Wake of Growth

Rekindling a Sense of a Freer Version of Myself

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Recently I was listening to Dave Matthews Band after a huge hiatus of hearing them. The feelings that arose were those of freedom, ease, happiness, romance, and fully living. It was unexpected and it felt so very good. I realised that I haven’t had much room for those feelings in the last stretch of time. I wouldn’t change where I am as I know I left all those other places, people and times in search of something more, or better, however, I do miss the nights where I danced with reckless abandon under the stars of the Sierra Nevadas in Yosemite National Park and just lived life as I wanted to. It’s been so long since I’ve felt so expansive and easy go lucky.

The years that I have been in Australia have been intense and full in a completely different way. Having a head on collision, a stalking highly emotional stalking ex partner, the restriction of going through the very long immigration process, the near death experience of giving birth and the trauma the ensued after, all the while moving from an area that was progressive, free thinking, open, and inviting, to Western Sydney which is nearly the opposite of those things I value, caused me slowly but surely to close myself in more and more and more. Then choosing for various reasons to stay at home full time with our child just compounded this. Thank goodness for my Mother’s Group because they have well and truly been the support that I have needed in a time when I needed community, connection, and a feeling of having people around me who understood me in some way and what I was going through.

Listening to Dave Matthews Band rekindled something inside of me, something that makes me realise that as I continue to grow this second child inside of me and expand our family, that I must make myself a priority. I must make room for me to feel like I have some freedom and choice in my life. I must make room so that I can  feel alive and expansive, and independent, and strong, and capable. When I feel those things then I feel sexy, I feel accomplished, I feel intelligent, I feel invincible, and that is what I want in my life on the regular. I want to feel all of these things because when I do, I live in my full expression of who I am, and who I am becoming.

I know I needed these last years to go inward, to restrict myself so intensely so that I would know the feeling of breaking out of it. I MUST incorporate ways in my every day daily life where I feel more free and easy go lucky, and healthy, and smart, and strong. It is essential to my personal well being. It is essential and it is something that I MUST cultivate because I am reminded now that it is a part of me. I may not be the free dancing young Jennifer that I used to be, and I don’t want to be that person again as I’ll never be again and I understand that I left those places, those people, those experiences for a reason, and I’m not looking back in the sense that I want to recapture that youth, or that way of life, I just want to cultivate those feelings again and let them fly high and in every direction!! I want to be that force of life, that joyous force of life that brings light and energy to every experience and don’t apologise for it, but completely one hundred percent owns who I am and what I want and need in such an easy manner.

This is what I need. This is my intention. This will happen. This is happening.

Finally I Saw Therapist

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Finally I got some face to face help. Two sessions today after calling around yesterday to see if I could talk to someone. I felt the dark wave of grief and despair rolling over me yesterday. I know this feeling. I know it very well since having my child. It was a very traumatic experience for me and I haven’t felt confident to seek a qualified professional as I didn’t have Permanent Residency and didn’t want to jeopardise my chances of getting to stay with my family here in Australia. Now I do have PR and I am working through this now.

The first session was a woo woo style practitioner. She let me ramble and ramble, and that’s what I did. I cried a bit, told my story, described how I felt in creative ways, and at the end did some sand play where I just created what was circling in me and brought it to the surface. That was fun, I always enjoy these kinds of ways of bringing out creativity and to help gain insight. I described what I thought about each piece I chose to add from her shelves of figurines. I chose a mini pot of flowers to add beauty and symbolise the circular path that life seems to be. I chose a native woman carrying a child on her back and a golly wog doll which is an inherently racist black doll that is very kitsch Australian, and I chose these because I feel empathy for them, and in my own plight I understand theirs better. I chose Merlin with a unicorn to help represent how magic is all around, I just have to ask and see it. I chose a happy smiling buddha because I want more of that in my life, but am not sure how to fully detach to get to that stage these days. In the middle I drew out two big eyes, like that Grateful Dead song that goes “wake up to find out that you are the eyes of the world” as it’s been running through my head for days now. All in all, it was a good session and I appreciated having that kind of very soft space to talk about things.

