letting go - PART 2

“How did it get to be so late so soon?


It is only 10:30, yet its way past noon.

How did it get to be so late so soon?

Here its September, but its only June…”

-Dr. Seuss

So, when it comes to letting go, there’s another side to this I hadn’t considered. Let me tell you where my head is. When I was a kid, like most of us, I had an idea of what my life would be like when I was grown. Kids, working, married to the same guy for the whole time, working together to slowly but surely build a life we could be proud if. Of course there would be fights, but we’d find our way through them. Even after college, I really thought that’s what the world had in store for me, and its what I really wanted. Even now, I still hold out for that dream of what I think I should have had. My actions today are all attempts to have the life I think I should have had in the first place. I save to buy a house, I try to find a job better than what I have, try to find someone to fill the void created when my kids dad left their lives.

When I got married, I really thought the dream I had was mine now, I held the first step of what I wanted, and I could see our lives mapped out together. As you all know, this didn’t happen. The whole thing exploded in a fiery crash and I left with a smile on my face and never looked back. Through this process, I found my voice, found my strength and found my own way. I didn’t see it then, but I still wanted what I had before, or what I thought I had before.

Obviously, no matter what I thought, God knew my ideal was not to be my fate in life. I was destined for something else. Of course, He never bothered to tell me that, but we wont go there for now. I see people around me who have what I thought I should have, or are on the verge of having what I’m about to have, and the envy is hard to deny. I want what they have. I want the partner and the house and the children being raised in a loving and united family.

Here’s my point, what if, maybe I’m trying to get something I wasn’t ever supposed to have. What if what I have decided is my goal, is truly the unattainable goal, because that’s not where I’m supposed to be. God may indeed have something else in mind. Hell, I think hes made it pretty obvious he wanted something different for my life. I have to step back and ask myself WHY I want these things. Do I want them because it’s the life I really want, or do I want them because it’s what I was raised to believe that’s what I’m supposed to want? Could it be both? And if I choose to let go of this, and accept that my path might lie elsewhere, what am I supposed to be working towards? I think the human mind works at its most capable when we have a goal, something concrete to work towards. If I let go of the house/family unit dream, what else is there? Maybe the dream I have held onto all this time is so hard to accomplish because I’m not supposed to get there. If not there, then where should I be going? Maybe its time to let go of that, and see what else is waiting on the wings for me. But having no concrete destination in mind makes me very nervous, like a plane with no radar. It all comes back to what I have said before, who am I supposed to be? I do not think I’m complete as I am now. More lays in store for me. Maybe this is a matter of letting go of not so much my dreams, but letting go of my own drive and will, and allowing God to lead me where he wants me to go. I’m not really sure I get what that means just yet though. I know it doesn’t mean to stop trying. I’m just not sure what I’m supposed to be trying to do. I know I’m on the right path when it comes to the kids, simply because the life I have with them feels right. That kind of instinct can’t be faked or ignored. When it’s just the three of us with outside distractions like work and school and cleaning interfering, being with them feels like where I should be. But there’s life beyond that, I think. At least I hope there is.

I guess at this point, I have to wait and see. Great, more patience. Never a strong suit for me. Patience, and surrendering control to a higher power, accepting that some things are just out of my hands. This goes against the fiber of my being, but I think I need to see where this takes us. (Except for the whole better job thing, that’s I cant let go of. If I don’t get out of this place soon, I’m gonna be on the news I swear.)

