Happiness

I started occupational therapy last week (a recommendation from my trauma therapist). It's a very interesting perspective, because it's based on the theory of Positive Psychology, which is rooted in happiness and one's well-being (rather than the medical model of disease and treatment). . .which sort of creates a little bit of a problem for me, because I'm not very familiar with happiness.

I don't say that to be funny (or sarcastically jaded). . .I am actually very serious. I think happy people live in a delusional world based in denial of the harsh realities of life...lol. So there isn't a lot of wiggle room for happiness in this paradigm. That's not to say that I don't experience or appreciate happy moments, but I don't chase happiness the way it seems to me that some people do.

Happiness is not something I seek in life...if it finds me, great...but I don't go looking for it. So, should I be surprised to find that happiness doesn't really find me very often? I think, not.

I just started the OT last week, so I've been working on the first simple project which involves taking an online strengths questionnaire/survey, and the results have shed some very interesting light on some surprising tendencies.

First of all, there was nothing surprising about the identified strengths. But, looking at the top 5 (out of 24 possible), what IS surprising is that I do not view them as positive strengths. The reason why I don't see them as positive strengths is because they tend to be the things that get me into trouble...lol. So while they may be my "strengths," they have not generally yielded positive results. In fact, I actually have a love/hate relationship with them, and THAT will need to be one of ther FIRST things to change.

My #1 strength is Creativity & Ingenuity. I absolutely agree. But, when I work in restrictive environments, this strength is not valued. . .typically because the agencies all have established protocols and regulations that then dictate procedures and process, so creative thinking is not highly prized in these environments! Hence, my #1 strength has not been valued in the places where I've worked. In fact, it has been openly rejected and viewed as an area that "needs improvement" if I am to fit in with the employer's culture and work climate.

My #2 strength is Bravery & Valor, which is all about speaking up for what I believe in, especially in the face of great adversity! Need I say more?

OK, so the bottom line with the process of this positive psychology is to focus on our first 5 strengths and incorporate them more fully into our daily life. But how can I do that when I am at war with them within my own self? How can I embrace my strengths when I reject them? How can I view them as "positive" when I have experienced so many "negative" outcomes because of them? And how can I use these strengths to enhance my happiness, when I'm not even sure that I believe in happiness as something of value in my life?

Heavy sigh. . .

Clearly I have a lot of work ahead of me, but I think this work is critical for helping my brain to heal. . .because I want to live a joy-filled life, and I suspect that there is a connection between joy and happiness...lol. (OK, that was a sarcastic attempt at jaded humor...lol.)

All joking aside, I can see very clearly that my beliefs about "happiness" as an experience are absolutely shaping the way my brain processes joy and pleasure in my daily life, and I want that to be different. So I am going to have to start challenging these negative beliefs I hold onto very tightly about  happiness as it applies to me and my own life.

I will add that one of my strengths. . .Curiosity. . .is one of the positive psychology virtues that help to foster happiness. . .so I am going to use that puppy for all it's worth...lol.

The bottom lines for me personally is that I absolutely need to deconstruct the negative thoughts I have about how I view my dominant strengths . .which is not going to be easy. . .but, I can see very clearly that I will never experience happiness if I am openly rejecting what is clearly the strengths that make me who I am.

Love/Hate

I saw a Facebook meme this past week that made me smile. It was an old man sitting next to his wife on some kind of bench, but they are turned away from each other because they're angry...but, as fate would have it, it's raining...and the man is holding an umbrella above his wife's head...even though he's very clearly angry with her.

Even when we're angry with the people that we love, we still love them.

This truth is the greatest complexity of our human relationships...how we can love someone and hate them at the same time. And not just this particular emotional dichotomy, but an infinite combination of relational emotional states that are just as unique to each relationship as the fingerprints of the persons involved.

For the past several weeks I have been processing my relationship with my mom, particularly how much I hated her and resented the roles that she and her life circumstances unfairly thrust upon me. It didn't start out that way, of course: at three years of age I only knew that I needed to help mommy. . .and, so, I did. . .time, and time again.

At age 3, I didn't even know what resentment was. But by the time I had turned 10, I not only knew the word, I knew from the core of my being exactly what resentment felt like, and it only grew deeper and harder with time. And now, all these years later, I am still processing the layers of resentment that have settled and hardened into a sedimentary relationship geology that remains my burden to excavate and understand.

Resentment doesn't simply "go away" just because a person dies.

What I can see now is that (just like the old man) I never stopped loving my mom even when I was angry with her. But this longstanding anger and resentment became a concrete wedge that made it impossible for me to feel the warm and loving feelings for my mom.

I never stopped loving my mom, but the resentment made it impossible for me to feel it...or express it.

As I sit here today writing this blog, it feels like resentment is nothing more than an empty word that has been assigned to a very complex collection of relational experience...almost as if resentment in and of itself doesn't really exist on its own...sort of like how a long list of symptoms are collectively classified as a "syndrome" of disease.

