Letting Go

Grief – sorrow, misery, sadness, anguish, pain, distress, heartache, heartbreak, agony, torment, affliction, suffering, woe, desolation, dejection, despair.

“Grief is a multifaceted response to loss, particularly to the loss of someone or something that has died, to which a bond or affection was formed.” You guessed it; this CSA will revolve around grief. Particularly, the grief of your life lost. This isn’t in the sense that you physically die. I’m talking about the life that you’ve known, have grown accustomed to, no longer existing. The loss of the life you had planned out, the life you’ve been working towards for so long.

More times than not, we associate grief with the physical loss of life, and not the emotional loss. We understand that there is a process for grief when mourning the loss of a physical life. We are more accepting of another person’s grief when we can link it to physical death.  The thing is, we (as in we as a society, or just you as a person) need to get better at recognizing and understanding a person’s grief that isn’t related to a physical death.

Have you ever experienced the break-down of your emotions? Have you ever felt frozen, or stuck, at some point? I’m talking about being physically unable to move or even think. Chances are, if you’ve ever been dealt a blow from life, you know what I’m talking about. If not, imagine the reaction you have (or would have) if you received news that your absolute best friend suddenly passed away unexpectedly. You will more than likely experience shock, disbelief, and yes – grief.

This same feeling occurs when life deals you an unexpected blow. In this instance, I’m referring to the end of a toxic relationship. Whether it’s your marriage, a platonic relationship, or a familial one, the end of these relationships generally bring about the same feelings of disbelief and grief. I personally witnessed the break-down of an individual in this regard over the weekend. After many, many years (longer than I’ve been an adult), a marriage is ending. A life, in essence is ending. The life that this individual has known for the past 25-30 years has come to a point where it no longer exists. The life that this individual had planned out for his/her future is no longer within reach.

Now, for some of us (myself included), it’s easy to say just pick-up the pieces and start over. Yes, this would be an easier thing for someone like me to do – I mean, I’ve had to restart and reinvent my life more times than I’d like to admit. Starting over, for someone who has lived the same life for decades, isn’t nearly as easy. Hell, it may not even seem do-able at this point. Think about this – the individual not only is mourning the loss of their marriage and life, they are forced to learn and decide who they are as an individual – NOT A MARRIED INDIVIDUAL. I for one can tell you figuring out who you are and who you want to be is not an easy thing. Seriously, I’ve had to brainstorm my life and what I wanted it to be to the point of my freaking head wanting to explode. I’m pretty sure at some point my heart actually died or moved the hell out on to some other, less f*@%ed up location. Now imagine having to figure out who you are and what your life is going to be like after who you have been for the past 30 years no longer exists...

This individual is faced with having to do even the most mundane daily tasks differently. He/she will have to now make decisions on their own – not something they were used to doing. Let’s not forget – the loneliness. God, the loneliness is unbearable.

As usual, this CSA is going to request that you put yourself in the shoes of others. Let’s do better to at trying to understand and empathize (NOT SYMPATHIZE) with everyone – especially those that are experiencing a period of grief. Let’s be more compassionate, be more encouraging. BE KIND. Before you so quickly pass judgement (and yes – this will be another CSA topic at some point), stop and consider (and so will consideration…) what another person is dealing with. Grief is such a complex and ever-changing experience. It’s different for nearly everyone, yet follows the same basic pattern – no matter the cause. Remember, if you’re going to offer advice (and I suggest you don’t, just offer support) please make sure it’s not the same old ‘just pick-up the pieces and move forward.’

So, to sum this up – the moral to this story is #Don’tBeAnAsshat. Shocker, right!?!

Compassion, understanding, kindness, and most importantly – LOVE. These are the tools for support that anyone grieving will need from you. Not your shallow, vague piece of advice to just move on.

Much Love!

#LettingGo #KindnessAlways

Giving Away My Sanity...