The second session was just a few doors down, also upstairs in this downtown charming historic town. When I walked into the stairwell it smelt like beauty parlour that specialises in waxing, and it took me by surprise. I guess that smell went with how I felt when I was in the session, very similar to when you are going in for a wax, you know you need to do it, you know you’ll love the results, but for christ sakes the process is painful, but some areas are strangely very satisfying and almost enjoyable in their pain. The psychologist was an older woman who I can only guess has hair that reaches all the way down her back, she had it piled up high on her head into a bun, she’s of retirement age, but so youthful and full of energy as soon as she opened her mouth with a bright sparkle in her eyes. She wore older woman nice clothes, you know the kind that were popular ages ago and they’re still in fine knick but not necessarily up to date. She also wore a beautiful broach that coordinated with her maroon pantsuit which gave me a sense of comfort thinking about how my grandmother used to wear broaches.

We got down to business after I sat in her narrow office. I had already filled out the paperwork, which thankfully my husband’s work pays for these sessions so we don’t have to pay out the $175 per visit as the contract had read. I get five sessions with her under his program and I will use them all. She asked me to give her a summary of why I am there and what I’ve been up to. So I backtracked to 2010 and mentioned that after a head on collision that happened just months after arriving in Australia, that I received counselling which was very helpful. I mentioned that due to a Medical Treatment visa I was able to stay here, and that’s in the timeframe that I met my husband. I mentioned about going back to University and finishing my bachelors. I mentioned that although my husband and I both had chosen in our earlier lives to not have children, that together we changed our direction and intentionally created our son who was conceived on our wedding day out of love, and that he is all love. I then talked about how that pregnancy went haywire, and I ended up in hospital for nearly three weeks until an emergency caesar where he was extracted from my body, and put into the NICU in a  plexiglass box and that a couple days later I was able to see him and all of it was very disorienting. I told her that before I was put under with the gas that I made peace with my life because I thought I was going to die, and how I had just left my husband’s hand in this stark white corridor on the way to the surgery area. I talked about how I had been so straight during my pregnancy with everything I was consuming and then all of a sudden I was taking major drugs to help me cope with the pain, and how that along with having to inject myself with a needle to help prevent dissolve the blood clot that had formed in my groin, was the worst kind of self harm I’ve ever known physically, and all of it took me so far from my natural clear headed state. I talked about the uncertainty when bringing home our child, and being all alone in Sydney with my husband working shifts of four days on and four days off, and not having any additional help and those first months were the darkest of my entire life. I shared how when I think of the newborn phase I think of the smell of Aquim hand sanitiser, chords, beeping, uncertainty, pain, hurt, and grief. I shared with her out loud things that I have never shared with anyone else that went on in my mind during that stage and I wept so loudly and it all came out. I completely lost it, and it may have only been in the first ten minutes of me walking in. Progress was being made.

She talked about the amygdala and how it stores all of our past experiences and how it’s like a volcano that has many layers and how when something gets triggered it then accesses every time I’ve ever had that feeling, and this made perfect sense to me. I had thought of it as wells of emotion within me, something I was holding, something I was internalising, something that was there always with me. She helped me to see that the release can happen by changing it to be a volcano versus a well, and to do whatever I need to in order to get the hell out of the fucking well. She didn’t say it quite like that but this was definitely how I heard it.

She talked about how this kind of trauma creates spikes in my cortisol levels and with that comes fight, flight or freeze. This was also an ah-ha moment to me. I know that my cortisol levels have been spiked from childhood due to having a very traumatic upbringing, and over the years it was clear to me what I was doing I was definitely fighting or fleeing the situation. This time around I have been full on in freeze mode. I hadn’t even considered that freeze was an option, and that’s exactly where I’ve been for the past three years. Adding on the waiting for Permanent Residency and that just created a stronger freeze feeling for me. So I’ve been on edge pretty much my whole life and in this last stretch, it has become freeze and now I get to fucking work it out so I can move forward. No more internalising. I see it, I understand, I have ways to move past this, and now that is what I am doing.

