addiction | theotherwomanblog

REFLECTIONS

It occurred to me, the other day, why I have children. Some reasons are obviously self-serving and easily identifiable…for example, having someone to love me unconditionally and having someone to grow old with and now that I am in The Blogoshere, having someone to keep me up-to-date with technology.

But a positive, less apparent reason, centres around the role they play in pushing me towards the ‘better’ me, the less self-righteous and omniscient me.

Mother doesn’t always know best.

For example…last week’s Blog Post was not going to include the real and graphic image of me fully engaged in escapist behaviour. I intended to merely create a tidy, unrevealing list of my behaviours. 4 items: British Mystery Shows, FreeCell, Food and Alcohol. I did not feel anxious or exposed by this list because it didn’t reveal the depth nor the intensity of my efforts to escape. In the readers’ mind I may have watched just one show, while I played one game, while I ate one slice, while I drank one G and T. While ambiguity prevailed, my ego remained intact.

But when my Editor (tech-savvy brilliant daughter) read my post before I published it, she asked the one question I didn’t want asked. “What happened that prompted this Post? You have to show not tell when you write!”

Hyperventilating, I answered, “No way! That would be embarrassing and anyway, I’m already at my Blog limit of 1000 words.”

And here is the blessing in having children. My daughter not only knows me better than most, but does what all children do instinctively…she called me on my ego and my lie! She was right on both counts! Blog Posts have no defined length, but my ego goes on forever!

The greatest gain I felt from last week’s challenge, Changing the Power of My Escape Artist, came from revealing my behaviour, not in list form, but in story form. If I had attended an Escape Artists Anonymous meeting, such a revelation would have been simple for me, because I would have felt safe(ego intact) in a group of like-behavioured individuals. But to reveal escapist behaviours to the world at large, initially bruised my ego, but I soon felt surprisingly liberated. I became aware that my need to ‘look good’ imprisoned me behind bars built by my fear of other people’s perceptions. In accepting that I may now be perceived as a loser…my worst fear…I was no longer held captive by that fear! Doing the work of the soul, definitely damages the ego, but it is becoming apparent that living a less egocentric life frees me to experience the mystery, the awe-inspiring synchronicity of my world.

Repression and denial of that which embarrasses me, not only zaps life force, but is a major factor in the cyclic nature of addiction.The vagaries of life will always present me with unwelcome events. If my reaction is to escape this reality, and then feel horrid about methods used to escape, what choice is there but to try to escape again in hopes of dousing the feelings of shame. A Merry-Go-Round called Denial. But the cycle is brought to an abrupt end when I stop feeling badly about escaping. So thank you to my daughter/editor and to all of you who bear witness to my truth.

ASPIRATIONS FOR WEEK 7 OF 52

CHANGING FROM WILLFULNESS TO BLOSSOMING

“The living self has one purpose only: to come into its own fullness of being, as a tree comes into full blossom, or a bird into spring beauty, or a tiger into lustre” DH Lawrence

I was reminded of some wisdom I learnt from my dear Herbalist, Annette. She suggested I plant a bulb in a jar in the dark of winter and watch it transform into a blossom by spring.

The purpose of this exercise was to show me how slowly transformation occurs. No matter how many times I bribed the bulb with treats, threatened it with punishment, or read it excerpts from The Power Of Positive Thinking, it progressed excruciatingly slowly. The salient point being, it did progress.

Of course this lesson was challenging for me because it put into question everything I believed about personal growth. I believed thoroughly in the principle of Mind Over Matter, which is the power of the mind to control and influence the body and the physical world. For example, if I had the desire to become more compassionate in my interactions with my friends, I would just act more compassionately…easy as that. So any thoughts, feelings or behaviours that were contrary to compassion, were just ignored, stuffed away, and repressed. Mind over matter! But transformation needs the death of the old, the planting of the new and the long, slow period of gestation, before new growth manifests.

Today, when I was enjoying a vase of blossoms from my garden, another profound truth flooded into my being. The potential for the blooms exists in the seed. The seed was not in the ground with a list of attributes it wanted for its flower.

“Let me see…I think I’ll be black with white polka dots this year…and I’m tired of the tear drop look, so I think I will look like that tulip I saw in last month’s Home and Garden.” I’m laughing at how preposterous this sounds. I accept unequivocally that the bloom on a fuchsia will look as expected, with negligible variation.

And yet I have trouble accepting that the same principles hold true for me. So this week, the 7th of 52 will centre around me accepting the attributes I was given, instead of trying to be a tulip, when I was born to be a fuchsia!

REFLECTIONS

Was it worth it, I ask myself? 5000 kilometres, 2 weeks, 10 beds. Why did I have to actually experience the town, the house, the street, the school, the people, where I spent my first 12 years? Wouldn’t it have been enough to look up the town’s news on Google? Check out my old house on ‘Street View’ of Google Maps? If I wanted to change my perception of my childhood in the hopes of feeling more positive about it, why not just try some of the suggestions from my .28 second search that produced 137,000,000 sites about positive thinking!! For example:

Always use only positive words while thinking and while talking. Use words such as, ‘I can’, ‘I am able’, ‘it is possible’, ‘it can be done’, etc.
Allow into my awareness only feelings of happiness, strength and success.
In my conversation use words that evoke feelings and mental images of strength, happiness and success.
Before starting with any plan or action, visualize clearly in your mind its successful outcome.
Associate yourself with people who think positively.
Always sit and walk with my back straight. This will strengthen my confidence and inner strength.