Ok, so this one is definitely a personal one for me – I allow other people and situations to make me lose my cool more often than I should. We are all guilty of this, we are human after all. Here’s the thing, WE are supposed to be in control of our own happiness. We are supposed to be in control of our attitudes and our emotions. Unfortunately, we aren’t always so great at being in control of ourselves.

For instance, I’m currently experiencing a Monday to beat all Mondays. Everyone I talk to seems to be in some sort of mood that requires them to respond with some sort of ridiculousness. Whether they are telling me that they don’t read the emails I send, or that they have no idea what they will have completed by a deadline, or just that they have already sent what I’m asking for so I have no reason to be asking for it – no matter that what was sent is incorrect. I will admit, to this point of my day I’ve been in a major WTF mood. It just hit me though, I just had a conversation regarding letting others take away your sanity. Rather, handing your sanity over to others.

In the conversation mentioned above, it seemed a simple solution – don’t let a child have your sanity. You’re the adult, they are the child. When necessary, discipline must be used to ensure that the child follows the rules and doesn’t manipulate people and/or situations to their own agenda. I realize now that maybe that isn’t as easy as it seems. When it comes to children, rules and expectations MUST be made clear. This is especially important when changes in the rules and expectations occur. Once these things are made clear to the child, there must be discipline in place to enforce the rules. Your choice of discipline is up to you, not one thing works for everyone. Trial and error is usually the only way to figure out what works for you.The one thing to remember is that NO child should ever have the ability or the power to hold your sanity in their hands.

Now, for the situation I first recalled – it should be as easily resolved. Yes, I know that not everyone works, reacts, and behaves the same way. Guess what, that’s not my problem or yours. What is my problem is the foul mood that I’ve allowed to surface because of the actions of others. It’s ok to not agree with the behavior and responses of those I’ve had to deal with. No two people will agree all of the time. What’s not ok is allowing the actions of others to change my actions and/or mood. So how do I keep from handing my sanity off to others? Well, for me, I take a break. I take a step away from the situation. Also, while I’m away from the situation, I ask God for help. Usually I’m only able to utter two words: Jesus HELP! This works for me. It may not work for you. Maybe you don’t pray, maybe you don’t talk to God (or don’t believe in Him) – that’s perfectly fine also. Still, take a break. Step away for a moment or two. Take some deep breaths, count to 85 (sometimes 10 just isn’t enough), close your eyes and remind yourself that you are a complete badass and more than capable of handling anything AND keeping your cool.

The difficult lesson here is that we are all guilty of giving our sanity away to others. We need to remember that our happiness is a choice we make. Happiness is something we decide ahead of time. We must be aware when people and situations are affecting our mood and happiness. We must actively try to keep from giving our sanity away. Mainly, because if you give away your sanity to someone else, they are more than likely going to keep it…

Much love!

#KeepYourSanity #KindnessAlways

Wake Up!

I’m realizing that lately, I haven’t really been the best me I can be. I’ve been overwhelmed by stress and anxiety and have allowed the devastating effects to seep out into my relationships with other people (humans as Colt would say).

I’ve been retreating into that dark place where I go to try and escape the depressing realities of the world. I’ve been trying to hide from the disappointments that I’m faced with each day. In doing this, I’ve allowed my personal relationships to suffer. Without realizing it, I’ve pulled myself away from life. In doing this, I’ve become easily agitated. I find myself being judgmental of others (which is the exact opposite of what I strive to do). I’ve fallen so far into this hole of despair that I’ve forgotten that I’m not the only person in the world dealing with life.

To those of you that have been directly affected by my craziness, I apologize. I’m truly sorry for any hurt, disgust, or extra stress I’ve added to your life. This is the exact opposite of the type of person I strive to be in life. I’m constantly pushing for kindness, compassion, understanding and love for everyone. Yet, here I am worrying about Me Me Me. So ridiculous.

