mea culpa

I am not a strong person. I pretend I am, and I can play the part as well as anyone, but in reality, I am not. In order to figure out where I should be I need to identify where I am and call it by name. I go along to get along. With everyone. I concern myself more with making the other people happy than I do with myself happy. I live to please the rest of the world. Even if it means denying who I am in the process. I recently found myself in a situation where I bent and twisted in order to create the person I thought that person wanted me to be. Maybe if I could be what ihe needed he would stop acting like he was. You know, it really doesn't work that way. I completely lost myself for a few days in the process. I have been given a few days of quiet in my own head, as there is no one in the house but for me and the kids for the next week. Its an interesting place to be in, as the kids have been in bed for some time and I've had nothing but the quiet I have so craved in my own head. I'm not happy, but that statement isn't enough to describe where I find myself. I'm not happy and I haven't been for a really really long time. I can't live like this anymore. As many of you know I have been looking for work for sometime without a great deal of success. Even as I look I can only think..."What's the point?" I have lived to make my mom and kids happy but its gotten me only to this place. My voice, my light is silent. I know, I feel I am meant for something different, but I don't know what it is. I am not strong enough. Those people closest to me will debate this as I have survived some ugliness in my life, but I see that as a further example that I'm right. Those experiences color my reactions to the world even now. I lived guided by what might be, a twinge of fear that infects my every interaction with those around me. I'm not a strong person, in most occasions I will give someone the answer I think they are looking for in order to keep the peace. Living under some peoples thumb for too long has poisoned my ability to fight back. Keep the peace, go along to get along,give them what they want. I don't know if I even know how to speak my mind anymore. I don't like choices I've made or some things I've done. I'm not proud of myself. I don't think I've done many things worthy of it. This does not mean I have poor feelings about everything I've done, just for the record. I know when it comes to my kids I'm on the right track. But the choice to just do what I'm told becomes stronger and stronger with every year that passes. I have to call the darker parts of myself what they are, and the only way to do that is to put it all out there for the world to see. A wound heals best when exposed to the air. This cannot continue or I'll not survive intact. I have bent too far and completely lost myself along the way. This is not enough. I need so so so much more.

changing

So...today i chopped off all my hair, well most of it anyway. (I'll post pictures later) the last week has been memorable, but sadly for all the wrong reasons. Between heavy ugliness in my personal life and having my car broken into and realizing dreams I have are further away than I would like to believe, I have had a tough week. In response to all this stress, I cut off my hair. I have found altering something I can control can help, at least temporarily restore my equilibrium and sense of being able to affect my own life. This week has left me questioning almost everything i thought, and everytrhing I took for granted. Some people were not quite what they seemed. Maya Angelou said once "When someone tells you who they are, believe them the first time." I chose to believe this person this time and made some choices in my life because of it. I hear a voice in my head, as I look around at where I am, and it tells me 'this isn't so bad, accept it, this is your fate to remain in this stasis you call home'. I cannot believe that. Even as I hear it said, something in me rebels like a hormonal teenager. No, my heart cries, this can't be it, this can't be all there is. I want, I need so much more. I ask myself if I'm greedy to want more than I have.

I feel good though, because for maybe the first time in my life I stood up to a situation that was unacceptable and didn't go along to get along. I found my backbone and called it by name, not sugar coating or lying about it. I didn't accept good enough as good enough. I know I deserve more. As can be seen in my dating history, I'm not known for being very good and calling people on lousy behavior. In the past i have accepted things I should not have because I wanted and needed that person to accept and validate me. I sought my identity through them, trying to become what would make them happy. I saw myself starting to do that again with this person. anything to make them happy. And hey even if this person made my cry sometimes, that's just how it goes right? This time, I saw it for exactly what it was and didnt pretend I didn't see it. I validated myself. Feels pretty good. There's more to come, in the more mundane aspects of my life, I want more. (I also want another tattoo, that will be very soon for sure) I have avioded getting one because 'some' people wouldnt like it. People might dissapprove, might say something.  Fuck em. I seem to have stumbled across my voice somewhere along the way. Funny thing is, the person who triggered this whole post might just be part of the reason I found it. Yeah, there's some irony there for sure. I am worthy, not because of who i'm with, but because of who I am. I don't totally buy this yet, but the seed has been planted.