Resentment really is a syndrome that gets assigned to long list of emotional symptoms. Resentment can be acute, an immediate response to something. Or, resentment can be chronic, building slowly and progressively over time. But either way, resentment is a state of a disease in a relationship.

For me, my resentment was the long, slow, chronic category of resentment. And the symptoms along the way were insidiously invisible, yet they were very, very real. Every time my needs were diminished, discounted, or destroyed by the unfair imbalance within our relationship, the pain was an unacknowledged symptom of the state of relational disease that was developing within the relationship with my mom in the exact same way that cancer grows in the human body.

My mom and I had a cancerous relationship. Her needs fed off of my life, just as the cancer cells feed off of the healthy cells within a body...a long, slow, painful process that left me feeling angry and resentful, that's true. But underneath it all, the core emotional symptom that ulimately made me feel angry and resentful is the endless pool of sadness created by the love for my mom that had no way to express itself...no way to be felt.

I may have hated my mother growing up, and resented the way that my life had been sucked away to feed my mom's cancerous emotional needs...but I never stopped loving her. . .

. . .and the pain of that dichitomy feels unbearable in its truth.

The Other "H" Word

The photo with this blog is Michael Kennedy, one of the Boston firefighters who died this week in a 9 alarm fire that took more than one firefighter's life. This man, and every single firefighter fighting alongside of him is a hero...no questions asked.

Why is it easier to identify the hero in others, than it is to identify when we, our selves, are the hero for another person?

I have been grappling with the "H" word for weeks, because one of my friends has made it clear that the use of this word applied to her is not supportive. And this vexes me greatly, because I'm trying to understand how a person who is clearly a hero from everyone else's perspective can so vehemently reject the "H" word as it applies to her.

And that's when I started to think that perhaps this "H" word may not be the only "H" word that she's rejecting.

A hero is someone who puts their life on the line in the service and protection if others. Agreed? Yes.

Does a person have to die in order to be a hero? No, they don't. Firefighters, Police Officers, Soldiers are heroes every day, whether they live or die in their service to our nation.

OK. Well, then, what about compensation. Is a person any more or less of a hero based on compensation? Absolutely not. Firefighters, Police Officers, and Military Personnel are ALL paid for the JOB they do...but that doesn't make them any less of a hero. And for those who never receive a penny, that doesn't nake them any more OR less of a hero, either.

Does the motivation make a difference? Is the soldier who joins the Army for college money any less of a hero than the soldier motivated by generations old patriotism? Or the young inner city youth with no other viable options for life success? Or the person drafted against their will serving only out of a moral sense of national duty and obligation? Are these "lesser" motivations cause for diminishment of hero status? Of course not.

So, what is it, then? What creates the difference? What is this other "H" word that I see as relevant to this process? That word, this other "H" word is Humanity...this is what I think is making the difference.

I think what causes us humans to reject the truth that we are a hero to and for another person (within the quiet sidelines of our personal relationships) is simply a matter of the degree to which we accept or reject our own humanity.

Humanity is the real "H" word.

We humans are such wonderfully complex forms of life...so aware of our own thoughts, feelings, and emotions. Which means that we may also resent much about our lives, or (especially) what is thrust upon us by chance or circumstance.

As for me, the process of sorting through the deeper relevance of the forbidden "H" word has helped me to find compassion for my own resentment about having to care for my limited mom as I grew up, rather than having a mom who nurtured my growth as a developing child.

And I do not claim to know directly what my friend is actually feeling and experiencing, but I have a life-long relationship with her, and have followed her blogs as she has walked this path, so I have been witness to what she has shared about her struggle with her own limitations to deal with everything perhaps as she might like to.

When it comes to labels of Hero and Human, there is a very long list of qualifiers that follow. A Hero should.... Or, a Human being should.... We have these qualifiers for every single label, as well (e.g., husband, wife, friend, daughter, son, God, etc.) And whatever experience gets filled in the blank that follows the "should" thus becomes the standard to which we compare our own experience. And how we "measure up" to these internalized expectations determines what we accept and reject from ourselves, as well as those around us (especially those who see us differently than how we see ourselves).

This is true regardless of the "positive" or "negative" connotations of our self-beliefs.

I want desperately for my friend to change the way that she interprets her humanity through the lens of experience as her mother's caregiver. But that remains my limitation as a human being, a flaw in my own humanity that rejects the truth of my friend's experience simply because it is so different from how I experience her.

And my rejection of her truth isn't supportive...it's condescending and unacceptable.

So, rather than seek to change the way friend accepts or rejects her humanity, I will seek to change my own limitations of humanity...because I absolutely want to support my lovely friend in a way that helps her to feel supported by me... because even if I don't always understand the experience of her journey, it remains her journey alone to experience, not mine.

Michael Kennedy is a hero who died this week...a very human hero with flaws and failings just like the rest of the human race. I didn't know Michael Kennedy (or the other firefighter hero who died alongside of him this week), but I do know my friend...and to me she is every bit the hero as Michael Kennedy...