She talked about the importance of getting my levels checked to make sure all of my vitamins, thyroid and all other blood markers are normal in case that needed attention. Thankfully I’ve had those earlier this year due to the endometriosis. Oh speaking of endometriosis, she also said that by keeping all of this in my “well” rather that in a volcano, it would create disease in my body, and then I told her about the endometriosis, which completely makes sense. It came on strong and seemingly all of a sudden, and lasted about ten months. After using the Mirena IUD and getting PR, it’s amazing how it’s settled down, but not at all surprising as I’m not as on edge about everything.

She talked about the importance of deep breathing. 3 count in, hold for 3 and release for 5. She said that if I’m in freeze mode and I’m shallow breathing all of my cells think that they are also in survival mode. She gave an extra oomph to it by talking about Taming the Tiger, and with the breathing to clench my fists in the in breath, and release my hands completely in the out breath to signal to my body physically as well that it’s time for this to go. I loved this. I love that this is actionable and we did it in her office, and I could feel the difference. I will continue to do this.

Overall I feel completely drained from today. My eyes are so tired and dry from all of the crying I’ve done, by far more than I’ve cried anytime in the past couple years, probably not since my father died two years ago. Interesting that it’s also his birthday today, feels very auspicious. I don’t want to be that kind of parent and it almost feels like I’m honouring that by getting help now.

I see her next week and I really look forward to it. I am writing it out. I am moving past this. Thank fucking god. I’m so ready.

Self Esteem

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I’ve come to realise that over the past two or more years, almost three really, I have had a huge blow to my self-esteem. There have been highs of course and a lot of really incredibly rich experiences, none of which I would take back. However, the blows to my self-esteem have been a lot actually. Not being able to find a job, even a menial job after graduating was really challenging, and it seemed mostly to revolve around me not having Permanent Residency, but it was hard. There was a constant struggle with some renters at the farm which caused so much stress and a feeling of frustration and not being able to just get other people to do the right thing like take care of the animals. We had a lovely celebration for our wedding amidst it all, but were dealing with this other stuff before the wedding, during the honeymoon and afterwards. The there was the not-so-easy pregnancy. I shouldnt’ even sugar coat it, it was a very complicated pregnancy. It was like my body wasn’t cooperating with me. Then there was the crazy flatmates that totally lied to us and then left without ever paying the money they owed and finding out that they had betrayed us by speaking so poorly about us to our other flatmates who we are actually still friends with these years later. That was hard to deal with especially while pregnant. Then the craziness of being in the hospital for  the weeks leading up to my son’s birth, having to take pain killers, having to some how accept whatever outcomes because my body wasn’t coping and the baby was in jeopardy. Then the actual emergency delivery which was so very traumatic. Followed by the five weeks of hell in the NICU going back and forth not knowing what to do all the while having to leave my new son at the hospital. Not being able to take care of him, or myself at that stage. Then the constant looming feeling of death due to a dislodged blood clot and the twice daily self harm I had to do by way of injections of blood thinners. This was al wearing me down something fierce. Then having a baby, a new baby at home and not knowing what to do and having hardly any support with my husband working big 12 hour shifts, and having zero family support here in the city, and not knowing anyone. I felt so alone and helpless and incapable. Even now still not knowing about if I have permanent residency, waiting for over two years after being told that it would go right through in six months by the immigration department, and it clearly not happening that way. Every once in a while I still look through jobs and am always hung up on the lack of having PR. It sucks. Then all the time wasted with the banks and talking about buying the other part of the farm land for years now and still not being in a position to actually do it and feeling like I just can’t get it together to make it happen.  Also the huge amount of money wasted with the program that I signed up for to build my own business as a way to get around having PR, and feeling like they didn’t have the right support in place to help me and me not knowing how to help myself all amidst the craziness of everything going on at the farm and in my body and then as a new mum. And as of late some unknown illness that was pointing to a cyst on my ovary that may or may not have burst and who the hell knows why the ovarian tumour marker really is elevated, it’s all so unknown. and somehow I need to be okay with this. And all the while knowing that my own dad died last year within a month of being diagnosed with cancer, jesus, it’s been a rough last couple of years. It’s been so crazy. I need a win.