I would have spent the 2 weeks reciting positive aphorisms, instead of having the real experience if I believed it would have resulted in any real, long lasting change. But I know, because I learned it the hard way, that there is a real difference in thinking about a potential experience and having that experience.

My drive towards The Pas occurred with the brakes on…virtual brakes…internal brakes…ones that screamed “I don’t want to go there. Bad things happened there. Dogs died, kids cried, goblins lived under the beds.”

And then I was there, my daughter behind the wheel, driving into The Pas. We passed the town Cemetery where I celebrated Birthday parties. The grounds were lovely with massive oak trees, rolling hills and beautiful grave markers. Nearby hills of sand provided a setting fit for a party! No longer did I question my Mother’s choice for the location of my party. This was the first shift in my perception of my childhood.

Then we drove down Constant Avenue, my family home mid way down the block. In my ‘Story’ about my childhood I have always used the street name ‘constant’ to reflect the constant despair I felt as a child, the constant practising I had to do, and the constant work as child labourer I endured.

But now the street looked so pretty with flowers in neatly kept yards,and shade tress welcoming a traveller to come and sit awhile to enjoy the peace. Unexpectedly, I began recalling happy childhood events; riding up and down the streets playing Chicken on my bike…you know where you drive as fast as you can towards another biker to see who turns away first!

Then I remembered the countless games of marbles I played and the skipping and hoola hoop games I created with my friends Marilyn and Jocelyn.

I could almost picture the walls of snow in winter where I built huge snow forts, with a kitchen and living room, the hills for sledding and our rink in the back yard, that Dad built for us each winter.

Where were all these positive memories before? Why now? What has allowed me to feel the joy and happiness of my childhood now? Why had I clung only to the pain of my childhood? Where was the balanced view? The mix of the yin and yang, the good with the bad, the dark with the light?I am not entirely sure why I can see both sides now, but I hope I come to understand this during my exploration of The Other Woman. No doubt my past adherence to my ‘Story’ contributed to my ‘stance’ on life, the one that has had me repeating patterns of behaviour that were destructive to me and those I love.

My most unexpected experience in The Pas though, was the attitude others had towards my Mother…they loved her, unequivocally. I heard this from my childhood friends and from kids who had lived on our street and from her friends, and from people she sang with in the choir. Why had I held such a jaundiced view of her? Had I not experienced her love as they obviously had, or did I just get stuck, like a burr on a bear, to the negative?

ASPIRATIONS FOR WEEK 6 of 52

CHANGING THE POWER OF MY ESCAPE ARTIST!

We cannot change anything until we accept it.

Condemnation does not liberate, it oppresses.

– Carl Jung

via Every form of addiction is bad, by Carl Jung.

The first step of any 12 Step Program centres around admitting one’s powerlessness over something. But this step presented a conundrum for me. Being the First Step it was apparent to me that the next 11 could not be attempted without acquiescence to the first.

But feeling powerless made me feel weak and weakness is obviously not an admirable trait, so I skipped over the step and have asserted my will over most everything and everyone in my life…for years.

I pictured myself as The Little Engine that Could…do anything if I tried hard enough. And as I am a Romaniuk, I have a very strong will. I willed my way through life, bulldozing what needed to bulldozed, building what needed to be built…with me as architect/creator! Well I did this until my body cried “Uncle” and quit cooperating with willful Contrary Mary.

Surrender to your fear so you may triumph over it.Choose me,open your soul to me, and embrace the Devouring.”

― Simon Holt, The Devouring

So now I have come to believe that admitting powerlessness is more akin to surrendering my wilfulness than being weak willed, I can admit when I am powerless in a situation.This brings me to MY ESCAPE ARTIST.There is a transition point between believing I am in control of a particular aspect of my life or a person in my life and the acceptance of the fact that I am not…that I, in fact, was NOT put in charge, and that no amount of cajoling, browbeating or flattery is going to make things go my way.This transition point can last a nano-second or days or years if I am honest. I call it a TRANSITION because eventually my will is broken, and I succumb to the truth, that there is a power greater than myself in charge.The purpose of my ESCAPE ARTIST is to submerse me into unconsciousness. When I don’t want to accept life as it presents itself, I choose to escape this reality by:

Watching British Mystery Series. American series don’t work.
Playing FreeCell on my phone
Eating
Drinking
Under Dire Circumstances…Do All 4 Simultaneously

For example, when I arrived back home from my emotional roller coaster ride to The Pas, I felt some disquiet, some dissonance. My Childhood ‘Story’ has been safely tucked in my hip pocket for ready access whenever I needed some sympathy, some ‘ahhh, poor you’ directed my way . But now a new picture was emerging and I wasn’t comfortable with its prettiness.So first I hit the couch and watched the waves, hoping Nature would calm me down…when that didn’t work I found a British Mystery Series to watch…and when that didn’t distract me enough my Escape Artist reminded me that I have FreeCell on my phone …and when that didn’t work I added a loaf of bread…and when that didn’t work I mixed a very large Vodka/Tonic and promptly passed out. I’m a little shocked at the lengths I would go to avoid feeling only to wake up and have the feelings there…still waiting to be acknowledged.So, for Week 6 of 52 and for the rest of the year, I will live in the moment as it is given to me, in an attempt to side-step and outwit the Escape Artist.

“Always say “yes” to the present moment. What could be more futile, more insane, than to create inner resistance to what already is? Surrender to what is. “― Eckhart Tolle

Week 7 of 52 Changing From Willful To Blooming

WEEK 6 OF 52 Changing The Power of My Escape Artist!

52 Weeks of Transformation

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