...even if her personal humanity is also just as flawed and filled with with human failings as every single other hero who has walked the hero halls before her...yes, even then...especially then.

Don't Look Back

I love these stories...

I am reading the Chronicles of Morgaine, and I am fascinated by the ethical issues these stories are raising! Vanye is disturbed by Morgaine's seemingly cold heart for not looking back (at the destruction she has left behind), yet he begins to understand and regret having looked back to see the destruction by his own hands.

I was thinking about my own life, my own journey, and how I have noticed how on more than one occasion, there is a wake of debris from the destruction that my process has left behind...yet, when I look back I am disempowered by what I see.

Are we supposed to not look back?

I'm thinking now about the Bible, and the story of the pillars of salt. I don't recall the intricacies of the story, but I do remember that God instructed them to not look back once they left the city, lest they turn to pillars of salt.

Is that a general spiritual mandate from God that we not look back?

I think there is a deeper truth in this. Yes, it is good to reflect on the past to learn from it, but is that process fundamentally different from looking back? Is there a difference between looking at the destruction left behind and personal accountability? If we don't look back, have we relinquished accountability for the consequences of what our actions have helped to bring about?

I can't wait to read on in this story...to see how Vanye continues to evolve. He seems to have such black and white thinking, whereas Morgaine is much more open to shades of gray.

Wow! Don't look back! Thers is just something very powerful about this truth tonight...

Of Mountains and Valleys

Today is a day to regroup and get my bearings. This isn't the first time I've been here, but I become more exhausted each time I am...so I need to regroup and get my bearings a bit.

I'm not afraid of cancer. I've been living with cancer for half of my life, so I made peace with cancer a long time ago. Cancer is actually a bit of a blessing and gift for me, because while the rest of the world is off working their lives away, I am aware that I don't have that luxery...so I can quit the stressful job and pare down my life to go off travelling the world.

People tell me how amazing and brave I am for doing this, but it has nothing at all to do with anything like brave OR amazing. I'm just more scared of never having lived my own life than being afraid of not having a job or the security it brings.

So I'm grateful for how living with cancer has motivated me to take risks that I might never have the courage to take otherwise. And had I not already quit my job, bought this trailer, and pared down my life for this trek to Nova Scotia...I would absolutely be doing so now. So, Nova Scotia is absolutely a go...and I am even more motivated now to get movin' on down the road.

But I am exhausted, so today is a day to decompress and regroup.

I think what this round is going to help me with is to face the fears that I DO have...like travelling through mountains high and valleys off the beaten track. It scares the crap out of me to be too far away from what I perceive as help or drive through winding mountain roads while towing my trailer. But I am NOT going to let my fear stop me from travelling to and through places that I WANT to visit, just because of the higher risk of danger!! Yes, these will be more risky paths, but I refuse to let fear dictate the course and direction of my life journey!

No, I am not afraid of cancer...and the truth is that living with cancer is actually helping to make me intrepid...so, bring it on!!!

And while today may be a day to decompress and get my bearings, it's so that I can say, "Look out mountains high and valleys off the beaten track, because I am about to drive my way through!" as I write these last chapters of my life with nothing but guts and glory!

Life Goes On...

I have just returned from my trip to SoCal, and I have a lot to figure out. I do not have good news on the other side of my procedures, and I don't even know how bad it is, yet...but what I do know is bad enough to have me eating Ben & Jerry's Phish Food snd Potato Chips for dinner.

So, the bottom line (no pun intended) is that 20 polyps were removed yesterday. I won't know the status of any of them until pathology reports are back...but the conversation doesn't stop there (even if they're all benign), because they're bringing the "total colectomy" conversation back to the table.

It's just a lot to process right now, so it's a Phish Food and Potato Chip kind of night...

...and the picture? This was taken at the VA of a family of geese...these six new baby geese just starting out in life...and reminding me that life will go on, no matter what is happening with the plot twists of my own story...

Sign Language

As I made my way across the southwestern deserts this morning, an interesting journey emerged. It started when I passed a "Speed Limit 35" regulatory sign just outside of Prescott, and I began to wonder why I can pass a speed limit sign without even blinking, but I would seriously scruff if I heard a live person yelling at me, "You can't drive faster than 35 on this part of the road!" as I drove by.

Same information...lol...totally different meaning.

We all have them. Those people in our lives who plant their regulatory signs across the terrain of our personal world....the signs that start with, "You should..." or "You need to..." for the endless things that they think we should be doing with what are, in fact, our personal lives.

There are other signs, as well...the "cautionary" signs that alert us to some potential or impending danger just around the corner. This is the "kinder, gentler" form of regulatory sign that nudges, rather than mandates. These people would politely say, "Might I suggest that you drive only 25 around this curve?" as I drove past.

Of course, the truth is that even though the cautionary signs suggest, and the regulatory signs mandate certain driving behavior, I am still free to make my own choices, because I am the license holding driver of my vehicle. So, if I am willing to accept the risks and consequences of not following these directives, then I am free to make my own decisions.

Why do we forget this fact...that we are the drivers of our own lives...when the regulatory signs are planted in our personal terrain by other people?

