I'm in a good place right now: I'm being productive, my life is moving forward in all areas, I'm acquiring knowledge through studying issues and skills that interest me, I'm making my album (!!!) and I'm finding ways to balance all the different areas of my life. People who thought they knew me well even a few years ago would hardly recognize this new woman I'm becoming.
Yet there are still many important patterns I'm discovering about myself: patterns that require undoing. I learned from an early age to bury my anger and to keep going no matter what--as a means of survival, I suppose. People around me were making me angry on a constant basis and in an effort to be able to coexist with them, I learned to hide the feeling deep inside myself. The problem with that is that it doesn't work. Like I've mentioned before, anger turned inwards turns into depression, and anger unexpressed turns into anxiety. No wonder I could hardly function by the time I was in my twenties: I was bursting with unexpressed
anger!
Even now, when I get hurt by others, I often turn to my old habit of suppressing my anger. But anger is a healthy response and once the feeling is aired out, life can continue in a normal, productive way. Whatever the feeling is, it needs to be felt and acknowledged. This is what is sinking in for me right now, and it's bringing me peace and warmth, quite literally. Turns out there's a difference in knowing something and really Knowing it.
I just love that I am where I am right now. Honestly, I've never felt this good in my life and I probably still have some ways to go to reach "normalcy". Yet when you're emerging from a dark pit, even a little light can be blinding... And I know it is bound to get brighter yet. My eyes are just getting used to this new light, little by little. So --this-- is what the world really looks like.
"What is to give light must endure burning."
- Viktor Frankl
:D
ReplyDeleteSo nice to read this!