2016 has been a challenge so far. It's hasn't been atrociously difficult but there have been some bumps in the road. There has been some losses, some battles, and some terribly anxious moments. They are also consistently spread out through the months. Unlike previous years, there were blocks of time where I might have been going through something but this year it feels like this it's a running theme. I am more negative this year in general. It's funny how at the very end of 2015 I spent the day on my own to celebrate the new year coming in. Spiritually, I felt I need that space and freedom around me. I thought that I would be welcoming a joyful and fruitful year because 2015 was incredible. It's very ironic or maybe the expectations were too high and naturally disappointment follows. You also never know what is around the corner. As this year has brought up some difficult circumstances and my overall general emotional state is not at it's best there has also been huge dissapointments towards at myself. I am disappointed for not being able to do more, to be more for others and to do more for myself. But I have resolved that this is a year for me to take things slow and do the best I can where I am. I will try my hardest to give but if I can't, I just can't.
Though for some perspective, there have also been great things this year and it's also only March, or near end of March. It's too soon to write the whole year off. But it's been up and down, up and down. And at times I felt despair, loneliness, frustration, desperation, sadness and fear. Lots of negative feelings. I have also felt elation, excitement, hope, accomplishment, wonder and awe. It's been so up and down for me I'm starting to wonder if I am bipolar. But I feel like what it truly happening is a crop up of emotions that I have not worked through are blossoming because circumstances have provided the fertile grounds for them to bloom and hopefully be released.
In the past couple of years I've worked very hard on my awareness and for the most part it has only brought good things to my life. But, on the other hand, I sometimes feel like I have to be happy and always positive. So when something knocks me off my feet, it's hard to get up immediately and be that person again. I've forgotten what it feels like to be sad or negative for long periods of unwavering time. Recently, I had to give into the fact that the negative feelings I have are real and I can't ignore them. They are there for a reason. How I use and interpret them is important though. The most common feelings that have been coming through recently are resentment, anger and regret and guilt. They are often directed both myself and others. I have also been feeling this is an unfair world, a world where there is no insurance you can buy to protect you from. Then I also feel disappointment from the fact that no matter how hard I try to change, I am reverting to the same person with the same reactions and same fears. I see a side of myself I don't like. Then I wonder which is my true self? Is my true self the one with all the emotions bubbling under the surface or is my true self that state of peace and happiness I work so hard at accomplishing? All I can say is that I am not a Buddha. It's hard for me to turn the other cheek and I can't pretend that what others do is not hurtful. Recent circumstances made me think about a person in my life that once told me they don't think people really change. At that time I thought that people changed if they wanted to and if they took their life lessons seriously. Now I'm starting to wonder. Maybe it's true. Maybe you can try all your life to be a particular kind of loving saint, one that never gets hurt, offended, or angry, one that always takes the high road and acts with love and compassion but it's all but a futile journey because you are human and you will fail... at least once in a while.
But now it's been a day and a half and though these thoughts crop up I am now cooling down and sitting here thinking that what someone has done to me is no different that what I have done to others in the past. So someone has hurt me, they have bruised my ego and they have crossed my personal boundaries. I can feel hurt. I can feel pain. But to be honest, I have done the same exact things to others. This is what I realized after sitting around in negativity for 1.5 days. I have done the same things to others. And did I feel bad about it? Yes. Did I want to hurt them? No. Did I know what I was doing? No. Did I feel like I had any other options at the time? No. I was just trying to make myself feel better because I was in pain. I know this world can be a dark place sometimes and we do whatever it takes to make it a warmer place for ourselves. Why do I get to sit in judgment? Whether it ends up hurting someone is not a consequence we are thinking about. I need to forgive those who have hurt me because I need to forgive myself and I need to replace it with understanding and compassion. We are all human. We don't always do the right things. In fact, we often do the wrong things. Nothing makes me immune from being on the other side. What comes around goes around. We call that Karma. I deserve to be loved, to be respected and to be treated fairly as does anyone else but I also deserve compassion when I am making desperate choices and so does someone else. Afterall, those choices come from a dark place where there is no light. Sometimes it feels like there is no other choice. Like The Arcade Fire said "we are just a million little gods causing rain storms, turning every good thing to rust. That's why we just have to adjust." Something like that...
I was getting pretty down and out and hating the world for a hot minute and looking for validation of my negative feelings from outside myself. I wanted a harem of anger. I wanted a revolution but I am no Hilter. I can't gather a crowd of hate. All my friends are also extremely spiritual and have worked hard on their own demons. My demons weren't going to drag them down. And even if I had my crowd of hate it would help little. It would just stoke a fire and when the fire burnt out the pain would still be there. Sometimes you just need to sit with yourself and let the feelings pass. We are all guilty of something. We have all been unkind, selfish, and hurt others intentionally and unintentionally in the past. This is the way the world goes around. The cycle of pain has to stop within myself first before i expect it of others. There is so much negativity in the world that if I dived into this ocean I would never get out. I found some online posters about depression and man are they accurate. They truly reflect the hurt. I had gone through a painful journey many years ago and remember the numbness I felt. I felt like I was an alien in this world. I couldn't smile genuinely, I couldn't pay attention to conversations, I couldn't laugh with my friends without really faking it. It was a rough time. It's hard to be an imposter. I was stuck in my mind and I couldn't leave the past alone. Though I'm past that dark place it will always be a part of me now and I will fall down that pit again. But I can't live in that hole for very long because I built myself ladders and I left a flashlight down there because I desperately learned my own way out. Today for a hot minute I felt like I was there again and then, snap yo' fingers, I came out. I am so grateful for that. The fact that I am here now in a state of peace is a sign that I have grown from all these lessons. The old stories are lessons, but not every story is the same but still the shadows cast far and wide. We need to walk away from the past as it may serve to teach you lessons you but if you take those lessons literally they can hurt you. I am hoping that writing out this story has opened up room in my heart so I can let it go. I don't want to be angry or hurt anymore. And I don't want to continue this cycle of throwing daggers and pain down the time space continuum. Maybe, for once, this pain will teach me to do things differently, rather than just think differently, act differently to save myself and others from further pain.
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