I was thinking long and hard about this truth...lol. Why is it that when I come across one of these "You should..." or "You need to..." signs planted in my personal terrain I get angry and scruff...sometimes only internally, but sometimes confrontationally? When the truth of the matter is that these human planted regulatory signs have absolutely no merit in my world; yet I give them power as if they do.

The fact is that I could simply drive right past them...ignore them, but I don't. Or, I could turn to the maintenance crew on 24-hour standby in my mind and simply ask them to remove the illegally planted sign...lol...but I don't do that, either. I read them over and over again, stewing over the presence of a sign intended to regulate me and my personal choices.

This is also my choice, of course, as no one else is responsible for making me stew over signs in my world that I don't like or want....and don't ever have to listen to, anyway!

But even harder for me to drive past or ignore are the seemingly "neutral" signs that just tell people what some place is called. I can be driving quite happily around my my home town of "Doing the Best I Can." Then, wham! Someone plants a sign in front of mine that reads, "Never Quite Good Enoughville" and I'm in the fetal position sucking on a Dove Bar trying to figure out what I actually would do for a Klondike!

I also began to laugh about how wonderful it would be if there were positive signs that supported and encouraged us as we drove. Imagine driving around a curve to read a sign that said, "Great job taking this curve!" It's funny to think about this silly nonsensical idea, but I did wonder if there were signs of positive encouragement that I was missing...so I began to look for them.

It took a long time before I could find anything positive or encouraging. I started reframing the regulatory signs so that they would say, "You can drive as fast as 35 along this stretch of the road." But there was always a big fat qualifyer dangling that would cynically whisper, "But not any faster!"

Finding a stand alone sign of positive encouragement was proving to be a challenge! The roads would tell me, "You can drive here." But the desert would follow up with, "But not here." The first fully positive sign was the dashed line on the road telling me I was free to pass...but then the cautionary signs all chimed in with their refrain, "As long as it's safe, of course!"

But then I found hope...Hope, Arizona, that is. And, then I saw the "A OK Corral" and thought I was on a roll...lol. However, Hope, Arizona is but a speck of road through the desert, so it wasn't long before I was beyond hope, once again. There was even a sign that informed me of this fact...it read, "Your Beyond Hope Now" as I drove out of town. And, yes, that is how it was spelled...lol...so, I guess I wasn't the only one beyond hope...lol.

I found "Lots for sale," but it wasn't clear if they were selling parcels of land or just lots of stuff. I passed the 3 Dreamers RV Park, and wondered if it were full already.  And I drove through a long stretch of road designated as a "blowing dust area," but I guess only dust was allowed to be blown, because I looked long and hard for the "blowing smoke up someone's ass area," but didn't come across one...lol.

But my personal favorite sign of positive encouragement was the "Passmore Gas Company" sign just past Hope, and I didn't think it could get any more positive or encouraging than that...lol. But then I passed the State Prison sign in California with the cautionary sign beneath it that read, "Do not pick up hitchhikers." Yeah, like I had to be told that one...lol.

So that was my drive this morning. Clearly, I kept myself quite entertained as I drove across the southwestern deserts. And I'm very much looking forward to my drive back to "Doing the Best I Can" as soon as these appointments are done!

Picking Flowers

I just read a post about how if we love a flower, we shouldn't pick it, we should just let it be and appreciate it. I think the same is true about people...how when we truly love someone we just accept them as they are, and appreciate them as they are.

But this isn't always easy to do.

I have spent my adult life helping people to create a functional life...that's essentially what my work was as a social worker, and it certainly was when I had my private practice. But these were people who were asking for help with that change, or someone was asking on their behalf (which was the case with the foster kids).

It' not always easy to do, however, when someone is struggling, but isn't asking for help. And I'm not saying it's a bad thing or wrong thing that someone is struggling and doesn't want help. It is their process, and they have a right to it....but that truth doesn't make the job of a bystander any easier.

We are always bystanders to another person's struggle...no matter how much we love them...no matter how close we are to them...no matter who they are within the scope and sphere of our lives, we are always a bystander to another person's struggle.

When people come upon a disaster scene, there are three responses...they flee (leave the scene and do not help)...they freeze (stand by watching, but don't know what to do, so they do nothing)...or they fight (they step up and do something, even if that something is "wrong").

There are good Samaritan laws that protect the untrained "fighters" who are on scene and do something to try to help. But there's nothing to shield and protect the good Samaritans who offer help to those we love within our sphere of personsl relationships within our lives.

Everyone has a right to struggle through whatever they're struggling through without any help from the bystanders on the side. And one of the first rules of any first responding is that if someone refuses assistance, the first responders are legally required to stop, even if it means that the person is going to bleed out and die...they are required by law to stop assisting...even if it means the person is going to die.

It's the hardest thing for me to do...to stand by and not do something...yet, it is exactly what I need to do.