Instead of focusing on everything that’s going wrong, or not the way I think it should, I WILL start focusing on the good in life. I have an amazingly kind, compassionate and intelligent son. This child loves me no matter what. He is always there by my side to remind me of the most epic thing I’ve done in my life. I have a family, a wonderfully and amazingly crazy family. No matter how ridiculous things get for any of us, I know that they will always be there to offer a shoulder to lean on, a hand getting up, or just a session of drunken karaoke. I have friends, great friends that I may not see often, but will always be there to shake some sense into me or to just listen.  I have a job; I have my health, and most of all… I have God – God who will never forsake me and will always, ALWAYS make sure that I’m taken care of.

I guess the lesson here is STOP to START!

Stop feeling sorry for yourself. Stop allowing yourself to get wrapped up in all that is wrong with life and START focusing on all that is right. Stop running away from the people that care most for you and START mending relationships and taking the first step to enjoy life with each other. Stop waiting for people to come to you so that you feel better, start going to them. Stop getting through life and start enjoying life. No matter where you are in your life right now, there are plenty of things to enjoy, so start enjoying!

Much love!

#KindnessAlways

I'm a Basket Case.

I want to start this off by saying that some of you reading this, possibly the majority of you, will not understand what I’m talking about. Some of you will find it hard to understand because you have never personally experienced this issue. Please, after reading this, take time to really think about this and try to apply a better understanding towards people in your daily lives.

Fear is part of all of your lives. Whether your fear is being alone or you have an immense fear of garden gnomes, fear plays a part in all of our lives. Our reaction to fear – how we allow fear to affect our behavior – is different for all of us.

My reaction to my biggest fear has always caused me heartache and pain.  My biggest fear is that I’m not good enough. I’m not good enough for the things I want in or out of life. I fear that I’m not a good enough mom. I fear that I’m not a good enough daughter. I fear that I will never be good enough to deserve the true, unconditional love of a man. This insane fear has ruled over me for the majority of my life. I’m still battling it today, successfully at times and unsuccessfully at others.

For the better part of my teenage and young adult years, I was made to feel as though I would never be good enough, for anything. I wasn’t popular enough in school; my grades weren’t good enough at home. It seemed that nothing I did was ever good enough. I was told regularly that I could be more popular, I could have a boyfriend, if… basically, to my brain at that time all I heard was, “If you want to have or be anything in life, you’re going to have to physically change yourself.”

Obviously, my self-esteem wasn’t great. I’d allowed all of this negative in my life to create a fear inside of me that for some time has controlled my behavior. I’ve allowed that fear to turn me into a basket case of a person. Get ready, this is crazy and probably will not make any sense…

The most obvious example I can give is my behavior in a personal/romantic relationship. If I feel that a person isn’t that interested in me, I will push and push and try and try to prove to the person that I am good enough. I will drive myself mad trying to prove that I can be good enough for them to want me, to love me. This in turn only ends up pushing the other person away.

On the opposite end of this ridiculousness – if I feel that a person truly cares for me, loves me, I will freak out and go into true basket case mode. I’m so scared that if I allow myself to truly care about a person that truly cares about me, things will end in heartache and pain on my end. I will create scenarios in my head where the person all of sudden realizes I’m not good enough to love and then disappears. I’m so scared of this actually happening that I will begin to push that person away. I will convince myself that there are reasons I can’t care for this person. I will change my behavior towards the person completely in an effort to push the individual away. Remember, I’ve made up all of these things in my head, nothing has actually happened to cause me to change my behavior… BASKET CASE.

Up until now, this ridiculous behavior has only caused me more pain that what I feared in the first place. This maddening behavior has cost me a couple of really important relationships.  I can look back now and see exactly when and where the madness would start. I can actually pinpoint where it takes over and how it’s affected everything. It’s painful to look back at these situations. Even more painful is the fact that I actually know when it’s occurring. It’s like I’m fighting with myself trying not to let the ridiculousness take over, but it usually wins the battle.

