I just went to get my clothes out of the washing machine and smiled to myself as the legs of my jeans and leggings were all tangled up in knots in what was quite an artistic kind of arrangement and some writings of the Buddhist monk Anam Thubten came to mind in which he speaks of how so often we tie ourselves up in knots with our thinking and feeling all mixed into a very painful entanglement. I thought also of how often communications between people can become all mixed up, people react to us and we react to their reactions and often our reactions are not coming just out of the present conflict either, but triggering past frustrations or resentments or difficulties. Before we know it everything has ‘gone to custard” (an expression my therapist loves to use) and we may even have thrown the person out of our lives or they have done the same.
I was trying to write a post yesterday about a conflict between Scott and I last week, it all surrounded the unexpected death of my friend and I got upset as he was asking me to block contact with someone from his side of the military who had contacted me and the person is a go between and we were not speaking of anything at all to do with him, as I told her that was off limits, however she was offering me some compassion in the face of my loss and I was quite alone with it that day apart from the wonderful support the loving community here on WordPress gave to me.
I found myself getting more and more upset with him as he seemed to be obsessed with fear of this connection between us and I was not feeling heard and at that time I really needed him to stop focusing on that ‘fear’ and instead focus on showing me some love in the midst of my painful loss. As I look back on it this week after a somewhat fraught weekend to the point where we have now reconciled the issue, I see at times how useless it is to reach for the love out there from certain people and how justifiably frustrated I get when needs for nurture and understanding are not met. I didn’t feel ‘seen’ or ‘cared for’ by him in the midst of all of this last week. I ended up connecting with my sister over it and she was more help to me and recognised my frustrations.
I am just glad that I could see his point of view and the fear he was carrying yesterday and show some compassion as prior to this my anger and the associated triggers to treatment by my father as a young child and adolescent were really being stirred up and in a dream last night I felt the healing as I was giving a massage to a man lying on the floor and using energy techniques that I learned to move the painful energy and tension out of his body. I see this as a metaphor for my inner masculine and also to do with the soothing I am learning to give to my body in the face of the biochemical ‘storms’ I so often suffer as a result of my head injury and the back of emotional abuse and other Complex PTSD issues such as a voracious inner critic.
Today I am going easy on myself. I slept pretty well last night which was good because I was wide awake at 12 am on Monday night and it was so strange my body was so stressed I didn’t settle until 4 am and then I spoke to my nephew as I heard on the radio that there were really bad bush fires so close to him that had been deliberately lit and they were at the peak of intensity around this time, also a piece of something went through one of his windows or screen doors and shattered sending schrapnel flying everywhere including embedding it in the screen of his flat screen television. I really felt as an empath and with our strong connection I was picking up on something with Gerrard as he is the one of two people in my family who cares enough to reach out to me and I love him so much. I never stay awake for that long in such a weird state any more.
As long as I don’t tie myself up in knots about things I am coping these days and mindfulness keeps my observer self on the look out for when the inner critic tries to diss me and make my day shit. I am working hard on self love at the moment and doing the best I can to actively reparent the scared and yet very intuitive part of myself that got so shut down and actively shamed throughout the course of my life. I know there is a part of me I carry that suffered so much rejection in childhood and felt so set apart, and when that loneliness is triggered now I am no longer living in the present one hundred percent as so much of my energy is captured by the unconscious past and it is that which keeps me so often in prison, or tied up in knots.
Emerging From The Dark Night 