basic problem of trust (and its stalwart companion, love). You mentioned blind trust in another blog... but I don't think it's really blind trust we're talking about, but rather, good, honest, real trust that gets built up over a period of time. The kind of big trust that you can only build up by trying a lot of smaller trusts and having them work out well. When someone does something to break the big trust, it can be hard to trust anyone again. Opening ourselves up for love is also opening ourselves up for hurt. You can't close off the potential to be hurt without losing the potential to love.
I look at it this way:
Imagine you are at home and it's a nice day outside. The sun is shining, the birds are singing and you see in this day a potential to walk outside and have fun and enjoy life. You walk outside, take 3 steps, get mugged, beaten up and sent to the hospital.
When you get out, you find yourself at home again and it's a beautiful day outside again. You see a potential for sunshine on your face, tulips in your toes and laughter on your lips. So you go outside, take 3 steps and get mugged, beaten up and sent to the hospital again.
Now you are at home again. It's a beautiful day outside. You peer through your curtains suspiciously, knowing that it's probably a trap and if you step outside again, you'll probably get beaten up. In your house it's dark and dank but at least it's safe.
I would step outside again, because god dammit, the sun is supposed to sparkle in my eyes, the smell of fresh cut grass should be in the air and and strangers passing by should greet me and smile, as I will greet them and smile. I will step outside, knowing in my mind that it's a trap, not because I am an idiot but because this is how it's supposed to go! There is supposed to be sunshine, tulips and happiness! I will keep trying for that dream. Maybe the world will fail to meet my expectations. Bah! I am doing my part. Maybe my original fanciful thoughts have been replaced with grim determination, but that's for me to know and the world to not find out. Either way, my actions and objectives are the same as before.
I call this philosophy "cynical optimism". Yes, I know it's a trap. I know I'm going to get hurt, but dammit, I see the potential for it to be great, I see the potential for it to be awesome, and I'm going out there again and so help me God, the world is going to act the way it should one of these days and I'm not going to miss out on it because I'm hunkered down behind the barbed wire and automated turrets.
...
I don't know if those words are of any help, Naomi, but I've read your words on your two blogs and you come across as a good person with a good heart. You must have a deep core of solid goodness to feel shame about apathy (think about THAT!). I give you these words, the best that I could come up with, in the hope that they are of some use. That's all anyone can really expect, surely: that we think about things and try to do what's good and right. Maybe these words will fall flat. Maybe they will cause more harm than good. But know that I sat here and focused all of my effort on you, a stranger I will never meet, because that's the way the world is supposed to work. You are in my mind at this moment and I am wishing you well with all the wellness that wishing can wish. I say, go out and be ready to love again and trust again. Maybe you will be hurt again. You can't be sure of the result of your actions any more than I can be sure of the results of these words. But we are trying our best to do the right things, thinking them through as we go, and this is more than a lot of people do. Sometimes we get hurt. Sometimes we will even cause hurt. If we are thinking and trying and doing our best, then we must be good people and at least we are making our small part of the world work as well as we can make it.
(Of course, I also advocate carrying some pepper spray, because sometimes you need to be ready to stick it to the muggers - there is a fine line between cynical optimism and outright foolishness. I'm not actually sure how this works into my whole analogy but I thought I should mention it...)
<3
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