Judging from the last entry, it seems that jumping from quick fix to quick fix has been a failed system of living. But it’s also no surprise that I would be trying it. When you need relief from life as badly as I sometimes do, you will attempt many far-from-center approaches. You will readily refuse to see any truths that may be comfortably sitting on a bench beside you, wondering when you will simply turn your head and see.
originally published on 5/20/09
I’ve always wanted to give 110%. It’s interesting that I think I can turn that off. It is my nature. I look for ways to express intensity. I can’t convince myself that it is unstable and therefore undesirable. If I have managed to curb my appetite for unbridled-ness somewhat, I’m a little afraid to imagine how I used to be.
I will suffer amazing amounts of pain in efforts to succeed and to drink in life experiences. I have two ways of behaving: 150% or 15%. All or nothing, basically. Somehow my brain and my soul are not tuned to those middle percentages; I don’t even notice life at that wattage. Is that why cats like me?
originally published on 1/28/10
Is it my usual conundrum of finding little to say when I am feeling happy and/or content? Am I incapable of talking about happy things? I guess I have an internal obligation that drives me towards a balanced sort of sincerity. Not rose-colored. If I am going to open my heart, it feels pointless and even derailing to leave out the yuckier stuff. Or even if I don’t specify the details, my overall outlook must contain the mixture of the whole spectrum of experience and emotion. I have spent far too much of my life omitting. Either I omit the positive or the negative. Usually this is done to kowtow to someone nearby. Or maybe someone powerfully embedded inside me.
I recently Kowtowed to someone, in the more literal sense of a bow. I felt a deep urge to show my respect and gratitude, and as I had witnessed this sort of gesture in the past, I already suspected what a powerful effect it might have. In this country we don’t demonstrate this way to one another, but there is something inexpressibly connecting and rich about it, eliciting a sense of our humanity rarely achieved in other ways.
originally published on 12/5/10
I would like to think that my ruminations in a sickly head have some application to a healthy head. At least I have a wise friend to advise and nurture me physically.
Lately I cannot blog much because things are too jumbled. I cannot write more than one word at a time. I’m also embarrassed to air certain things. I don’t know where the line always is between things I’m irrationally ashamed of and legitimate shyness or privacy. The shame is probably not good.
That is why it can be good to get sick. You can do more hard-core soul-searching, and weed out some of these discrepancies. I have developed a very deep respect for learning. My first forays into it were more out of survival and experimentation. Now it is daily nourishment. I think this enjoyment enhances the value of the learning. I don’t tend to question it anymore. I don’t bother to second-guess. If I can feel that something feeds my wisdom, then I’m a happy camper.
originally published on 4/18/11
For my close friend Dick Carter, having passed away November, 2011.
You were at my wedding! (Not much pomp and circumstance, but it meant a lot to me). I miss you. Especially when I need some sage advice from a close friend, one who knows things about my life no one else does, and could understand the way you do. I do think of you in the present tense. It actually hasn’t sunk in that you’re not here anymore. A year-and-a-half later. It doesn’t seem very long. Just a blink of an eye.
I wasn’t ready for this. Even if the thought had occurred to me. Our age difference didn’t create any gulf between us. From the first EA meeting when I heard you speak and then introduced myself afterwards, I felt a kinship with you that is rare in my experience. Perhaps a lot of people felt that with you. But it carried me far when the going went rough, both in meetings and in the rest of my life.
Remember when we had an ad hoc meeting in your living room with a few of us guys? Remember when you helped me out (!) with my crazy summer tenant? And you were the most beloved devotee of my music making here in town. You would always ask me about my summer music plans with great interest. You wanted to come hear me and visit me, but your loving curiosity about it was just as good as an actual visit. We did have a few nice phone conversations from across the country. You always had great interest in when I would be returning, in which months, so that we could reconnect. Basically, you cared.
But of course it was your wisdom on more personal matters that I miss most deeply. That I need. How many discussions about romantic relationships (mostly mine, but also some yours) did we have? God knows. And thank God for all of them. I was so happy to hear about your good feelings, both with and without your significant others. I think we had a similar style of looking at certain aspects of life. It’s called friendship. I’ve never had a friendship like ours end like this.
But you were my sponsor, too. I put you in, and you accepted, a position of advisor and guide for my emotional and EA progress for quite a few years. It was wonderful, believe me. Invaluable. It went way deep.
Thank you for all the bottled water. Thank you for that dinner you shared with me. And Cody. You were sweet with Cody. Sweeter than me. And my God, how sweet you were with your granddaughter. Ha! She was one lucky girl.