Sometimes, I feel like I can only express myself so much, like I’ve just been beaten down and I don’t like that feeling. I play nicely, I am in an area of Sydney where I feel like I need to and it’s in part for companionship but mostly because I need them or I have needed them to help me and support me through this phase of becoming a parent.

I need a win in a major way. I keep having this strong desire to have my own place, our own house that we own so that I can have a sense of permanency, a sense of ownership, and a sense of pride almost. It’s like I need to grab onto the part of making a home so that I can fulfil this sense of feeling incapable, or helpless, or just not able to do what I need to do.

I am not always so blue about this and about what I’ve struggled with, but I really have struggled in the past stretch of time, more than I readily like to admit. I also got a degree in a field that I am both fascinated and horrified by, and don’t want to actually work in it. I feel like my plans are always changing yet nothing really changes. That’s not actually true though, things have been changing, but not at a pace that I want, and I need to be okay with this.

Sometimes I feel like maybe I need to try some antidepressants, and I know that isn’t really the answer, the answer is adjusting my life so that I don’t feel like this. I am not sure exactly how to do that right now, as a mum, as a wife, where I am. I just know how to make the smaller changes, so I do. My biological clock is still ticking and I’m so overtly aware of it it makes me question like every choice right now as well. Do we make another baby, do I go back to school, what do I do? I feel like there are so many choices, so many options, and at the same time, I feel a bit stuck, a big weighted down, a big heavy in it all.

Somewhere Along the Way

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Somewhere along the way I grew jaded. I mean that has to be the reason right? The reason I am questioning so much after spending so much of my time in this way of thinking. That I would devote so much time and energy into the thought and lifestyle of “following my bliss”. I curated the thoughts in my head, I used mantras, I cut out people from my life, and even would steer away from friends who had gotten sick because they must not have been aligned for something to go wrong, right?

I’ve always been an optimistic person and I’ve always been one to dive right in, and this stage of my life was no different. I had been living in Brazil and was totally lost, I knew I wasn’t where I needed to be and was searching for clarity. I was trying anything and everything and even fasted for about a month on just water with alternating days where I would drink some coconut water or some sugar cane juiced with lime. I taught myself to meditate and would create art for arts sake to see what was going on. This was all back in 2007-2008 and the internet was really just starting to kick off there weren’t a lot of resources like you can find now about all of these topics, so I just kinda figured it out as I went along. A sort of friend of mine said that he had been reading Joseph Campbell and in a short email exchanged mentioned the term “follow your bliss” and I grabbed ahold of it with all of my might.

I made posters with that wonderful phrase and hung them on my dingy apartment wall overlooking one of the busiest street intersections in Sao Paolo. I scribbled in my journals, and I meditated with it in mind, hoping to figure out what that actually meant and how I could use it to help my situation. One day at a friends ranch in the countryside, we ate some “Hawaiian babies” which were seeds from one of the plants in the yard. I had broken my fast by taking them and drinking watermelon blended up, a strange way of ending it, but I got the clarity I needed. I wasn’t a very good guest that weekend, I scribbled in my journal, I drew the fabulous magical plants around me and I came to realise that for me to follow my bliss meant that at any given time I needed to do what felt best to me, even if that meant being anti-social and completely doing my own thing, which I did. I had so many realisations that weekend while I was off my head and it certainly was an awakening of sorts.

