nature of a freak
Something is happening to me. This book is doing something to do me that I never imagined. I’ve never had such a strong reaction or such a cathartic experience from reading something.
I have just spent the last hour crying off and on after reading this passage in the book about the author and her self-realization of being a control freak. that’s not what made me really cry but that did strike a chord with me. I am a total control freak. I didn’t realize it until I started reading what Liz’ friend told her in the Ashram about being a control freak. The timing of that couldn’t have been better. Yesterday, I was sitting around thinking that I should send an email to Mark explaining why I did what I did and why I wasn’t speaking to him. It seemed like a really good idea at the time. I thought I was doing myself a favor by doing so. I thought by sending it, I would comfort both of us at the same time and to let him know that things would be okay and blah, blah. I ran the idea by Sonia, who has become a trusted confidante in this whole matter. She just said coolly that I shouldn’t, that I should just let it go. Just let time smooth things over and stop thinking that life has to be fixed and wrapped pack up in a package. I knew she was right. And the truth was that there was already a little sign that I didn’t need to. While waiting in the lunch line, there were a few minutes Mark and I exchanged looks but they weren’t tense and crazy or drama-filled. They were just gentle smiles passed between us in the midst of amusement as we joked about lunch like we always did. It almost seemed like there was an understanding right there. A few minutes later we passed each other in the kitchen and pleasantries were exchanged with simple, “Hi, how are you’s?”
Now, the control freak in me, probably rose up in that moment and felt the need to grab a hold of that and turn it into something. That’s a habit of mine. I spent the rest of the day, obsessing over the situation, over whether things had really made a turn for the better in terms of the work environment….to see if Mark really had modified his behaviour as a result of me pulling back. How often was he talking to Jeng? Were they still in each other’s face? Did I really matter that much to Mark that I could make him re-examine his life and make him change his behaviour?
In short, I was making myself crazy. And then I started beating myself up for having those thoughts, for fussing over what Mark thought, for being sad that we weren’t talking to each other like before. I started scolding myself for being weak and being so needy that these things consumed me so much.
On my way home, I started reading about Liz’ exprience in the Ashram and her anguish over not being able to get over her ex-boyfriend and how those thoughts invaded her when she should’ve been meditating and her emotions were being purged. In her conversations with her friend, the Texas Guru, he started pointing out things about her that smacked me hard. The need to control everything. The need to, when things don’t go my way (for once in my life since I pretty much gotten what I wanted in many respects), I scramble to fix them or find a solution or some deeper meaning or over-analyze….yup, that was me all right. It hit me smack in the face. If only I could just be still.
I wasn’t still at all last night. All that pent-up energy was coursing through me from the long day and the long class and I spent a lot of time, talking out loud to myself and pacing, until I basically wore myself out and went to sleep. I didn’t want to in a way because I was afraid of my dreams. I have been having very emotional dreams that I know are a result of my mind going in overdrive trying to cleanse, purge and process all that has been bottled up. The night before I had another dream about my mom for the second night in a row (before then, I rarely had dreams about her). Last night I had dreams about Mark again, but this time it was negative and yet I found myself trying to control his behaviour in it. We were in the office and I saw things swiftly disintegrating in front of me and I felt panicky as I tried to fix them.
I woke up feeling confused and a little sad and lonely. I beat myself up for feeling that way. Then I started reading more this morning about the author trying to meditate and all of these feelings about her ex came swirling about and then her mind began to judge. She looked past that and decided to respond to her judgmental mind with compassion and then her soul roared out, “YOU HAVE NO IDEA HOW STRONG MY LOVE IS.” i read the passage again on the following page and then all of a sudden, my chest broke and I started crying (almost like I am starting to cry right now). It hit me like a ton of bricks again and the tears kept coming and coming and I had to put the book down and cry. Then I spent the next hour crying and trying to hide that from my roommate who had unexpectedly come home earlier than I had anticipated. I keep crying when I think about that statement and trying to understand WHY I am crying. I think about and I feel transported, like I am going to another place, like everything around me feels too small and I want to be in a wide open space. I keep thinking about that statement and I just cry, not out of sadness, I just don’t know what. Maybe it’s because I feel like I have no room in my life for hate, that no matter how angry I have been at people and cursed them, that I didn’t hate them. Maybe I’m crying because I’m suddenly opening up that fortress over my heart and being honest about how hurt and lonely I feel but in a way that’s different…probably because I”m seeing it reflected by to me in this book. I don’t know. It just feels overwhelming and yet I’m afraid to let it go. In brief flashes I feel peace and grace and that I will be okay. There’s still that side of me that wants to run out and tell and share. There is a part of me that wants to run and tell Mark because had it not been for this experience with him, I would never gotten this book. I know that is premature and at this time when his heart his hurting from depression, he would probably not understand or something dangerous would happen. There is a part of me that believes that there will be a time for that conversation with him but it’s not now.
I don’t know. I’ve never felt this way before. To feel a little fearful but yet free and open to uncertainty and being okay. It’s all jumbled up right now. It’s a scary feeling and somehow good at the same time. I feel like Natalie Portman in that scene from V for Vendetta when she has a total meltdown and her world is changed upside down and all she can do is cry, gasp for breath and gulp in the rain (God is in the rain). It’s overwhelming.
But now I have to kind of pull it together to meet up with Benecia to go to a bar, of all places., to watch, of all things, a football game between two teams that I am ambivalent to. But I’m going to get out of the house and probably out of my head. I just don’t want to lose that feeling.
Tomorrow I will see Sarahi and tell her what I feel. She will understand. She is one of the most spiritual people I know and right now, she says, she is going through a spirtual journey and transformation. It will be good to see her and talk to her. The need feels so urgent right now.
But in the meantime, I’m going to be patient.
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