I say all of this not to make excuses, and not to be sent off to an institution. ;)

I say all of this so that maybe, just maybe, someone reading it will understand that sometimes, it’s not the other person’s fault for being a basket case. I’m trying to give you an insight into what happens in a mind controlled by fear. Understand that we (basket cases) usually know our behavior is crazy, we just can’t stop it. Be kind and compassionate and be aware. A sudden change in behavior on someone’s part may just be them fighting the basket case battle.

Also – I fear spiders and snakes. I will AVOID them at all costs.

Lots of Love!

BE MINDFUL

I have days where I wake up and I’m just not in a good mood. I’m not necessarily in a bad mood, just irritable and aggravated. I can’t explain why this is or where it comes from. I have other days where everything seems to be going wrong… my depression is at a high, my life seems to be pointless and Newton’s laws are in full swing. These days don’t have anything particular to do with anyone, nor are they a result of anyone’s actions/attitude towards me. It’s something I go through. Sometimes, situations with other people may add to the stress level I’m dealing with, sometimes it may just be that my entire day is one stressful situation after another. I say all of this to say BE MINDFUL.

I’m sure that we ALL have days or weeks where we aren’t our best. We all deal with life – seeing as how we are all living. Everyone has to deal with stuff, everyone. Even a one week old will scream for something (usually they want food, or need a diaper changing). My point here is this, WE ALL GO THROUGH THINGS, WE ALL DEAL WITH STUFF. Remember this the next time you feel like someone is being rude or mean. Remember this when you think someone is being bitchy or stuck up. Just because someone doesn’t behave the way you feel they should at a particular moment doesn’t mean their behavior has anything to do with you.

The person next to you may be quiet and keeping to themselves because they have a lot going on that you don’t know about. Maybe it’s family oriented. Maybe it’s finances. Maybe it’s personal and not really any of your business.

Here’s a random thought – STOP BEING SO JUDGEMENTAL and BE MINDFUL instead. Don’t go around talking about how rude or stuck up someone is being. Don’t go around asking a million questions to find out if anyone knows what’s going on with another person. Just BE MINDFUL that maybe the person is dealing with his/her own stuff and may be just a bit too exhausted to entertain you at the moment.  Stop being a pest and instead, offer some encouragement. Send a private message letting them know that you hope they have a great day. If you can’t do that, just send a smiley face. You’d be surprised what a smile can do.

Oh, and while you’re BEING MINDFUL, go ahead and focus on yourself and try to figure out what you’re trying to avoid dealing with by being concerned about everyone else’s business. Just a thought.

Much Love!

#PayItForward

That Moment You Need to Ask for Help

As I sit down to write this, I'm not completely sure what I'm going to write about. I just realized that I've been sitting at home today crying. Crying for no one reason in particular and for every reason there is. My realization of a day completely wasted by this non-sense has me wondering if I'm finally cracking. We joke about these things often, having a mental breakdown, losing ourselves to our life struggles.

I've got a ton of things going on in my life, personal and professional. Who doesn't, though? So I'm sitting here writing, hoping it will help to figure out what the hell is wrong with me. Ok, so I've been trying to figure this out for the past couple of hours, between the flood episodes. So far all I've come up with is that I'm needy and maybe a bit over sensitive and emotional. I need to feel like I matter. This is basically what all of my madness comes down to. I need to feel like in someones world, besides mine and my son's (he doesn't have a choice in the matter since I'm his mom), I matter. I need to feel like I rank somewhere on the importance scale. I want to feel like I'm a priority to someone.

What I'm noticing is that when I don't get this need met, I tend to breakdown. I feel rejected, unwanted, less than worthy and the value I like to think I bring to the table falls to zero. Before you all get ready to send over those "you're awesome," "you rock," "don't let others determine your self-worth" comments, just finish reading.

The thing is, I'm not normally prone to breaking down over not getting what I need. I've never been one to wait for others to validate my worth. I've always just been the one to keep pushing and know that eventually all of my hard work, kindness, compassion, love and goodness will eventually pay off.