Eventually after I was back in the US after my escape from Brazil, yes it was like an escape, but I’ll write more about that later, but after I was back in my home country I was even more lost than before. Familiar people, familiar places, familiar smells, but none of it felt fully like home. Yes I snuggled and cried and danced and swam and stomped through the snow in my beloved Yosemite, and did think about returning for another round, but I just couldn’t. I wasn’t the same, I was a different persona and I needed more than I knew how to get there. I continued to listen to the writing on the wall or take tips from people to heart, and one gave me a tip about a meditation centre nearby, one that had been there the entire time I lived in Yosemite but never knew about.

I spent time at this meditation centre and there’s more to this story too, but I’ll share more about that later. I will say that it was another one of those times where I met the right people at the right time, and forged friendships that would definitely support that stage of my life. I had learned about the power of manifesting along the way by writing down what I wanted and watching it unfold. I noticed this happen again and again and again. I also felt like it was contrived and I came to the point where I actually wanted to be surprised and let go of trying to be the master of my universe. I have still used that over the years though because I know the power of my words and the strength of my mind can cause tremendous change in my life and those around me. It sounds like a god complex kind of thing but it wasn’t, or maybe it was? Is this the heaven on earth scenario just a bit manufactured? Who knows. There are always questions.

So fast forward and I got into head on collision and I was fully into that mode of thought of Law of Attraction where what I think becomes, and was certain that I had created this crazy accident in some far-fetched way because I wasn’t on the path I needed to be on, so the Universe not so gently helped me correct course. Okay, I accepted that and it made sense. Maybe that’s the biggest part of all of this line of thinking, we always want everything to make sense, I always want to put everything into some neat little informational package so that all the pieces fit together, to tie up loose ends and ensure that it all flows so I can continue moving on to the next thing.

When my very complicated pregnancy came around, I did try to change my thoughts, I did try to manage my vibration but sure enough I couldn’t do it well enough, if looking through that lens, and had extended hospital stays, prescribed pain killers, and an emergency cesarean of my baby two months too soon, followed by an intense section of life of the emotional hell that is the NICU. I felt embarrassed that I wasn’t strong enough to handle the way it happened. I felt that I had failed in my own way of thinking and had surmised to this weaker state of mind which allowed all of the heartache and pain to happen. I didn’t want to share pictures of my child that would normally be joyous of his first days because to me he looked like an alien in a clear box with all kinds of tubes and wires hanging off of him, I had failed to create this birth for both of us, for all of us. Whoa it’s hard to confront this truth and I’m getting emotional typing it. I really felt like I had failed and let myself, my new son, my husband, and every other person I have every talked to about the power of thoughts, down. Like going through seeing your child like that and dealing with my own pain wasn’t enough, that feeling of failure was absolutely soul crushing. How could I have not been able to practice what I have preached and been able to do again and again in my own personal life before then? Oh boy it was a hard time.

I see how “thought leaders” in this industry of selling the thought that you have control over everything in your life attribute being poor with not being spiritual. I see them also attribute not being healthy or having an illness as not being spiritual, that you can just turn it around with your thoughts. I think it’s all a big pile of bullshit these days. I believe in optimism and I believe in setting goals and doing your best every moment and really finding the goodness in life, but everyone has the path they need to walk and to justify it one way or another is just making a huge pile of excuses and it may sell books or speaking gigs or classes, but I don’t subscribe to this thought any more and it feels like I am breaking up with it.

I do however still believe that my thoughts influence my life, absolutely. I absolutely believe that being optimistic can bring sunshine into the gloomiest of areas and help a person get out of situations to where they really do have more sun in the sky than rain, metaphorically speaking. I’m just dropping the judgemental part of it. We all get a starting point where we are, and sure enough we can do whatever we can with it, and that’s great, that is fine, that is enough, and things happen in life, it is our attitude that helps guide us through the process but that still doesn’t justify why there are kids who starve to death, or young people who get cancer or other atrocities like this, it’s not because they aren’t spiritual enough, it’s just the hand they have been dealt and that’s it.