letting go

What does it really mean to let go of something? I mean we can all say I’m ready to let go of that and move on…what are we really saying were going to do? Are the bad feelings associated with that person going to linger but your making a choice to look past them, or are you supposed to truly stop feeling the negativity towards that person? And how should you really let go of something like that when the person in question won’t stop pissing you off? In case you haven’t figured it out by now, this is a conversation about my ex husband. Simply put, no one can piss me off quite like he can and he manages to on a fairly regular basis. When he bails on his kids, or makes half assed attempts to be involved, yet dedicates his life to his NEW son and HER kids, well it sticks in my craw some. Or a lot. My boys, who are sweet and wonderful and perfect as far as I’m concerned, get pushed aside in favour of someone else, it makes me nuts. But I’m in this cycle in my life recently where I’m starting to clean house of some of the negativity in my life, as I am tired of it weighing me down. I want to stop hating him, but I don’t know how. Every time he turns away from the children we made, it peels away the scab and opens the wound again. I long to lay into him, unload what he’s done to them, but I don’t know if that would be productive at all. The real irony of this whole situation is his actions towards his two children are exactly what his father did to him. His dad got remarried to a woman who had a son, and his father cared for that child, but turned his back on him. You would think he would want to prevent this from happening to the next generation. Just for the record, pointing this out to him, which I have done previously, gets me nowhere. Like talking to a brick wall. I’m starting to see what we put out into the world, for the moist part, is what we have returned to us. If you sent love out, you get love back. Again, this is not a universal truth as far as I’m concerned, as it doesn’t take into account plain old luck and chance. Some things happen just because, not because of something you may have done once.


So how do you let go of something that continues to grate on your last nerve? I would like to remove myself from the argument entirely, pack up, move away and drop all contact with him all together. But the only people damaged there are the boys. I don’t want to give them the opportunity to hate me later because I made it impossible to see their dad. So far, the turn the other cheek approach is what I’ve been doing, but it only works for so long. I want to scream at him until he hurts the way they do. You know how it is, nothing makes a parent crazier than someone messing with their kids, even if that someone is their dad. So how do I stop hating someone who seems intent on reminding me over and over why I hate him? There aren’t my own personal feelings involved, I stopped caring a long time ago what became of him. But he’s hurting my kids. He’s made them cry, and that is something I just cannot abide.

So I am promising myself I am going to continue to be the bigger person, and be the one who is the adult. The resentment builds some, as he felt no responsibility towards these kids, and was able to walk away from them, without a second thought, and start over with someone else. I take comfort in knowing, the boys have me. I am their stability and their comfort. You don’t need to stable parent to turn out ok, as long as they have one, that’s what really matters. At least that’s what I keep telling myself.

stuck

So here's where I get stuck. I believe the life I lead now is simply not good enough for me, and I deserve more. I don't mean that in a materialistic way, like I need to be able to buy more things, but in a spiritual sense. What always sticks me is the How of it all. So I know I want so much more in my life. I want control I want to dominate my own life. But how to get I get from the inertia I currently live in to the place I want to live in? In life I have found the best way to get from point A to B is the break the process into small doable steps. In this instance I can't see the first step. Of course the logical place to begin is getting a better job. That step has proven more difficult than I had expected. I look and search and get no where. I look only to get 1000 no thank yous. So I get frustrated and stop looking for a bit. I think this job is the first step in where I want to go, but so much stands in my way. I believe certain things only happen in life if they are supposed to. I ask myself if maybe this isn't happening because this isn't the first step I'm supposed to take. If its not, then what is? I don't know where to atep so I go nowhere leading only to greater frustration so I ponder some more and hope the answer presents itself to me. I can hope anyway. Any suggestions?

losing the shroud

So for those who know me and know where I’m from, you know I’ve had some bumps in my past, some of which were larger than others. There have been periods in my life that at the time I wasn’t sure how I was going to get through at the time. I’m going to skip the gory details at this point, but suffice to say, I carry some battle scars from my journeys so far. Some of those scras are deeper than others. I’ve been pondering these recently, wondering how they defined my life up until this point.


Here’s a what if: What if the first time you met someone knew, you pulled up your pants leg and showed then the scar on your knee from when you feel off your bike as kid and proceeded to tell them the entire long drawn out story of the pain you endured from that injury? That person would identify you in their minds with that injury from then on. Most likely, they would think of that first next time they saw you. Needless to say, most of us wouldn’t do something like that because we don’t want people to identify us with that sort of image

Is it possible I’ve been doing the same sort of thing this far and I just didn’t see it? I allowed my scars and my pain to define who I was. I was a survivor of this, or a victim of that and I allowed my own mind to color my definition of myself in light of these experiences. I was such and such a way, because if this experience, or I’m allowed to react a certain way because of this thing I’ve been through. I allowed my scars to be the first thing people saw, even if they didn’t always know the story behind them. These marks, these wounds became something I would associate with newer experiences as I went through life. This situation reminds me of this thing from long ago, so I should avoid it. I’m not saying we shouldn’t use our experiences as a warning against future situations that may have similar risks, but we as a whole need to balance that with the courage to continue living.