"Billy Jean is not my lover...," sorry got a bit off track. Michael came on and it made me smile for a quick moment. Back to this...

Lately, I've been under a huge amount of stress professionally, which has affected my personal life. I've been less of the parent I want to be and less of relationship partner than I want to be. Because of this, I'm putting even more stress on myself, which is only making the ridiculousness worse. It seems I'm spinning around at stupid fast speeds and I can't stop. There are no hand holds to grab, no branches and damn, where are the brakes? I'm really starting to think that my anxiety over not being the person I need to be at home, or at work, or in the world at the moment has gotten to a point I can't come back from. I'm seriously considering going to the doctor to find out which of the anxiety medications may also work for just plain crazy and ridiculous. This is hard for me to admit to myself. I've dealt with depression before. I pushed my way out of it, more than once. I've overcome situations way worse than what my current situation seems to be from the outside (damn, there go the tears again). Why can't I get past this. Why can't I do the things I know I need to do and why can't I just force myself to be the person I need to be.

I guess the whole CSA lesson here is that we need to learn to figure out when it's time to ask for help. We need to get past our own doubts about what it means to ask for help and just freaking ask. Wouldn't it bet better for all of the people in my world, along with myself, if I'd just go see a doctor, ask for help and then get a move on getting over this? I mean, I give my all to everything I do. I always have. I don't like being less than, and at the rate I'm going, that's all I'll be able to do if something doesn't change.

Sorry, I know this one is a bit off and different from my usual. Like I said at the beginning. I didn't know what I was going to write, I just needed to write to get my head straight.

Thanks.

The Value in Accepting Defeat

If you’re like most people, ok, well if you’re like me, you’ve probably felt defeated at some point in our life. In my case it’s been more than a few times. When I was younger, less mature and definitely suffered from an immense lack of wisdom, I always felt as though defeat weakened me. I felt that being defeated meant I was less of a person somehow.

After what has been an extremely difficult, trying and stressful year, I’m faced with defeat once again. Only now, I can see this defeat for what it truly is.  This defeat has less to do with my shortcomings as an individual and more with the lack of understanding/knowledge of others. Where I am patient and diligent, others are not. Where I have an understanding of baby steps, others believe in the snapping of fingers approach.

This current idea of defeat that I am facing has required much of my soul searching time. I’ve built a pros and cons list so long that I can get by for 6 months without purchasing toilet tissue. I’m not the type of person to step down from a challenge. I view myself as an individual that sees things through. I definitely don’t like the idea that I’ve worked so hard to make something happen only to have to face the realization that none of my work or persistence has value to anyone other than myself.

I have, however, succumbed to the fact that my own wellness (mental, physical and emotional) is not worth risking to continue to try and move a mountain on my own. Yes, I said move a mountain. That’s the best metaphor I have for the situation I’m referring to. My child doesn’t deserve to have less of me than he should. I don’t deserve the foul moods I’ve been in for some while now. My personal relationships don’t deserve to suffer because this situation has sucked the life out of me. I have realized that not only will I be doing myself justice, but also everyone and everything around me, by allowing myself to accept this defeat and realizing that some battles just aren’t supposed to be won. I’d rather lose this battle and be well enough to win the war of life than to continue fighting (getting clobbered) by the small battle I’m currently faced with.

I apologize for this sounding all Woe is Me, I really just needed to write it so that I could be absolutely sure that I had come to terms with this. My common sense lesson in this is that we as human beings should focus more on ourselves and our personal sanity than on trying to fight losing battles. We need to be able to realize when to wave the white flag and when to let the ship sink. It doesn’t mean we suck or that we aren’t capable. It means we are wise enough to understand that we aren’t good to anyone, especially ourselves, if we continue to let ourselves get beat up by a losing situation.

That’s all I have for now.

#muchlove