I’m still holding onto the need for joy and laughter and fun and time off in my life. I am still holding onto the need for beauty and smiles and healthy living. I am still holding onto the fact that loving someone else and feeling that love back is one of the most precious gifts in human existence. I am still holding onto my way of being that likes to see the bright side. I am still holding onto my understanding that we aren’t really all created equally and that we all don’t have equal ways to get ahead or to progress and I have compassion for this. I am holding onto my belief that I still get to choose in every moment who I get to be and can be that person and allowing change to happen this way in my life now. I still believe that if you surround yourself with things/people/environment that make you feel inspired to be your best self, then its a hell of a lot easier to do so. I am still in total belief that I am here to make a positive impact upon the world and will continue to do so, even if with only my smile as I pass a stranger. I will continue to share love and be love because I can.

Mortality

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I don’t know if I believe in an afterlife, going to heaven or hell, or reincarnating. I do know that the fear of death has been with me even when I was a child. I recall sitting at my grandmother’s knees crying asking her about death. She was a good god-fearing woman and would lean on her bible for strength in those times.

As an adult I have experienced moments when in deep stretches of meditation, that everything is unified and all of this is transient. I feel like that is more of a truth to me than believing of some light at the end of the tunnel. I have lived my life with the acceptance that now is what is, and it’s up to me to make the most of it. I have changed my life again and again in pursuit of my own growth, without a thought of if I do x now, then maybe I’ll be redeemed in heaven, or whatever. I live a moral life. I have a strong sense of right and wrong. I don’t lie on purpose, which is a great distinction from saying I always tell the truth because maybe some times I do lie but it isn’t on purpose, it’s just that memory isn’t in my memory bank at that moment, so I go with what I know and is fresh in my mind.

All in all, I really am the best person I can be and live as good of a life, making as positive of an impact as I can amongst the people I associate. I feel good about all of this. If anything, the feeling that I can be doing more is always there, which is why I am changing course and heading into medicine, so that I can positively impact even more people and have the influence so that people may actually do what I suggest.

So in researching and studying for the upcoming medical school test, GAMSAT, I have been diving in biology, anatomy and physiology, psychology, philosophy, chemistry (only lightly so far), and have recently watched a succinct version of life from start to finish from a scientific standpoint, and I was crying by the end of it. The amount of change that a person goes through in their life, especially for women, is tremendous. I am aware of my own mortality again, and all of this life seems so precious, and so fleeting, and I am tinged with sadness because there isn’t anything I can do about it. I know that I will flip this perspective and use it the opposite way, of making most of every moment and finding happiness and alleviating stress because I know it makes life better and healthier, but in this moment, right now, I am sad and I feel it.

Sadness is a rich human emotion and I am glad that I get to feel it. If I had to choose to know that I would die, I don’t know if I would choose that again. I would like to know the preventative measures I can take in order to make my physical life as healthy as possible, but if I could choose to be like an ordinary mammal and not know about my own mortality, I would. Perhaps I will change my mind when I am in a better disposition, but for now I just want to cuddle up and escape for a moment.

My Mind

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I love the way my mind works. It is mysterious, it has great moments of clarity and insight. My mind is easily able to connect disparate things, items, genres, ideas, and is able to find the similarities. My mind is highly impressionable as well, I can sit with things and they can greatly affect me. My mind is also one that absolutely takes what it wants and leaves the rest behind, integrating as I go along, as I absorb new information. My mind works best when I am immersed in something, something different, something stimulating, something worthwhile like solving problems, or creating a base connection between things.

My mind is wild, imaginative, and I have beautifully descriptive dreams that are very close to reality that sometimes it’s hard to know the difference. The mind doesn’t know the difference I guess, so I have to dissect it to understand, yet I certainly don’t do this all the time. It would be too much. Plus I have other responsibilities.

I am highly inspired by so much, beyond just nature and it’s perfection, but onto man made things, and ideas, and intangible things. It all has an affect on me and I carry all of what I have been around with me. It’s really beautiful that way. Multifaceted, able to debate for debate’s sake, able to get to the root of the problem, able to see from different sides, able to laugh at my own self.

