Day 611 – Words

Well. Hi. Y’all? Y’all won’t believe what has happened. It has been two months since my last post. I just read it over to see what was the last thing I focused on. I’m blown away.

I’d like to start with the present. I’m currently sitting in a library. The Downtown Public library. It is my favorite library in town. Not because it’s the most fancy, although it is pretty fancy. It’s big. I believe it’s five or six stories. It has art installations and programs and computer rooms and all manner of things. I like it most because I like the vibe here. I like the people in Downtown LA. They are nice to each other. They humanize each other.

I used to like catching the bus and coming here when I wanted to feel inspired and get a lot of work done. Now I walk here. Yep. You heard it right. I live five blocks away and I can walk here. I live in my favorite part of town. Since my last posting, I have moved twice and I have finally landed in home. I live somewhere beautiful. I absolutely Love it.

What has happened to me, or, rather, what I have happened to, is a quantum leap. It is the stuff I read about. In two month’s time, my life has changed in ways that would generally take two plus years to happen. What has happened is so good that I don’t even want to jinx it and write about it.

Suffice it to say that my awful situation with the vampiric, spellbinding housemate motivated me to move and just about a month after the awful roommate moved in, I moved out to a better place where my nervous system could regulate. Then, two weeks after moving to the regulated place, I got a call that I had been accepted into a place that I had applied to 2.5 months prior and within the next two weeks, I had moved in. My dream home. Even as I write this, my jaw trembles. I wonder if I should post this because, you know, the haters and monitoring spirits are reading. My mind asks why I let them have power over me. Why can’t I be ok celebrating and acknowledging my wins even IF there are haters and monitoring spirits in the world? Why do they have to run things?

They don’t. That’s not what I came here to write about, but those are the thoughts that are present to me. Quite frankly, those are the barriers that are present for me. This deep subconscious fear of being seen as good and successful because I think people, particularly some people who I love, will hate on me and attack me and betray and abandon me. I’m sitting at the Downtown library crying, but it’s not because I’m sad. I mean, I feel grief and feelings that I don’t have names for, but I’m not sad. I’m grown. And that is why I’m crying.

Because I know life has changed. More than changed. Transformed. Transmuted. Because I have changed. Transformed. Transmuted. I wlll never be the same. My life will never be the same. And I might have said something like this before, but this time is different. It is different because I am different. I am here.

How can I explain what it means to be here? A way I can explain it is by explaining what it has felt like before. Before, for a long time, I have felt not here. Burdened. Like there was a heaviness on me. Like my life wasn’t mine. There was always something other than me that was supposed to take priority in my life, and in fact, thinking about myself first felt very selfish and gross. At one point, it felt like there were literally always hooks dug into my back. There was nevery much room or space or ability to follow through and fulfill on the things that mattered most to me. And most of the people that I wanted things from? Like love and goodwill and companionship and consideration? Well, they just wouldn’t give it to me. I have words for it now. Codependency. Enmeshment. Toxic dynamics rooted in all manner of distortion and dysfunction. Trauma fences. It was like I didn’t have my own thoughts. I didn’t have my own feelings. My thoughts and feelings were always bound to whoever I was living life with at the moment. And I was always living life with many people. I thought it was a good thing to be connected. I thought it was a good thing to always live life with others and I abhorred being alone. And you see, it is a good thing for me to be connected when the connection enhances me, but that never used to be a prerequisite for me. I was mostly enmeshed in relationships that diminished me without me realizing it.

Like, I didn’t used to understand what was going on in my relationships in real time. Words. That’s the name of this entry. Words. I didn’t have the words to explain what has happening. All I knew is that I was perpetually sad. Even though I had many moments of happiness in my life and even though somehow I never lost my smile for too long, there was usually a low grade depression under the surface of my life. It was just life as usual, so I didn’t know anything was wrong. There was always some family issue happening and I’d mostly be involved in some way. Either I was at the center of it for doing things like breathing or dating or sharing my life with non-approved of others or telling the truth or asking for a shelf in my own house, etc. And if I wasn’t at the center of the drama, I was at the peripheral, expected to make someone else’s drama that center of my life and support them through it. You know, it is good to take inventory. Like, actually sit down and see what has happened in your life. Then you will see the patterns. I do believe that every blessed month for a very long time, there was always something going on. And most of it was not, “Laydie, you’re so amazing! I Love you. How can I support you? How can I take care of you? How can I connect with you in healthy ways? How can we bond in ways that are good for us both?” These things were not happening in my life. And I don’t blame anyone. I blame ignorance…. And then there was also usually some man reflecting back to me that I wasn’t worth shit. Using me. Cheating on me. Diminishing me. Not offering much. Not wanting to build much, or if he did want to build something with me, he generally hadn’t built the inner capacity to sustain what he wanted. And then there was usually some money stuff. Even when I came into a lot of money, I was generally so overcommitted and so backlogged with debts and current responsibilities and future ambitions that money never felt like a cushion. There was always some low level anxiety that whatever I had was going to run out in the next couple months and so I had to stay hypervigilant about stuff. And my inner life? What inner life? I didn’t even know what that meant. I mean, I’ve been writing journals forever and eventually integrated blogging journals, and I had even been exposed to the concept that thoughts and subconscious beliefs create your reality for several years now, but I was always so busy being caught up and enmeshed with one thing or another that I didn’t allow the proper time to integrate my moments of enlightenment and transition into new ways of being.

And now I have the words. Even in writing this, my mind feels clear. I have the words! I know what happened. And because I know what had happened, I feel a bit more safe in the world now. Safe enough to want.

And what do I want, you ask? Well, I won’t tell you everything yet. I’ll keep some private for now. What I want in this very moment, though, is to reach out and touch someone and share my heart. I want to encourage you, dear reader, my friend. Life can change. Life can transmute. Life can transform. I’m not gonna get on a soapbox and lecture you. What I want is to connect with you. Let’s be equals for a minute. This is new to me. Let’s be honest for a minute. I have been feeling lonely, but a deeper part of me knows that I’m not alone and that in any instant, I will build a new life. It’s not like before. It’s not a fantasy anymore. It is real. Because I am real. Like the Velteneene Rabbit, which I am finally understanding in this very instant of writing this blog. The Velveteene Rabbit became real because he stopped being the object of another’s fantasy and began using his own will to self-identify. It is easy to write about this from here, at my favorite library in my favorite neighborhood, but it was a far away thought when I was in the throes of grief and pain and survival.

What I came to write about today, before being detoured by what’s actually present in my consciousness, is life after survival. It’s not the right subject for today, though. The right subject for today is compassion. For myself and for anyone reading, even the haters and monitoring spirits. The right word is empowerment. I choose to speak to my trembling hands and name them good. Goody Good Good. I don’t care what they did or didn’t do and I don’t care who they did it to. They must have done something good for at least one moment in their lives and for that, they deserve to be Loved. And so I give them Love. Right here. I give them Love with my words. And I give you Love with my words.

Hello, Goody Good Good. I don’t care what you did. I don’t care what you didn’t do. You, too, deserve a moment of ease. You, too, deserve a moment to be without threat. I wish you well. I Love you. I Love you. I Love you. Ameen.

Sincerely,

Laydie

Day 611 – Words