Good morning SLAYER! One of the happiest moments in life is when you find the courage to let go of what you cannot change.
New blog goes up Sunday, until then… SLAY on!
life on life’s terms
I Don’t Want To Feel What I Feel
I stepped on this path over 13 ½ years ago, and much of what got me to this path was not wanting to feel my feelings. At first it started with not wanting to feel bad, or different, or less than, disappointed, or unsafe, but as my disease grew, and I continued to stuff my feelings down, I got to the point that I didn’t want to feel anything, even the good. The good, toward the end, was worse than the bad, because I didn’t feel like I deserved the good, so when a good feeling crept in it was immediately followed with guilt, and, fear that something bad was going to quickly come because I didn’t deserve to feel good. Much of the work I have done in recovery has focused on feeling my feelings, all feelings, acknowledging them, giving myself permission to have them, and letting them go. It has been many years since I have been challenged the way I am right now with not wanting to feel.
There has been an ongoing issue with a neighbor, a neighbor, ironically, who suffers from mental illness, and appears to be self-medicating with an illegal substance that affects our home and our own mental health greatly. We have tried through different channels to address this situation and it was decided on, through council, that our best option is to remove ourselves from the situation altogether. This, brought up a lot of feelings. And even though I am an advocate for everything I talk about here at State Of Slay™ I am still human and the feelings that came up knocked me off my feet.
I’ve really struggled, this week in particular, and I realized that since dealing with this issue next door, something that has been so upsetting and traumatizing that I may actually have some emotional damage from it, and, alongside that, the feeling of anger, frustration, and grief at having to leave a home we love because of someone else’s illness. Again, I can see the irony in this, as I was once, very much like this person next door, was living inside the darkness of my disease, although, never brought my disease to someone’s front door and into their home the way this person has. And as a result, I’ve had a really difficult time through this. I struggled in a way I haven’t for a long time and there were moments in my struggle that scared me. And, it’s interesting being so open about mental health and an advocate for self-care and positive thinking, because I almost didn’t give myself permission to feel what I was feeling, and, to not want to feel it. Having been on this path for so long I have many safety nets in place, and, ultimately know what to do to get myself back on track, openly admitting this to someone I love and trust was a big first step and eased a lot of the shame around it, and digging into the foundation I have built has gotten me on stronger footing already, but it was a bit of scary week. I think, also, having this all come during Suicide Prevention Day and this month of awareness also brought up some old feelings and gave my disease a little bit of a soap box to stand on. I am grateful that I know better to listen, but those all too familiar feelings came up, and they felt awful.
My point for sharing this today is that no matter who you are, how far you’ve come, or what you use for voice for out in the world, you are allowed to feel, whatever that may be, and if those feelings bring you to a place that scares you or gives you concern, reach out to someone and share with them, and do the things you need to do to get yourself back to where you feel safe and at your best. Life does has it’s ups and downs, and most of it is beyond our control, accepting life on life’s terms and doing our best to navigate the twists and turns is all we can do, sitting in our hurt, or hate, or anger, and not accepting the truth only hurts us more. Today I will work on seeing the silver lining in all of this, of what I can learn and take away from my pain, and to use it to shine a light for others who may be feeling the same. SLAY on!
SLAY OF THE DAY: Do you allow yourself to feel your feelings? How do you do that? Do you share how you feel with others? If not, why not? If yes, do you have a circle of friends or people you trust you can be open and honest with? It’s OK to feel, you are entitled to have feelings, but what’s not OK is letting them dictate how your day is, or life is, or your value as a human being. Feelings are great indicators of what is really going on, they are triggered by memories or situations from our past, and can tell us a great deal about where are mental and spiritually. Let yourself feel and then set those feelings free, thanking them for showing you what you needed to see.
S – self L – love A – appreciate Y – you
Hear Your Own Complaints
I know for myself that no matter how bad I might complain about something, or feel that something is, it never warrants me going to back to the way I lived my life before. As I always remind myself, my worst days today are still better than my best days back then, but my mind can try to convince me when I’m angry, lonely or tired, that how I’m feeling in that moment will not change, I’m grateful to know that it will. Life ebbs and it flows, nothing lasts forever, things always passes, and I know, from talking to those who have slid back to their old way of life, that there is nothing good waiting for me there, and likely what is waiting is worse than where I left it, and it was really bad. I need to put things into perspective and use the experience I’ve had on this path to remind myself to stay right where I am and not go back, and any thoughts of going back are my illness trying to lure me back to where I came from, they’re not truths. No burdens, disappointments, blows to my pride or ego, or loss is worth going back to my old way of life. And if I harbor those thoughts and not let them go I’m at risk of sliding back, so I know I have to learn to live life as it comes, to not get stuck in negative thinking and to let go of anything that could potentially pull me back, recognizing that my complaining could be the gateway to the way I used to be.
