Wear things lightly .... let go

I was sent this today and how relevant it was with the controlling me .......

EMBRACING      THE GOOD...
      LETTING GO OF THE BAD
      by Susan Jeffers, Ph.D.
It is a strange fact of life that we let little - very little -      things take away our precious peace of mind. How silly is that? In his      wonderful book, Joy      Is My Compass, Alan Cohen describes his great moment of      awakening when it came to letting go of trivial things in his life that      tend to drive him crazy. This moment didn't come upon him on the top of a      great mountain or at the edge of a vast ocean. No, his moment of      awakening came to him at McDonald's! (There are many paths to awakening!)
He reports that from the minute he walked into McDonald's for a      quick lunch, he was miserable. He remembered someone telling him there      was sugar in the French fries. He imagined the presence of preservatives      in the apple pie. He lamented the preponderance of noisy kids disturbing      the whole environment, and on and on and on. He vowed he would never      return. But, then, as he sat there in what he called "the smog of my      own thoughts," the voice from his Higher Self came through loud and      clear. It asked him a profound question that made all the difference...

"What if this were all      alright?"
He gasped, "What do you mean...alright?!? This is      terrible!" His Higher Self answered...

"What if nothing around      you holds any power to make you unhappy?"
What a concept! What a breakthrough! All of a sudden, Alan Cohen      saw everything with new eyes. He looked at the boisterous kids and      decided their laughter and shouts reflected their joy. What's wrong with      a little joy in the middle of the afternoon? He decided a little sugar      and preservatives wasn't going to affect his ability to love. He decided      that everything that was previously annoying him was totally alright. He      said...

"Something happened to      me when I let it all be OK. I felt relief. My heart opened. I was at      peace. I had found the answer to being there. I had found the answer to      all of life. Just let it be."
With this realization, he got in line for some more French fries      and apple pie, which, he concluded, was what they serve in heaven! And he      basked in the wonder of letting it all be alright.
After I read Alan Cohen's story, I thought about all the little      things in my life that I was constantly obsessing about...getting the      right table in the restaurant, the weather, the stock market, the      traffic, points of view that were different from mine, other people's      behavior, getting everywhere on time. And so on. What a struggle!
What if any table I got was OK? What if the weather was perfect      exactly as it was? What if the delays in traffic were just part of the      scene? What if other people's opinion had nothing to do with my      happiness? What if life would go on joyfully even if I arrived at an      appointment a little bit late? What if all that little stuff was OK? What      a freedom! Then I would be "wearing the world just as a loose      garment" instead of struggling to make it all different than it is.
So much of our struggle with life has to do primarily with minor      things in life. The big things often pull forward an incredible sense of      power and inner knowing. I had breast cancer many years ago and I handled      it beautifully. I made it a triumph instead of a tragedy. By way of      contrast, I got a very bad hair perm three weeks before my present      marriage. Did I make that a triumph? No way. You would have thought my      world was coming to an end. Even after the wedding, I was upset for      months until the frizzy hair finally grew out.
Does this make any sense on a Spiritual level? Absolutely not!      My Higher Self could care less about my hair. It's hard to believe my      Lower Self cared so much, but it did. Had I known what I know today, I      would have been in a much better position to say to myself...

Let go. Let peace. Let joy.
I think all of us should paste stickers everywhere we can see      them, that say, "What if this were all alright?" It would help      to remind us to pull ourselves out of the negativity of our Lower Self      and lift us to the freedom of our Higher Self.
So think about the many little things that cause upset in your      life. Getting a dent in your new car. Forgetting to buy something at the      supermarket. Sitting in the airport for two hours because the plane was      delayed. Rain when you had invited people over for a picnic. It's at      these times that we really need to take a step back and asked ourselves      that profound question..."What if this were all alright?" Yes,      we do what we can to change what is not working in our life, but for      those many little things we can't control, letting go, letting peace and      letting joy is the heavenly way to go.
As an exercise, I suggest you write down all of the situations      in your life that are causing you struggle and ask yourself the same      question about each situation..."What if this were all alright?"      Each time you ask this question, take a deep breath and relax. You will      experience a momentary feeling of peace. Do this over and over again      until just the asking of the question is associated with a deep breath      and a feeling of relaxation. And as you go through each day, notice where      you are trying to control everything around you. Add it to your list and      keep asking yourself the question, "What if this were all      alright?"
If you think about it, what I am talking about here is simply a      shift in focus. Why do we always look at what's missing instead of what's      there? Why do we always look at the bad, instead of the good? Why do we      always focus on the ugliness instead of the beauty? When we focus on      what's missing, or what's bad, or what's ugly, we are operating from the      level of the Lower Self. Why not rise above the Lower Self and see what      the world looks like from the Higher Self?
We can create this shift in focus in all areas of our life that      bring us upset. The truth is that blessings surround us all the time.      That shift in focus isn't a delusion. In fact...

We are deluding ourselves      when we focus on the bad!
Read that again! So when that lousy table comes up and there are      no others available, you say to yourself, "Yes the table may be      lousy, but look at all that is wonderful in this situation. How blessed I      am!" Indeed, when life is seen in this way, we are a step farther in      conquering our control addictions and there is very little that can take      away our peace of mind.
I know it takes a lot of practice to reach a "let go"      state of mind, but the one thing I can assure you is...I'll be practicing      right along with you!
From my      heart to yours,
Susan Jeffers
Copyright © 2012 Susan Jeffers, Ph.D. All rights reserved.
      Adapted from End      the Struggle and Dance with Life

Orlando

My musings after watching the film of Virginia Woolf's book

Does Woolf often use time in that manner? And the gender switch was interesting too. The irony of the rejection and rejecting interested me too and societies sexism. How funny that today the androgynous appearance is revered. Skinny women with almost boy-like figures.
I wonder if David Lynch and Peter Greenaway were inspired by Virginia Woolf? Would plays on time generally be considered experimental? I was just thinking that writing the impossible and treating it as if it's perfectly normal is quite something. So in Orlando I like the way to me that it seemed perfectly normal and acceptable and yet there was reference tot he oddness mainly to the gender change momentarily through other characters but then simply accepted .
Just some rambling ideas on what I watched. I am trying to think which other film I watched recently that dealt with issues in a similar manner - ie explicitly separating out the subject i.e. society, sex etc.

