Where to begin…for the first time in the better part of a year I am starting to feel like myself again. I have my own place, stable employment and I’m not an emotional train wreck. So where do I go from here? I have had several interesting conversations in the last month or so that have me re-thinking “The Plan.”
To begin with I should state that “The Plan” has already had several revisions and was crafted in a time of utter confusion and emotional instability- hence the need for revisions. I started with something along the lines of “get the hell out of dodge!” this early stage had notions of running as far to the other coast as my little Neon would take me. Thank God my best friend made me sleep on that one.
Then it moved on to “Survive, we must keep safe.” So I focused on my job but in my semi crazy state any change made me even more neurotic and so I moved again. To a place with a little more space and a lot more issues. Finally, I reached “Remember how to breathe.” This actually being the most challenging phase of the transition to reclaiming my life. Without the distractions of pain and survival to take up my waking thoughts and am now faced with the wonderful question of “What do “I” want to do with my life?”
The obvious answer would be to double my salary and go back to teaching. But after five minuets of logical thought I know that is not the answer. Because the truth is that I loved my students more than I loved my subject or teaching itself. And I know that I cannot go back to throwing myself into a life that is empty or diminishing. So I am left to ponder what kind of life/do I want?
In my head I can see a new path for myself and at the same time I have a lot of nagging voices saying things like “You went to school for five years to throw it all away? You want to go to night/correspondence school? isn’t that just a rip off?” But deep in my heart I know that I cannot go back to teaching and I cannot stay where I am either. My life here is good but it is only a stepping stone to real health and stability in my life. And I realize that I could pack up and move across the US and probably be okay now but I would be doing something that I don’t love in the name of money and I am not that kind of person.
I’m not saying that I won’t work a job I don’t “love,” I’m saying that I will not dedicated more than a year of my life to it if there is not an end goal and I think that is what I have finally found. So I’m going back to school to be a Vet Assistant. Other than teenagers my other great life long passion a has been animals. In fact I almost went to college for zoo keeping.
I know if you have been reading my old blogs you’re thinking “wasn’t she writing a book?” and I was and have. But I also realize that I have to eat, and the writing will always be there waiting for me. I know the “real” writer’s are rolling their eyes and rightly so. I am not a real writer. I am a person who loves stories. Real writers write when there is no bread. Get up and do it every day and don’t wait for inspiration and that is not me. All I will say in my defense is that the birth of my would be novel is very much rooted in the death of my marriage and for now they are too closely bound.
There are many things that I am just awakening to. I took my first pictures in months of my bran new niece. It felt good to do something creative but I feel myself holding back. I know I am afraid to open the door. Anyone who works in a creative way knows that whether you mean it too or not your life ends up on the page, canvas or plate. It is the nature of creativity and there is a part of my the is still scared.
This is step one: imagine a different life. I was talking with a friend when I realized in some small way I already have done this. When I used to sit in my best-friends house crippled by a broken heart I would dream about the place I knew I would one day have. I saw an open room with lots of light a large window and I felt happy there. The other day I realized that I was already there. Sitting in my living room with the sliding glass door open to the balcony. Light streamed in on my two cats blissing out. I smiled looking at the tree just beyond and realized I was home. That place I had dreamed about finding was here.
Now I have to dream a bigger dream, one where I’m not just safe and stable: one where I am creative and passionate, one where I am brave and bold and not afraid to try again and again because I and worth it. My dreams are worth it and I still have lots and lots of time to be and do what-ever I decide. I’m about to be 32 and I am starting over- Yay me!!!
‘We meditate on the transcendental Glory of the Deity Supreme, who is inside the heart of the earth, inside the life of the sky and inside the soul of Heave. May He stimulate and illuminate our minds.’
When I was in are school I was always drawn to things with perfect or near perfect symmetry. There is something about four corners and two halves that speaks of deep grounding and balance. Still my teachers tried ardently to express the idea that a triangular (3) formation or the “X” of five was visually more simulating. Over time I have come to understand this concept and the inherent direction or movement that is implied but the odd numbers, but I am still drawn to the balanced, even more.
Why? Do you ask am I on some esoteric rant about visual balance? I am aware that in life we have many reflections of truth around us all the time and for me this is a truth about myself: I long for a balanced, quiet life. I find it interesting that though this longing has been so dominant, my life has rarely resembled it. I moved a lot as a small child. I went to two different high schools. I moved three times during college and have stayed no more than four years in any place since then. Don’t worry, I find all of this perplexing myself and it causes me to wonder…
It is the place that make you feel at home? Or is it possible that my life is playing the 3/5 so that my heart can know that it is my 2/4? The more I grow and stretch, the more I believe this is so. If my life were clam and stable to the point of stagnation would I have ever gotten here? Some of the best moments of my life happened on the wings of change, distinct parts of myself would have laid dormant or withered had I not been forced open doors I thought were nailed shut.
So her I stand in a 3/5 place again. I know what my life will look like for the next year or so but after that…I can see a life for myself again where I understand where I am going and who I chose to be, but its frightening. I question how much of me is real. I spent years trying to make the 3/5 become a 2/4 and only caused myself a lot of pain. Now that I know my life is unlikely to ever be the 2/4 I long for, the responsibility falls squarely on my shoulders to make my inner life what my outer life is not.
I must be brave enough to seek my own truth. To rediscover the person that I was and find out what she has in common with the person I am now. It feels like there is a vast divide between the two but this is my work. There is no one in this life who can do this for me and the longer I run the longer I leave my whole life in that 3/5 state of ambiguity and imbalance. So starting today I will be more mindful of my choices. I will choose to nurture myself, instead of self medicate. I will learn to be quiet again and trust the voices in my heart. I will let myself love and be loved.
Where to begin…for the first time in the better part of a year I am starting to feel like myself again. I have my own place, stable employment and I’m not an emotional train wreck. So where do I go from here? I have had several interesting conversations in the last month or so that have me re-thinking “The Plan.”
many things that I am just awakening to. I took my first pictures in months of my bran new niece. It felt good to do something creative but I feel myself holding back. I know I am afraid to open the door. Anyone who works in a creative way knows that whether you mean it too or not your life ends up on the page, canvas or plate. It is the nature of creativity and there is a part of my the is still scared.