I have read that a baby chick will die if they are helped with the breaking away of the shell they are struggling to break out of. There is something inherently necessary about the struggle. Yet, as a bystander watching, it is the hardest thing to let the struggle happen without reaching down to "help" pull away pieces of a shell...and the truth is we're not really helping, even if it makes US feel better to do so.

Today has been some hard lessons bout not picking flowers, and about not pulling away pieces of a broken shell, no matter what the intent...no matter how much I want to help...no matter how much a person may be struggling.

Loving people when their lives are filled with love and sunshine every day is easy. But loving a person who struggles with an unfairly burdened life challenges every aspect of humanity to its core (for everyone involved) As for me, I'm not doing a very good job of it today, but tomorrow is another day, and I will try to do a better job loving the people who are struggling around me.

The "H" Word

I have a friend who has been her mother's caretaker for the all too many years of a progressive illness that robbed her of her mother a very long time ago...which actually leaves her the caretaker of a stranger whose high maintenance needs have also robbed my friend of her own life, as well. She maintains her sanity through her blogging (something I relate to very well), and she recently posted a very articulate list of what does and does not help her to feel supported.

As a supportive friend goes, I was doing pretty well until the "h" word came up. And after reading her list, I promised her that I would not ever say that word to her again. But since this is my blog, I can say it right out loud...lol.

The word in question is Hero.

I am not the only person who feels very strongly that she (and her children) are all heroes...but she doesn't feel supported by it when we tell her so. She has her reasons, and they are not the motivation for this blog. But I have continued to think about what constitutes the word hero.

Would a firefighter be less of a hero if he or she grumbled about having to leave in the middle of their daughter's birthday party to save a person's house from burning down? Absolutely not. If a soldier yells at his bunker mate because he or she's exhausted and misses home with a longing ache in their heart, does that make them any less of a hero, either? No! I could, of course, go on and on with hypotheticals, but the answer is always going to be, "No!" Because these imperfections make them human, not anti-heroes.

People don't have to feel like a hero to be one, and that is just the rock hard bottom line....it's all about perspective.

So, fine...if (from my friend's perspective) she can't see herself as a hero, then fine...I won't use the "h" word in her presence. But from her mom's perspective, she is absolutely her mother's hero. Maybe she's not always patient or kind, but I don't know a single person on this planet who would be!

But when it comes to her mom, she advocates for her mother in a way that nobody else would, and that's the truth. She has ordered her entire life around doing everything she can to maintain optimal stability for her mother. She moved out of her own house so that she could take care of her mom in the most familiar setting. She has endured countless sleepless nights, rejected crappy daycare centers, and tolerated arrogant doctors...all in the name of doing the best she can to advocate for and take care of her mother....and, yes, that even includes the days when Dave's not home...lol.

So, if this doesn't constitute being a hero, then I don't know what does.

And maybe it still doesn't matter what any of the rest of us see when we look in as an outsider, but I do know this much: On that day when my friend goes to heaven, she WILL be greeted by her mother who is going to hug her, tell her how much she loves her, forgive her for any raised voices or impatient discourtesies, but most importantly she will tell my friend how grateful she is that her amazing daughter was her hero during the darkest days of her life on earth....of this I am absolutely certain.

My friend may not be able to see herself as a hero...but we do...her mom will...and God does!

I don't know why it is so hard for us to see ourselves as flawed and imperfect human beings. Even saints are imperfect human beings. And as much as I wish my friend could feel the truth of what the rest of us see, what hurts my heart more than this is knowing that the reason why she can't is because she is carrying a heavy burden within her heart of every imperfect moment that she has lived as her mom's caregiver.

I actually understand this feeling, at least my own version of it. I had the same role with my mom, only it was thrust upon me as a child (rather than as an adult, like my friend). And I still carry the weight of this burden, as well...because I hated my mother (at the time) for the way her illness and limitations as a human being impinged unfairly upon a daughter's life. And what I needed from my mom was for her to be my hero...but that's not what I had. Instead, I had become her hero.

I never saw it that way at the time, but after a lifetime of conflict and inner turmoil, I can finally see the truth of it...how even a young child can be her mother's hero...and I was.

It's taking me a lifetime to make peace with the conflicted relationship I had with my mom...and the guilt I have lived with for abandoning my mom's needs so that I could pursue my own life's dreams. And for her to die while I was halfway around the world in Germany serving my county's needs snd my own (rather than hers) is a burden I still carry and search for my own forgiveness. And while I am certain that my mom (now) understands and forgives me a million times over....it's the forgiveness of one's self that is the greatest challenge....and sometimes even an entire lifetime isn't enough time for this challenge to be met.

So if I still cringe at the horrible things an angry daughter said to her bed ridden and emotionally limited mother over 40 years ago, I can absolutely understand how it may take more time for my friend who is still very much in the thick of it to work through her own feelings.

So I won't use the "H" word in her presence.

Me? Well, I am treking my entire life to the other side of the world to make peace with my mom...to pipe for her on her birthday at the grave site I haven't visited since we buried her nearly thirty years ago. So I am learning how to let go of this heavy bursen of guilt.