I also have to remember that I am in control of my mind, not the other way around. It is a great power and with that does indeed come great responsibility and I do my best to use it with care. Although I could likely use it at a great capacity than what I currently am, but this is a stage I am in as a full time carer and I am a using my mind to be the best mother I can be.

Unattachment and Change

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The biggest barrier for real change is attachment. Having an attachment of the idea of what you think will happen, or the expectation of a future event is the downfall of progressive change. In order for real change to happen, the unknown must be embraced so that whatever actually does happen, based on goals and aspirations, that it is not shrugged off as not what you were looking for. The acceptance of ambiguity must be there so that the progress along the way isn’t underestimated. Just as a seed is growing underground, you don’t pull it up every week to see it’s progress, you just trust that it is indeed doing what it is designed to do. We are all meant, all designed to be born, grow, evolve, and then die. This is the process. It happens again and again.

Even when we think that we know what will happen in the future, there are so many variables, that it is necessary to release attachment of the outcome and embrace what actually does happen. By looking for the underlying theme, the underlying feeling, you can determine if what has unfolded is on the right path. Life is so full and so much happens every day, and every single thing really does matter. Even the simple option of what you want for breakfast matters because it sets up habits in your mind, it affects your body, it makes an impact. In ten years this may seem insignificant, but it isn’t because it is now a part of you. Everything that happens now is based on the past, and everything that will happen in the future is also based on what you do now in the present. Releasing attachment to what has happened before, and what may happen in the future is essential in order to minimise the drag that can happen when making change. The drag that stymies growth, the drag that may slow down progress to where a person gives up because they aren’t getting there fast enough because they are attached to a certain outcome and it has not manifested clearly enough for them to realise it.

So in order to utilise this idea to our advantage, it is best to accept that the future version of you is already here. The mind doesn’t know the difference. It’s best to accept that the future version of life is already here. The mind doesn’t know the difference. By understanding which virtues, which attributes you value, you can infuse them into now, in order to create this version. Staying unattached to the proposed outcome during this process is as essential as accepting that the change has already happened. It’s all habits, it’s all mind play, It’s all change, and it’s all happening right now. Right now.

The Genre Must Change

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If your genre always thinks its at the edge of destruction, it will never fully emerge into the next paradigm. Instead of holding onto the hippie movement, let go and embrace the next chapter. Take the good things with you, but don’t hold on to what was because it will never be that again. Let go of nostalgia, and do whatever you can to make this next paradigm the best version of itself.

If the mindset is always that “we are so close” then that’s all it will be, so close, but never actually gets there.

The mindset for actual change must be that it’s already happened. It must be of a thought solely of the new paradigm and how it operates. It’s about understanding the virtues of the new paradigm.

If the new paradigm is that technology is here to stay, then one must embrace it and use it wholeheartedly to avoid the heartbreak of the feeling of not wanting to be a part of something that is happening anyway. It would be a matter of embracing the “this is now” paradigm and making the most of it. of course, understanding the shadow side and still working with it as well.

The old is old, the new is here, let it be. Infuse the goodness of the past and work it into the future that is now. Holding on is a futile effort as it will always be filled with strife and disappointment because it is not what will survive in the future.

In order to emerge into the next realm of growth, of evolution, we have to announce that it is here, not that it’s coming. It is here. It is now. This is how the change can happen without holding on to what was because that is long over. That genre is over. It’s over. The next one is fuelled by it, but it is not the old one, it is its own new version.

In order to be the next version, you have to be The Next Version.

Announce that the new is here. This is it. Be in it. Breathe it in. Learn it’s ways. Thrive. Then Flourish and Lead.

Navigating the Waters

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In the last week, I have turned a corner, a major corner. I have started to allow someone else to look after my child in a maximum of 2 hour increments. This is a big deal. He’s now almost 22 months, and prior to now, I pretty much count on one hand the number of times someone else has looked after him besides my husband or myself.