It is up to us to keep ourselves in check, to stay positive, live in the light, and to stay in gratitude, no matter what is going on. Ultimately, even when we’re going through things that challenge us, we still have many things to be grateful for, so when I find myself in one of those places I know I need to double-down on my gratitude and focus on the positive, from that place I know I won’t slide back, and from that place I can keep track of what’s really important in my life and not what my head tells me is. I also have to be aware of the patterns of my thinking, what triggers those negative thoughts and sets me off in the wrong direction, and listen for those same complaints, and that tone I’ve heard before, always remembering that as I’ve gotten better, my illness or disease has been learning what I have, so it’s using that information and trying to find the work-around while I’m working to stay well and continue to grow.
It’s important to listen to ourselves and our own complaints. To recognize the ones we’ve heard before, or even the tone of our complaining to identify what may be setting us off in that direction. We are typically so quick to judge others when they complain but we don’t call ourselves out in the same way and pin-point the true source of the problem, which may be, that there is no problem, sometimes we make problems when there aren’t any because we’re more used to having them than not, and it’s uncomfortable to live without them, but we must learn. We always need to be rigorously honest with ourselves, about ourselves, to make sure we stay on the path that allows us to be our best selves. When we listen, we learn, and when we have knowledge, we are can do anything. SLAY on!
SLAY OF THE DAY: Do you listen or take notice when you complain? When you find yourself in that place, where does it lead you? Does your mind take you back to a darker time? How can you prevent yourself from going there? What are the warning signs that you’re headed there? How can you keep yourself in the light and in a place of gratitude? Finding the gratitude in your life will keep you in the light, even when you may be going through a dark time, it’s that gratitude that will keep the light burning in your life and light your way back to your path.
S – self L – love A – appreciate Y – you
Never Cursed
Before walking this path when bad things would happen to me, or when things didn’t go the way I wanted them to, I would say I was cursed. Others would say it me too, so I believed that I was, or I would say that maybe I had been someone really awful in another life and was now paying the price. I believed I was cursed for most of my life. It wasn’t until I changed my life and made a commitment to live in the light that I realized I had never been cursed at all, well, maybe by my own thinking, but that it was my need to control everything that caused my frustration, and my expectation that everything and anything would go wrong that made my cursed theory a self-fulfilling prophecy. I expected the bad, so the bad came. I also played a part with some self-sabotage as well to really get the negative narrative spinning that I wanted to tell, and could use that for sympathy to manipulate others and to see if I would get a break because I could get someone to feel sorry for me. Yeah, that’s an attractive way to live. It felt as ugly as it sounds, because it was. So here’s the thing, I was never cursed, I was choosing to only see the bad, the negative, and sometimes created it myself, to stay in the muck and dirt because I believed I belonged there. And if that sounds like you, it’s time to clean yourself off and come clean about the story you’re telling yourself, and those around you.
The truth is, life happens. Good, bad. It ebbs and flows. And sure, it sucks when we get disappointed, or hurt, or slapped with an unexpected surprise that may be hard to deal with, but that’s life, it’s how we deal with it that makes us who we are. I’ve talked quite a bit about expecting the good, because when we expect good, many times the good comes, and even when something perceivably bad happens, trying to find the good in it, or at least the lesson learned. For me it was about practicing some contrary action, which I’ve blogged about in the past as well, when my brain would go to the negative, focusing on something positive, searching for it, even if it was small, to turn my negative thinking to positive thinking. It took time, and sometimes still I’ll slip back to negative thinking, but for the most part I stay in the light and expect the good. We tell ourselves stories, either to back up the story we want to tell, or because it was a story that was told to us as children or by others even in adulthood, but what really matters is not the story, but the truth, what are the facts, those won’t steer you wrong. But it’s always looking at the facts for what they are, not skewing them to lean the way you want. Live life and life’s terms. Now I know that statement may scare some of you, especially you control freaks, I know you’re out there, I used to be one of you, but there’s so much power in letting things go, and truly accepting things as they come, it’s far too much work, and exhausting, to try to spin everything to fit the story you’re trying to tell, to manipulate the facts, to manipulate the people around you. You are not cursed anymore than you are a genie, but you do have the power to make some magic happen in your life, focus on the good things, and focus on getting more good in your life, that’s when the real magic happens.
At the end of the day, you have the power to reverse that curse, and change the outlook you have on your life, let the light in, accept what you cannot change, and make changes where you can, and focus on the good, after all, the energy we put out is the energy that comes back to us, so step in the light and make a plan to stay there. SLAY on.
SLAY OF THE DAY: Do you think of yourself as being cursed? Why? Do you tell people you are cursed? Why? What do you think will happen if you stop saying that? What if you stopped thinking it? What if you just took the “bad” things in stride and walked through it, never labeling it or giving it more weight than it deserves? Do you have trouble finding the light in your life? Why? How have you tried? Make a list of 5 things that you are grateful for, that you cannot buy. When you have trouble finding the light, look at that list, visual light around those things, and yourself, and see if you can add 5 more by the end of the week.
S – self L – love A – appreciate Y – you