But I also know that on the day when I go to heaven, my own mom will greet me, hug me, tell me how much she loves me, forgive me for my own thoughtless words and hurtful deeds, and then she will thank me for being her hero for all of those long years when she should have been mine....

...and I will be able to forgive her, too.

Friends Part 2

In response to part 1 a friend asked how I knew they didn't like me. It's not about liking me as a person...it's about not FB "Like"ing me. But that is precisely what I am questioning...why do I place interaction requirements on my Facebook friends in order to maintain them on my friends list?

And the question becomes this: at what point does a friendship become a friendship? And, is one-sided interaction still considered friendship?

As I said, these questions are real life questions as well, but FB brings them to the surface. I have friends who pop up like prairie dogs from time to time, but I would never consider deleting them simply by their interaction. The very small number of friends in question are the people who I don't really know in real life, have requested to be FB friends, I interact with their world, but they do not interact with mine.

Does one-sided interaction constitute friendship?

I think the bigger question is about what constitutes a Facebook friendship, because everyone in Facebook has their own reasons why they participate in this part of social media.

For some, it's a social gaming media. For others, they collect FB friends like baseball trading cards (and the bigger the number the better). For others it's a way to keep in contact with real-life family & friends. Some use it to market their business, organization, or cause. While others participate simply because everyone else is, so they're doing it to. And for some, it's the primary source of social interaction that they have in their life, period.

Everyone has their own reason why they've signed on with Facebook...which means that everyone is going to have their own definition of what constitutes a Facebook friendship.

This question of what to do with the one-sided FB friendships remains in process...I certainly don't want to impose my values and expectations onto other people, because I scruff when they're imposed on to me. And I certainly don't want to become a slave to the "Like" button, either.

For now, it is what it is...and I will sit with this as I continue to figure out how the complexity of friendships in my life are defined...

Friends

I have periodically culled my Facebook friends list, and I'm not alone...I see people culling their lists all of the time. But I have an "issue" with my current Facebook friends list that I find both challenging and intriguing.

Facebook is such an interesting reality. It brings to the surface every single invisible aspect of human relationships...every single one. Except in Facebook, we are more aware and in control of these usually invisible social cues.

In real life relationships we don't ask people if they want to be friends, and we certainly don't maintain a list of our friends...lol. But Facebook (as a reality portal) does give us a lot of power in establishing and maintainong boudaries with our friends.

Every single person has their own way of organizing their friends list.

As for me, I have three tiers of boundaries...close friends...friends..
and public friends. The people who are designated as public friends are "restricted" so that they can only view what I've posted for public viewing. It's the same information that anyone (friend or not) can view.

So I've recently culled people who (for whatever reason on their part) asked to join my lost of friends, but never post, and never respond to anything that I post. But I have a small group of FBpeeps that I've been having to process what to do with them.

However, to simply delete some FB people (by the nature of relationship in the "real" world) creates a "political" issue for me. What I mean by that is simply there could be social consequences to delete them, even though I may want to.

I love the way the overt nature of managing FB friends list mirrors the struggle that I have managing my friendships in the real world!

What I find intriguing about this personal dilemma is that I don't know why it's even an issue. These "friends" are already restricted to what I post for public viewing, so deleting them will not change what information they could view about me and my personal life. And I could "unfollow" them if I wanted to, so I wouldn't even need to see what they post. Yet I struggle with what to do with the small population of my FB friends who have requested to be my friend, but do not ever "like" or respond to what I post, even though I regularly "like" and comment on what they post.

I don't know what to do with this collection of the one-sided friendships!

The question that I grapple with is this: If I am interested enough in these people to respond to their life, what does it matter to me if they do not "like" or respond to me? Honestly, why would I delete someone that I actually like, simply because they do not like me? lol...FB is crazy for what it brings to the surface of the relationship table!

I remember one person in particular back in grad school who just did NOT likr me...but I adored him (non-romantically adored him). I would see him and be filled with joy, so I would say hello, and he would just grunt or say nothing. And I made a conscious choice to let him feel whatever he felt about me, but also to not let that influence the way that I genuinely felt about him. Eventually we came to be friends...which is not really the point, because my warmth toward him had nothing at all to do with a hopeful outcome, but had everything to do with me being true to what was real for me.

So I am struggling with cull decisions for people who don't like me....lol...but for whatever reason also don't unfriend me. It's my own choices that I have to grapple with, of course, and not someone else's.

I don't know yet what I'm going to do, but for now I will continue to let my dilemma shed light on my personal process. But before I allow myself to delete these friends I need to justify to myself why would I unfriend someone that I actually like, just because they don't like me.

Good Enough

It's pushing 9:30 in the morning, and I've barely just begun to get motivated today. I "should" already be over at the storage unit working hard to get as much done as possible to get on the road as quickly as possible...but it's pushing 9:30 in the morning, and I've barely begun to get motivated today.

What's wrong with me that I can't get more done each day?