I have so many feelings that are arising from this. Perhaps this is what primary carers of little people go through with this transition. Simultaneously wanting to have freedom and independence, but at the same time wanting to make sure that my little person is completely taken care of. The feeling of, YES FINALLY, I’m Doing Something For Myself, AND the feeling of guilt that someone else is looking after my most precious being, who is completely defenceless, completely incapable of articulating with words anything that goes on.

Exhale. I am doing that a lot, deep breathing. He is going to the day care option that is available at the gym I have joined. It’s all super new, totally customer oriented, and really top of the line. The classes are incredible, the machines are the newest available, the instructors are top notch, the child care is incredible. Even in the baby area, they have a huge play section that rivals the places you have to pay to go into for $12 for 2 hours where you have to buy an obligatory coffee as well. The carers are so lovely, so friendly, so very obviously kid people with big hearts and huge smiles.

All of this is good, I know it. I do. Me progressing forward by moving my body and getting back into shape, along with allowing the next stage of our lives to happen by me letting go and accepting help with my child. I know all of this, I know it’s truly all good. There is still a fountain of feelings coming up and I can’t ignore them. I even invited a fellow Mum from my mum and bub group to come over and watch a tear jerking movie that left us both sobbing, just so we could let the emotions out in a safe place.

The new chapter is beginning and I am grieving the last one. It’s normal, and it’s okay. I have loads of self compassion for myself and am being as gentle with me as I possibly can in this transition. I am also doing my best to be there for my son while he transitions, because it’s also a major shift for him as well. Such a big deal.

How could they?

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My stomach is turning, my throat is tight, my brow is furrowed. I have blocked out the majority of my childhood, only a glimpse or two remain from before I was in my teens. Recently, as in about 20 minutes ago, I learned from a close relative, whom I trust, that when I was 4 or 6 weeks old, that my parents asked this relative to look after me for a couple of hours, so they could go on a motorcycle ride, and did not come back for 3 days. THREE DAYS! Three days they left me, their premature baby of 6 weeks, with someone else.

My relative only brought this up after asking if I had put my own child into preschool or daycare yet. I said I hadn’t, and that I honestly didn’t really trust it, at least not until he is old enough to speak. This is a deep untrusting level I have, and maybe this is where it comes from. She said that I was so different, like the opposite of my own parents, and told me that story jokingly. She of course didn’t realise how it would effect me, neither did I.

I feel so disappointed. I feel so sad. I feel so very angry and pissed off. How could they do this to me? Why have children if you aren’t going to take care of them? Really, and me? How selfish of them, it really is the opposite of how I am with my own child. No wonder I was reluctant to have children.

This all shows that even from the beginning they didn’t want to be parents. I had this rosey view now that I have my own child, that maybe in their early days they did care, that we really did have a family atmosphere, but clearly that is a fantasy, and certainly not one based on any memories, just hope.

External, internal talk: I love you Jennifer. I know this is hard for you. It is so very unlike what you would do. Try to have compassion. You are special, you have gone through so very much and look how far you have come. I know it hurts. I know it hurts to feel like someone doesn’t care, I know it must be devastating to feel like your parents didn’t care, but they did their best. You are highly resilient, and no matter what happened as a child, you are not destined to repeat their lives nor their mistakes. You are better than that. You are a beautiful, thoughtful human being, and you get to choose every single day how you operate in the world. Let this be fuel to make you better. Let this be fuel to understand your own self reliance, your own self worth that you have developed because of you.

I really feel gutted right now. NO wonder I’ve had self worth issues. NO wonder I’ve had issues with security. No wonder. Without a solid base, everything else is hard to build. I am so lucky that I have chosen this conscious route and have rebuilt myself as an adult. It still hurts though, uncovering a bit of the truth that is so utterly revealing.

Also just from a baby’s perspective, not having your parents there, for days on end. Not having the security of your parents for days on end. I know that can be overcome, like it has with Abraham after him being in the NICU, something I did not choose. However, it has taken conscious effort to rebuild that trust, no wonder I never really trusted my parents.