Day 593

Y’all. I’ve been busier than I’ve been in a long time. Actually, not completely true. I’ve been busy for a long time. Busy doing things I don’t want to do. And this is no different.

But different. I’d like to stop this trend. And get back focused. I was in LA. Sick first. And then running and running in circles solving all these problems that had built up while I was sick…

I don’t want to start there. I want to start with a post I read online earlier. It encouraged us to review the past ten years of our lives… And then think in ten year terms for the next ten years.

Ten years ago, I left the nine to five world. Because I had gotten sick. A different sick than I am now, but sick nonetheless. It was the first time that my brain had stopped working. I had had a major incident at work – I was being used as a cover-up and blamed for doing something wrong; story of my life. I eventually proved my innocence, but I had to fight and fight to prove it and in the fight, I was being ostracized in the work environment. One day, I sat down to do my work and I was looking at my files. I used to go through these files regularly to do work. But on this day, I looked at the files and I couldn’t remember why I was looking at them. It felt like my brain skipped a beat.

And I looked at those files for a long time, and I couldn’t remember what I was doing. At some point, my supervisor, who had been harassing me for some time, came to my desk to do something stupid that I can’t remember now. He asked me some dumb question and I busted out crying.

Within a day, I called the therapy people that I had with my insurance. I told the lady on the phone that I was having a hard time coping with things that were happening in my life. I went to see the therapist within a week and they took me out of work. Sent me to this place called “Work Clinic”. I don’t remember if it was three or four weeks, but me and a bunch of other people met up for some weeks in a group therapy type environment. We talked about our awful jobs and the facilitator gave us tools to cope.

It was great. I learned about how to face bullies. I learned about grounding. I learned about finding ways to recharge…

I digress. Today, LaVerne told me that I looked so different. LaVerne is a lady I met a year ago at the place I am now, which I will tell you about in a bit. She said she didn’t recognize me because I looked so open and vibrant. Indeed, I am open and vibrant, but I can feel my energy reducing, and so I am here on this blog so I can get my mind right so that I can get my act together and have this time of my life be a bit different than ten years ago.

So ten years ago, I went to Work Clinic. It was great. I was recharged. And then it was time for us to have an evaluation to see if we were ready to go back to work. I busted out crying in the therapist’s office, and before I could even ask, she told me that she’s not approving an extension of my time off. “You can always quit your job,” she said, and that’s what I did.

I quit my job. I won a lawsuit against the job, and I haven’t worked a nine to five since. It has been a transformation that I guess I signed up for, but I didn’t anticipate it happening like it did.

I can’t really tell you what I’ve been doing in those past ten years. Some of this, some of that. Mostly, I’ve been wanting to live life in a certain way and then getting sidetracked. Like now. This blog isn’t a sidetrack, but this past week has been.

I will tell you about this past week, but first let me finish with the ten years. In the prompt online, we were supposed to talk about how we’ve grown. The truth is, I have grown, but it has come at such a high cost that I don’t know if it’s anything to brag about. I’ve pulled away from almost everyone who I was living life step by step with, and I miss them oh, so badly, but not bad enough to ever want to go back to the way things were. Things were not good. I was not good. But I didn’t really understand why not.

I know you probably understood why if you have been reading my blog for a while, but I didn’t get it until recently. I was a codependent, people pleasing empath, and that was OK with me. I thought that’s the way I was supposed to be. It made me happy to help people. It gave me a sense of purpose to know that I was supporting people on things. But over time, I began to feel unappreciated. I began to feel unloved. I began to feel under resourced. I began to feel disrespected and even resented by the people I was helping. I began to feel betrayed, stifled, judged, abandoned and downright wronged. There were problems in my relationships that needed pronto fixing, but the thing was, most of the people I was relating with were either not willing or not able to recognize the problems, much less fix them.

