Who Am I? (Jim)
Belonging 11/22/2005
A sense of belonging, of being wanted, valued, loved, is the best words for describing how senior year of high school felt but it went beyond just a physical worldly experience of it onto an other-worldly spiritual one, for me. With enough nourishment (emotional and physical) we can all blossom to our capacity, I think. Perhaps I internalized my source for fear of losing it. After high school, I again found myself isolated and alone. I again blamed myself, just as I had when I’d gone away to prep seminary.
Feelings are a funny thing. They may not be the truth but seem more real than reality. They’ve frequently led to my demise. For example, Mickey and I were perfectly safe fooling around in his basement or at the cliffs, but I wanted to make love in my room, in the bright light of day. It was the desire to redeem myself, to escape me, that also led to the demon experience. After that I shut down all feelings and drank, for twenty years. More than anything I wanted my feelings back, though, even if they were all bad, when I fought to arise from the ashes of my depression at age 40. Without them I was lost, a total stranger to myself. Are my feelings me?
Two days ago Ty called me at work. I hadn’t given him my number at home and had insisted he call Ron, my CODA sponsor and friend of 25 years, to reach me. Ty has terrible boundaries and little respect for others. So calling me at work was him naturally going around mine. Though we’d been apart for a year and a half, he’d called a lot in the last two weeks.
My feelings are so confusing to me. I love him! I feel elated. Yet he’s awful for me. How can my feelings betray me so? They feel so like the truth but are not the reality of my experience with him. He loves me, in order to use me and perhaps I him. When I try to save him, or to redeem myself through rescuing him, I only earn his resentment. I see the dream more than the reality. How can I contain these opposites, both my feelings, so I know me, and the reality of my experience?
Rumi says, love is not found in another, but when it already exists within their selves. Does it exist in reality or is it an illusion, on this plane?
A sense of belonging, of being wanted, valued, loved, is the best words for describing how senior year of high school felt but it went beyond just a physical worldly experience of it onto an other-worldly spiritual one, for me. With enough nourishment (emotional and physical) we can all blossom to our capacity, I think. Perhaps I internalized my source for fear of losing it. After high school, I again found myself isolated and alone. I again blamed myself, just as I had when I’d gone away to prep seminary.
Feelings are a funny thing. They may not be the truth but seem more real than reality. They’ve frequently led to my demise. For example, Mickey and I were perfectly safe fooling around in his basement or at the cliffs, but I wanted to make love in my room, in the bright light of day. It was the desire to redeem myself, to escape me, that also led to the demon experience. After that I shut down all feelings and drank, for twenty years. More than anything I wanted my feelings back, though, even if they were all bad, when I fought to arise from the ashes of my depression at age 40. Without them I was lost, a total stranger to myself. Are my feelings me?
Two days ago Ty called me at work. I hadn’t given him my number at home and had insisted he call Ron, my CODA sponsor and friend of 25 years, to reach me. Ty has terrible boundaries and little respect for others. So calling me at work was him naturally going around mine. Though we’d been apart for a year and a half, he’d called a lot in the last two weeks.
My feelings are so confusing to me. I love him! I feel elated. Yet he’s awful for me. How can my feelings betray me so? They feel so like the truth but are not the reality of my experience with him. He loves me, in order to use me and perhaps I him. When I try to save him, or to redeem myself through rescuing him, I only earn his resentment. I see the dream more than the reality. How can I contain these opposites, both my feelings, so I know me, and the reality of my experience?
Rumi says, love is not found in another, but when it already exists within their selves. Does it exist in reality or is it an illusion, on this plane?
posted by LifeWriter at 3:08 PM
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