As I went through life, up until recently, I allowed these scars to define me. I have grown weary of living under the shroud of what has been. The person I am supposed to be lives just under that blanket. Some demons from long ago stayed with me, whispering in my ear, “you deserve this, you deserved that, because choices you made long Ago.” I chose to listen. I chose to agree, at least on a subconscious level. I told myself I was no good at judging people, I told myself I shouldn’t talk to people who remind me of certain things, I told myself I need to be careful careful careful all the time. Again, some careful choices are needed in life, but not to the point that it controls what you do. I have to wonder how long it has been since I have seen myself without the shroud. This is not to belittle or minimize what I’ve experienced in life. Some of the things I’ve been through have had a massive impact on my life and the choices I’ve made. But because of them, I know better now what’s I’m really made of. I can choose to live under shroud, wrapping myself in my pain and damage, or, I can choose to remove the cover and look at others they way they really are. These bad things didn’t happen because I made bad choices, these bad things happened because some people are assholes and there’s nothing I can do to control that.

I cannot judge myself for someone else’s choices. I didn’t pick to experience these things, but I can decide its time to put it away and move on. I can decide that I don’t want to live like that anymore and I don’t want to identify myself with this shell that I have built around myself. I think you miss too much like that. I will not forget where I have been, because that’s not the point, but I will push the demon aside and tell him to get gone. He’s wrong and so was I for listening in the first place. What I’ve experienced is not who I am, not my identity. Who I am is someone who is funny, smart, strong and kind, in spite of these other people who tried to break what I was. They only broke me if I let them continue to control who and what I am.

I see things as they are now, and I love how bright the colors are.

doing fine, or too tired for a midlife crisis

An interesting observation was made while watching TV last night. I was watching Losing It and Jillian was trying to get someone to see that their current path was not a healthy lifestyle for them, and what she said was “This life, what you have now, you’re better than this. You’re too good for this.” I heard her say that, and it resonated with me. What if the changes in my life I seek are only a matter of attitude? Many of us, me included, simply accept what were handed, and we may like or hate parts of it, but we continue to live it. I am guiltier of this than most people. I have not been happy for some time now, and yet I am done little to actually affect any kind of change. I accepted what I was handed and moved on. What if, I stopped doing that? What if I said this life, what I have now, isn’t good enough for me? What if I said I deserve better and this life doesn’t meet my standards? Could it create a shift in my thinking, or would it simply be another distraction? What if before I get my life straight, I have to get my head straight? I have always been a fan of the ‘little less talk, a lot more action’ mentality in life. Discussing your problems only helps for so long. At some point you have to decide to do something about them or nothing ever changes. Issues rarely go away on their own. Could this insight simply be another road block on the way to where I want to go, or is it a needed step along the way? Perhaps this attitude adjustment is part of drawing the map so I have some vague idea where I’m headed. I think that’s what bothers me the most about this whole mire I’m caught in, I don’t know what I want. And that’s unusual for me.


When I was a kid I used to work mazes from the end, picking my way through backwards. Often I’ve approached my life the same way. I figure out where I would like to end up or what the goal I want is, and then I figure out how the get there from where I am. This time, I have no goal, no direction to begin. I think that’s where the rut comes in. When you don’t know where to take that first step, you don’t leave where you are. Part of me wants to jump, just go all out with both feet and figure it out along the way. Perhaps what I want, what I’m really after will present itself to me along the way. At least I’d have my freedom. But I start to think about those boys just down the hall and I hesitate. That surely would not be the best choice for them. I need to put them first. Of course it could be said by taking care of my own needs I will be giving them a happier mommy and a better example of how to run your own life, so perhaps I should jump. The back and forth of this in my head creates inertia.