And thus my transformation began. Sickness will do it to you. And therapy… In 2017, a friend told me that I had no boundaries. I had never even heard of the concept prior. But, lo and behold, friend offered me a book called “Boundaries” and she was right. I had none. I didn’t even know if boundaries were a good thing at the time, but now, as I’m sitting in a room boundried up, I can tell you that boundaries are great. 2017 was a great year. I joined a program called Feminine Power. I won the lawsuit against my former job, and I was going to start a new life… I had found an amazing doctor and family was supporting me to get health treatments. And I was getting better. I was, in fact, well. And I was ready to start a whole new life…

But things didn’t work out that way. A family situation shook everything and started the breaking of my whole heart. And then the next year, I joined with family again and started my heal the world business over seas. And it was great until it wasn’t. There was more heartbreak. And heartbreak upon heartbreak upon heartbreak year after year. With family. With friends. With men… I became a nothing.

Have you ever felt like a nothing? Like you don’t matter? Like you were never anyone’s precious somebody? Like you are only made to be food for others?

As I began to find the words – through coaching, counseling and mentorship – I was beyond heartbroken to see the dynamics happening in my life. And I got sick again. I’m sure heartbreak did it. Doctors said this, that and the other, but I know it was heartbreak and such a deep feeling of being so alone and so misunderstood.

My sickness became my redemption, though. During my sickness, I was facing another lawsuit – nonsense I won’t even write about. I won this one as well, but it took a toll and it took time. I was self represented and would literally spend 40 hours a week working on my case… Men came and went.

I fell in love with an overseas guy and for the first time in my entire life, I was willing to give my whole self to someone. And at first, he was willing to give his whole self to me. But when the slightest problem arose, both of us could not follow through with our love… I am laughing to myself as I think of the first issue we had…

“Let it all go”, God whispers to me as I write. Write it all down and then let it all go… And so I will. So many things happened, and I am left with the wounds. A jaw that trembles when I feel too emotional. A body that gets sick often.

Somewhere in all of this, I found my way. What does that mean, you ask? It means I grew up. And I decided not to give away all my gains. A friend of mine offered me that advice. He offered that I show up for myself now. And here I am.

I came to a new adventure recently. It’s a private adventure, but I have an opportunity to do many healing things like go to hot springs regularly, get massages, go to healing workshops, etc. It’s a dream come true. Except the people here are kind of rotten. One particular woman has taken a liking to me. She complains about everything, messes up my vibe when I meet new people because of her negative energy, brags about the hookups I’ve been getting us (thereby making the hooker uppers look bad and messing up our hook ups) and is just an overall fuddy duddy. She latched on to me because she finds me safe, and today, I realized that our friendship is not the answer for me.

And this is where my ten years has come full circle. Me ten years ago would have had a hard time telling this lady to leave me alone. Heck, me ten years ago would have felt compelled to help protect this lady and help her have a good experience here. Because the lady needs help. She’s suffering and blah blah. This is the hard lesson I’ve learned after ten years of my own suffering and transformation.

I used to think it was so noble to sacrifice my life in service of others, particularly others who were suffering more than me. But it’s not true. There is a time and a place to sacrifice in some ways, but what is more noble is to do the ultimate sacrifice: Do the thing you want to do with your life. Imagine how many more people I would serve if I wrote an amazing movie that would help people understand themselves and be empowered. Imagine the service if I got my act together and did my overseas work at the level I’m capable of… Imagine how resourced I would be if I had a man to come home to and smile with regularly and if I had kids, the responsibility of whom would motivate me even more to get up when things are hard and to have love to look forward to.

I believe that is what was on my mind when I started writing this blog. Love. Love to look forward to. In this past decade, I have evolved into a steward. A steward of the land. A steward of Love. Somehow I am not afraid of the world anymore. Somehow, even on my weak days, I feel like I have agency. I used to feel so confused about what was happening in relationships and now I understand and see so much.

Mostly, I see the difference in whether I actually like someone or whether I’m engaging because I just feel like I’m supposed to. I can say no… I can follow through on a good intention. And I can receive Love. And I’m starting to love myself. And honor myself… And be myself..

I’ve written a lot, and I’ve left you without a message. Intentions when I started writing were to think about the difference between going away from versus going towards… to evaluate the past ten years and see the growth… and to also sort out and process my emotions and current experience.

Now is the time for Love, my dear. Now is the time for joy. Now is the time to put your money where your mouth is and stop repeating the same mistakes. Now is the time… Now.