I’m sad I haven’t been able to connect with Cherry. I don’t know if she has some issue with me, or if she has simply moved on. I loved spending time with the 2 of you. You were really sweet together.
I am not going to say goodbye to you. You have SO not gone. I actually want to grow closer to you, if I may. You bring out the things in me that I should hold dearest. You are absolutely alive, in my heart.
originally published on 4/8/13
Is it not enough to pursue the things which make you happy? Do I feel a true void in the absence of the sad, weighty things? Is it habit? Maybe it’s a viewpoint which needs tweaking, maneuvering.
Maybe I know what makes me happy, but I haven’t had much practice immersing myself in those things. If I only touch upon them occasionally and reluctantly, naturally I’ll still yearn for the other stuff I have become old friends with. The somber, melancholic stuff.
Maybe my childhood observation about my multiple personalities should tell me something about the possible cause of my moodiness. I liked to talk about how frequently I felt like a different person. I’m sure each different person was in a different mood.
I have observed that focusing more on what makes me happy engenders a state of mind which hearkens back to childhood. More unfettered mentally.
originally published on 12/29/09
I’m not sure how long I’ve been catastrophizing. I thought it was a more recent phenomenon, but perhaps not. I think I often let my friends and family do the brunt of the catastrophizing for me, so I figure I am free of it myself. There’s also the opposing trait – idealizing. I seem to have dreams full of that. Not to mention the trips my mind goes on in my waking hours.
But why is it so different in my head, so one-sided, and then when I write or talk about it, everything changes? When I am thinking, it stems from some sort of raw emotion or physical sensation. When I am writing or speaking, it is once removed, at least, from the raw emotion. So you can reimagine the emotions, reconfigure them to help serve a greater, vaster truth than that stuck in your body and psyche. But what happens when I feel I have run out of material? Is there something else which is equally rewarding that I could do to reconfigure the wiring which causes the angst? Yes, I believe so. But there are a lot of deceptively pleasing or fruitful activities which don’t provide the assistance or expressive qualities they have been deemed to. Or, if they do, I overuse and abuse them to the point that they cause more harm than good. It’s that “ize”-ing thing that I am so drawn to. I exaggerate.
originally published on 12/24/09
I was listening to JS yesterday playing a Bach suite. It is so easy to listen to, so direct. It seems to me that his bow is always coming from the most convenient place prior to beginning a note. Whether above the string or beside it, the act of traversing from there to the contact point is simple and non-stop. Then I was listening to JdP today, and I heard an utterly contrary style of making notes. She coaxes them out of the instrument. The act of starting notes for her is laced in mystery and mist. And don’t get me started on what she does with them once they get spinning. Hers is a heart-wrenching and sumptuous listening experience, plumbing the depths of the world’s soul.
originally published on 12/21/09
I have written many journal entries recently, on paper. I didn’t feel anybody needed to see them. It’s not like some instances when I feel the issues are too personal. It’s more a question of sharing. There’s a side of me that just really sucks at opening up. Maybe some would wonder if there is another side at all. It is possible for me to be extraordinarily open. When I feel that way, I still have a glimmer of the closed, private side in my field of perception. Likewise when I’m feeling pent up – I know there’s the other half waiting for its chance to shine through. But these appear to be equally true, valid halves of the whole. I can’t just eschew one of them on a whim. Man, I wish I could sometimes. I want them to be friends, partners, gracefully navigating through daily events and interactions, but particularly internal swings. External events are much less reliable and critical than the odd, uncharted biological hills and valleys which sear through us hour to hour. It’s quite a trick knowing when our mind, heart or body will summon up sensations which we then need to live out in some way. I am sure these are not accidental nor incidental; they have little to do with what goes on around us.
originally published on 9/13/09
I have happily noted that I am insane. I thought they were just whistling dixie when they were saying that doing the same thing over and over and expecting different results is the definition of insanity. I probably felt that I had no way of affecting any change over my expectations, anyway. Or my actions for that matter.
It may be apparent that I tend to shy away from too great an abundance of positivity. So therefore it pains me to say that I made some sort of breakthrough. That I have been feeling a much lower percentage of sadness in the past week or so. My friend suggested I blog, and I do feel my soul is ripe for expression, but it is still difficult to sincerely spit out the words, “I feel better.”
The thing is, I would love to be able to get used to it. Imagine such a luxurious time frame of contentment as to permit trust in it. And if you are as uncomfortable with the concept of contentment as I am, don’t forget that it is my version of the feeling. There will forever be room for valleys and gullies and meanderings along the way. I could not change my essence, right? It appears to be the more superfluous angst which I have been able to assuage of late.
originally published on 10/17/09