The truth is, there's nothing "wrong" with me at all. I average about 3 hours of sleep, and the sleep I do get is more often than not a restless fitful sleep that never lets me feel rested. I'm having a hard time getting motivated because I am absolutely exhausted by a lifetime of forcing myself to "push through" the exhaustion and "trudge on" like a good soldier should.

What does a battle fatigued soldier do to get some well deserved rest?!

Well, a battle fatigued soldier quits her job, doesn't take classes she has no energy or desire to take, buys a trailer to create her ideal travelling home, and downsizes her life to a functional manageability so that she can rest as she needs to each and every day.

THAT's what a battle fatigued soldier does.

There probably is more that I "could" get done each day, but not without a cost. I ended up spending a frightening week in the hospital last Thanksgiving with a very serious life-threatening situation precisely because I had been pushing myself too hard for too long...and it nearly killed me.

So, no...I'm not going to force myself to push through this exhaustion...and I will get to the trailer work as soon as I can reasonably get motivated and moving around today.

My life is here...my life is now.

Yup! This is my life. So, I no longer put my needs on hold in order to chase these "after I" carrots that do nothing to help me further my goals, but always leave me feeling drained and depressed.

So, today I can be kind and gentle with my myself by understanding that I am doing the absolute very best that I can do today...given how exhausted I feel. And I will get done what I can reasonably get done today, but I'm not going to sacrifice my needs just to cross a few more things off of my list.

This list of things that need to be done before I leave WILL all get done...but I will also enjoy the process of the journey along the way...even if it means that it takes me a few extra days to do so.

This, right here....this morning after an exhausting sleepless night....this is my life, too...so what I get done today is good enough for me...

Fear Mongering

I have a friend who is in the early stages of her personal liberation from an oppressive environment, and she's (rightfully) feeling scared. And our dialogue this morning helped me to understand that there are essentially two different types of feeling scared: (Genuine) Fear and Fear Mongering.

How to tell the difference is simple.

When we are speaking in statements of facts (e.g., I do not have enough money to pay my bills, my tires are nearly bald, I have a pain in my stomach that won't go away), we are speaking the truth of what is. And they are situations that can make a person (rightfully) feel scared. But these facts can also be addressed directly with a tangible solution.

Genuine Fear is our hardwired safety protective mechanism that helps to keep us as safe as possible from threats that are real.

But when we are speaking in sentences that start off with, "What if...?," these signify fear mongering, because they're not based on fact, they are based on hypothetical possibilities. And these have no solutions, no way to resolve what makes us feel scared, and so the fear just keeps mulling around,  generating even MORE fear. 

Fear Mongering are the thoughts that make us feel crazy and stop us from doing what we want to do.

This is important for me to remember as I venture off into this life of travel and adventure, because there will be a great deal of "risk management" involved each and every day

For me, the big fear trigger du jour is the trailer brakes issue. When I line up all of the facts, one picture emerges. But the very long list of "what if?" possibilities of what could happen, well, this list will only serve to drive me crazy to think about, and make me so afraid of what might happen that I won't ever leave my front door!

The bottom line is that I am not ever going to be able to predict every possible scenario and plan the safest preventive measure. And I can't let all of this internal fear mongering make my choices for me, either. I will simply do the best with what I have available to me at the time, and move forward in spite of the risks involved, because no matter what I do, life offers no guarantees.

The Share Button

I've spent a few days processing the subtle intricacies of Facebook privacy (through my Bitstrips processing, of course!), and I have finally settled on the unwitting culprit: it's the "share" button.

The "share" button is the underlying source of the problem with privacy in Facebook.

The button is right there. And, with a click of the button our information is off and running through the virtual world gone viral. But the button itself isn't the real problem, because share buttons don't share information, people do...lol.

The problem isn't the button itself...the problem is what the share button represents.

If I were having a face to face conversation over tea in someone's home, there wouldn't be a free-floating "share" button looming beneath our words (or the family pictures hanging upon the walls). No, there wouldn't. And, we would not ever share this information without someone's permission.

The problem is that the share button in Facebook gives permission to share what people say and the pics they post without having to ask for their permission. It's an implied permission to share...something that we would never do in real life, yet there it is...the one click permission for guilt-free sharing of other people's information...lol.

It's Facebok...it's what Facebook is...it's what Facebook does.

And, I don't have a problem with what Facebook is OR does, in and of itself. I post information about my life precisely so that friends and family CAN share what I post...lol. But does this implied permission to share extend beyond Facebook? That has been my scruff, of course...that someone published 4 of my pics in a non-Facebook newsletter without even asking me if it were ok. I would have said yes, but that honestly is not the point.

The share button has caused me to reflect deep and hard about how the world has become "trained" by social media that it is somehow alright to share other people's personal information without their permission. And, I don't like what it's doing to human relationships. I also don't like how desensitized I, myself, have become to the use of this great and powerful share button of Oz.

As for me, I will keep my eye on this pervasive free floating share button in the conversations that I have (both in e- and real-world contexts). And, I will be much more cautious about what I post, and who I grant access to view what I post, because I am not in control of how other people use this share button with MY personal information.