Bottom line, this life is not good enough for me. I am better than the way I live now. I have done nothing to deserve living in endless mire that does not satisfy the core of who I am. I deserve better than this, and so do the boys. The have a right to a happy mommy.

part 2

So here's where my head was this weekend. I was hanging out on the beach with my two best boys on Saturday, having this completely Zen moment, watching my boys and other children on different races and cultures intermingling and playing together without a care in the world. These were people who in their regular lives wouldn't cross paths in their regular lives spending the day away from whatever stresses or sadness waits for them in their everyday life. My kids, and other kids, accepted Hispanic, black and Asian kids as readily as someone they saw everyday at school. I was pondering how the kids have it so right and we as adults have it so wrong.
So that's where i was coming from, and as the end drew on my time there, this pissiness began to creep inwards and got more and more pronounced. As I said earlier, it finally occurred to me I didn't want to go home. And it wasn't the kids, we had a great time this weekend. I simply didn't want to go back to any part of my life here. I had nothing to look forward to. Theres nothing in my life thats mine I know I've said that before. I played with so many ideas today, ranging from new ink to going blonde to packing us all up and starting over somewhere else, and everything in between. Nothing feels like the right choice. Usually when i find the right answer, it just clicks in my head, and nothing gave me that zing. So i look onward. I know what wont fix it. This cant be fixed by a guy, or a haircut or a new toy. I don't know how to fix this. I expect more of myself than this.
I think if i were to dig I would find that I do and do and do for everyone else, but rarely does anyone do back. This is not to whine and keep score and  moan poor poor me. Its just a fact. And there was a time I took pride in this role, being in control and in charge. But was this feeling of being in control an illusion? Maybe I only wanted to think I was in control, because it was what I needed to believe at the time. Bottom line here, my life is thoroughly off track. There is only one person fix this. I think up until this point I figured  something or someone would come along that would change this, and so far not so much. I think this is my time to find my own voice. I just wish I had some idea what I'm supposed to do now. I really cant just quit my job, I have kids who need me to work and pay the bills. I can say I'm gonna and think about it, but in reality my responsibilities have to take priority. My kids count on me to provide for them. I cant just pack up and move away, cause it would be detrimental to their well being after all they have been through in the past year. They are only now finding their security again and I cant yank that out from under them right now. So where does that leave me? Right in the same rut that got me on this tangent in the first place.
Is it possible I've been this off track for a while and I just hadn't seen it until now? Could it be said I've been covering for a while and i finally have some clarity? I keep asking myself what will fix this, what will make me smile at the end of the day? It could be possible this is a cumulation of stress from working everyday at a job that deadens my soul. I sometimes spend an hour plus at work sitting at my desk fantasizing about telling my boss I quit. But then when I'm out of money and still have no job, what do I do then? The car loan people do not care about my existential crisis. The bank does not care about my joy. I cannot buy groceries with thoughts about my inner workings. I love my kids, and I love them in my life. They are the one aspect that I wouldn't change a thing about. At least that much I do know.
I feel like there is something in myself that wants to be heard, but i dont know how to give it a voice. The essence of me and  what I have to offer is silent and waiting. I dont know how to look for it, how to identify that thing that is me. I can feel it there an sometimes I catch a glimpse of it, and then just as quickly its gone. I want more. I want to let that thing out.

too early for a midlife crisis?

After I spent three glorious days at the beach with my kids, I came home with the kids only to find a seriously foul mood decending on me as I drove home. This is unusual for me. Usually the beach is fun but home is nice. After getting home my mood went further and further south. Crabby and snapping at the kids and just being an all around pill to be around. I sat and tried to analyze my motives, and it finally occurred to me, I didn't want to come home, to come back to the life that waited for me here. My job, living with mom the stress, all of it is becoming too much. Everyday that goes by the walls seem to close in just a little more. I have spent the day weighing several fixes, everything from a new tattoo to walking into work tomorrow and quitting my job. I really don't know how to fix this. I don't make enough to move out and in this economy I don't feel secure in quitting without something lined up. I've been feeling progressively more and more isolated recently and I think the ever increasing stress is mostly to blame gfor this. For once, I'm at a loss. I feel who I am shifting but for once I have no plan or direction. I need to get out of this rut I'm in but I can't find a shovel. So another day goes by and I wiggle an inch or two deeper into my rut. I need a change. Stay tuned, I'll let you know as soon as I figure it out.