The Daily Struggle…
As I change, I see one obstacle that continues to prevent me from a free-flowing existence: maintaining presence in the present.
The Daily Struggle, I will call it, is one of keeping my mind from being stuck in sorrow of the past or imagined versions of the future. It has taken me a long time to recognize that I have kept myself in suffering by allowing my mind to wander into these two impossible realms. I know I’ve only recently evolved to the point where I can recognize when I’m getting stuck, but I’m impatient to find a time when I will no longer have to force myself back into reality.
Sometimes, I think I want to suffer. Honestly, it’s ‘comfortable’ to me, because I always knew my place was to assume the identity of ‘whipped dog’. And, I just accepted that. I will not accept that any longer. My thoughts of the past, though, put me right back into that mindset… and I think over and over how I “deserve” to suffer, and I don’t “deserve” love, or how the world would be better off without me.
Who decides what we do or do not deserve? Why do we judge our lives and relationships by this imaginary scale of “deserve”? Why do we cause ourselves pain, prevent happiness by telling ourselves we aren’t good enough for others? Why do we force ourselves into continual suffering because we think we must spare others from our awfulness? It is not true. We are the ones deciding that others shouldn’t be “cursed with our presence” because we are hurting and thinking negatively of ourselves… and we do not give them a chance to love us because we do it under the guise of “saving them”.
I want to tell you one thing I have learned: it is better to let others see us as we are than to hide ourselves out of FEAR that they will discover what we think we are. Other people can handle our goodness and our badness. We just have to give them the opportunity to know US as beings, to accept that we are not necessarily ‘good’ today, and accept their help and support.
And, that’s such a powerful thing to realize: we are all flawed, and we are all broken, and we ALL KNOW IT, but some people still accept you as you are. Some people don’t mind.
I think I’ve finally gone beyond the idea that I’m a worthless cur, but I still have trouble with the reality that I have a right to self-love and self-care and that I do not have to endure negativity or insults from others. I do know I should not self-deprecate, because it is a way to keep myself down in that valley of woe. I need to think well of myself, despite what I think is “bad” about me… and I am still learning to do this.
Mostly, I feel like I’m going one step at a time. It’s hard enough to take a new step every day, and it’s very difficult just to keep up what I’ve learned so far. It would be much easier to slide back into that despair, because I KNOW what it’s all about. I don’t have to stumble in hopelessness, because there’s nowhere else to go. But, in this new life? I don’t really feel like I am able to assess my place on the map of my life now. Heck, I don’t even know where I’m going, if I’ll even be alive tomorrow. When I try to understand what this all means, why I’ve had these urges to change (why I’ve done such strange things so that I could change), I get stuck in imaginary incarnations of false futures.
And, I’m tired of missing my life. I realized the other day that I’ve missed giant chunks of my life while I was stuck in the haze of those distorted thoughts of self-hate and agonizing suffering. I missed special moments in my children’s lives, I missed being emotionally present at what should have been important or pivotal moments in my life. I’ve missed love and support and care from others because I couldn’t see outside of my idea that I wasn’t “good enough”.
I only just realized that if care is offered, it should be taken. If someone extends genuine affection, it means you are loved and cared for! It means you are good enough, and you deserve that love (even if it’s hard to reciprocate fully at first, or ten years later) because others can see you as you cannot see yourself. They see you are someone they want to journey through life with, someone they want to spend time with and have happy memories with.
One specific part of my daily struggle has been to look at people while they speak to me, to really listen to what they are saying and respond with a present mind. I still find myself getting lost in my own thoughts and misery, missing half of what was said and then mumbling a vaguely relevant response or having to ask for the information again. I never truly realized I did this before, and I never considered how it must have made other people feel, to think I didn’t want to talk to them. I know it was not intentional, but I do feel like this is something that I need to change.
It really comes back to being present in each moment. I won’t lie, it is difficult for me to stay in a moment, because each moment seems eternally long. I want to skip ahead three or four hours because I feel like time is at a stand-still, and I just want to get on to the next thing so that the day can be over and I can go to sleep. I also have a habit of thinking things like, “How can I do this another ten years? It’s too DIFFICULT!” and then getting stuck in the ideas about all the suffering those ten years will bring. So, then I start feeling very tired, and want to give up entirely. Basically, I cause myself to feel despair by getting stuck in time as a torture device.
I do not want to be that way. I want to be able to appreciate each moment, accept it as it is, and let it pass as it passes. Rather than trying to skip ahead to “get it over with”, I would like to be content with the moment I DO have. This intentional discontent causes me anxiety and a feeling of hopelessness that is entirely avoidable.
I am doing my best, I know that. I can breathe a sigh of relief to know I am doing my best. I don’t judge my “best” by any criteria or expectations now… I just know I’m doing okay, I’m doing it my way, and I’m still alive and still moving forward. And, I see that even when I am tired, it is okay to be tired. Because, I can seize the next moment and make THAT one the one I find to be content.
Right now, I am content. I feel love, peace, and a tremulous joy.
It is a good day in this moment.