Internal GPS

Today I found an old key chain with a floating compass on it. I thought it would be cool to have the compass on my current key chain...but, upon further inspection decided that a compass with no sense of bearings would NOT be a good symbol of my new life direction...lol.

The compass didn't work!

That's the trouble with relying on information outside of us...and, if I followed the direction on THIS compass, I would most certainly never get where I'm headed, and probably end up just walking in circles. Sometimes we need some external help, but we also need to rely on our internal GPS.

This compass went bye-bye today...lol.

I think the hardest thing to do in life is to learn to trust our own internal guidance system. I live in a world where experts on every corner are trying to make a living by telling the world how everyone is supposed to live their lives. Entire industries are built on this model, and the basic premise is to undermine individual empowerment and critical thinking skills.

Where would the beauty industry be if everyone simply accepted themselves as they are, flaws and all?

Road maps created by those who have travelled before us from what they've learned from the experience is wonderful...but we still need to stake out own choices about which roads we take (or not), as well as how we travel the journey.

My mind is flooded right now with a whirlwind of internal voices causing uncertainty and hesitance...so, I am having to sort and downsize this part of my life, as well. And, learning how to trust my internal GPS is the hardest part of all...but it's the only compass that will get me to where I need to be...

Cross Roads

It's nearly 1 in the afternoon, and I feel immobilized. I have downsized my life into the 10x10 storage unit...I have built all of the major structural pieces for the inside of the trailer...I have envisioned a completely different way of doing my life....but now I am at a point where my life experience no longer informs my choices, and I feel paralyzed.

I don't have enough information to reasonably predict the outcome, so I am afraid to take the next step.

The next step involves the securing of the structure, and I just don't know...I am well beyond my knowledge and experience here, because I'm dealing with forces that are just not relevant in a static box. This box will vibrate, twist, and jolt in ways that make standard ways of  securing obsolete...so, I feel paralyzed....and I'm not accustomed to not knowing.

What if I fuck this up? I have invested a large chunk of my tiny bit of capital to buy this new home, so I can't just start over if I shred the plywood. Yes, that would be the worst expected outcome...that the bolts are yanked out...that the butterfly clamps are sheered off by the jolting forces...that the internal structure completely collapses into a pile of debris...and I no longer have a safe and sacred home.

Wow! That really is a worst case scenario!

If I just do what Patty suggests (and put everything into totes) then it's still functional, and I am essentially guaranteed success. To take the next step of MY plan is taking a huge risk...because totes I know...I don't know securing stuff to a box on wheels!

Yes, that's true...manifesting your vision IS the bigger risk. So, if the worst case scenario happens....and it could...then you will treat it like you would any other disaster (natural or choice-created). You will sift through the rubble...retrieve what remains viable...and recreate a new vision that incorporates what you learn from this....because there really is NO way to know how your vision will actually work out unless you try.

The only way to find out how this will turn out is to step into the unknown...to risk everything for the vision and the dream.

So, the question becomes, Do you want the safe, guaranteed option? Or, Do you want to risk everything for the manifestation of your dream home? And, can you live with hearing the words "I told you so!" if your choice to risk everything for your vision actually does end up in a pile of debris and shredded wood?

I don't know...I need to sit with all of this and process through. Just for today I can go to the storage and sort through what's left, and see if I can find the courage to take this next step...

Yes, you can...

Self Love

I live in a world where I'm not really allowed (at least not publicly) to love my self. To openly admit to the world that I am the most amazing and beautiful person I know would be viewed by "the world" as narcissism at its worst...lol.

Narcissitic, arrogant, cocky, blah, blah, blah...

But, the more I think about the statement, "I am the most amazing and beautiful person that I know," I realize that this statement is absolutely at the core of self-love!

How could it not be?

How can I NOT be the most amazing and beautiful person that I know? I'm really the ONLY person that I am capable of knowing directly...I may "know" other people, but it's really a "knowing about" them, rather than knowing them. The only person I can ever truly know is myself! So, of course I would be the most amazing and beautiful person that I know!

I AM the most amazing and beautiful person that I can ever truly know!

If I had a daughter today, I would raise her from day one to know, without doubt, that she is the most amazing and beautiful person she will ever know. And she would feel the depth of that truth with every waking breath (or, at least that would be my goal). And in those moments when she forgot, I would remind her of that truth until she didn't need to be reminded any more.

We need to remind each other how amazing and beautiful we are, because even if we know this truth, it's very easy to forget. And the people around us, well, they don't remember to remind us of that truth, either. So we end up walking around our world thinking other people are more amazing and beautiful than we are...and we start making decisions based on what these other "more amazing and beautiful" people think about us and what we should do with our lives (and feeling like crap about ourselves because of it).

But nobody knows me as well or as deeply and truly as I know myself...nobody. So, how the hell can anyone else make decisions about me or my life for me?

To love my self is to feel the deepest truth that I really am the most amazing and beautiful person that I know...the only person that I can ever truly know...and knowing this truth changes everything...