Bliss
xx

Full of sound and fury

What a week of blind obstruction moving to awareness and resulting in change and more freedom. Thank you God. Herrrr hmmm, still I feel so vulnerable using that name, God I mean, potentially to be read by others who might freak out and think I'm religious. You see I think of religious people as indoctrinators and single-minded. I hope people will see beyond all of that but know that it can deter so many very quickly. People who won't keep and open mind will have already turned off this page I suspect. Oh well I need to be true to myself but even so I feel a need to once again explain myself. God for me is not in any shape or form connected with a religion. It is a convenient word, yep capital letter included, for the enormity of the Universe and how it works as a force that is more powerful just for it's unstoppable force. It is how it is and that's life. We humans are meager even en masse. Well clearly I do not yet know how to put into words the wonderful sense of being a small cog in something so immense. I hope somehow you will have your own understanding.
This week or actaully two has involved me being in raging fury. It has worked into it's frenzy gradually in the early few days then once it had escalated in me it's been refuelling itself. All I say is in hindsight now. perhaps I should have written more often whilst in the midst of it all so that there was a view of what it was like from the inside. I will do my best as now I feel filled with love and a peace and it's not quite as easy already to write about the intensity with the fullest dynamism.
It revolves around the new boss. Well lets have a little lashing out here as I condescendingly point out not so much boss but merely (that's the vicious bit) team leader. You see if I'd been discussing PD he was most definitely the boss in the very best of that meaning. This one, LK has the title of team leader and thus far I do not see her as anything more than that in title. Oh yes it's still there alive and kicking, the anger. But it's more at a level of disappointment.
A number of events started fuelling my rage, which I feel certain is driven by fear but I haven't quite got in touch with the fear, maybe I will as I write here. A monetary break for a sip of peppermint with liquorice tea. Mmmmm Teapigs as well as a French Menth/Reglisse version. I'm not sure you see that I can recall each event but I will write those that are clearly in my memory. One involved a hospital appointment. It meant that I would be late arriving for work, in fact not until lunchtime. i suggested to the team leader in the capapcity of knowing the office (rather than the controlling versio that I now see) that she would be well advised to get some cover for the morning. She turned to me and suggested that actually I do the late shift then whe needn't get cover as she knows she needs to be aware of expenditure and budgets. I saw red!! I said I would not wish t do that as after having been through various procedures in the gynaecological depratment I would be struggling to return to work let alone work until late. At which point she sniped at me with the comment "well I will need to see a doctor's letter to verify your appointment". To be honest I'm not sure what her exact words were but that was the essence and I heard it said in a very accuational and venomous manner. I replied saying that I was offended and that I am entitled to hospital appointments without hassle. She backed down slightly saying that she didn't know the procedure here and so would have to check it out with NL, clinical manager. The fury started. I guess in rality I was already feeing vulnerable with the whole idea of the appointment. I also felt afraid (here's some of the fear) that suddenly tings that have been accommodated without any issue were going to start being issues, issues that would somehow make everything much harder and steal my freedom and security. Some of this is linked with finances for instance if we now had to start taking appointments at our own cost it would make things even harder for me to go to the docs. For some reason I struggle with this degree of self-care. Lots of vulnerabilities I think were immediately fed into. Not least the difficulty I have working for an outfit that have no concern for employees well-being, or rather little, unlike HR who i realise now were truly investing in people, even if it was because they felt they had to. Competitive staff markets can drive that and also I would like to beleive and investment in people to treat other humanely and encourgae development. Something tthat I don't think I've really experienced or appreciated fully from a little girl and yet can take for granted when I have it. So you see already LK is not PD. Whether he liked it or not he never "turned his nose up" at anything for SH or myself. He was a little more resentful about this sort of thing with AW and I think this links with her resistance to working as a team member. She doesn't want to do many of the things that we generally muck in with to keep everything going. So I understand the resentment as I felt it too. Why should people get the same when they don't put the same in (this is all underlying anger with injustice).
Then there have been several daily working issues that we as a team having been trying to convey as the way we have agreed to do things. LK has argued against them, not hearing us. I think on reflection what I was expecting is that she would come in and frstly do things our way. Discover through experience what works and what doesn't and gradually implement new ideas through discussion and openness. But the fear (there it is) is that she is arguing against that, in a backhanded way criticising our way and telling us to do it differently - straight away. So there she is saying on the one hand I don't want to change anything, it's a great programme you have here and you are a great team", but actually doing something completely the opposite. I hadn't been aware of this until just writing it now. So with each little situation I have become more and more frustrated, not feeling heard at all and overridden. The frustration has been devloping into fury and the fury has been exhuating me causing resentment and fuelling the ever growing fury.
So then it starts to become personal. I can't abide the way she completely goes off track. On one occassion we were processing the previosu group as a team and as we always do. One of the clients had breeched the boundaries and this was not the first time. We felt as a team that we needed to escalate this, more than processing in the group and that there needed to be consequences. This is something agreed between the team and not taken lightly. LK disagreed and started talking about all the things the client needed to be working on. Both SH and I looked at each other incredulously. We know that and yes sure everyone beings new ideas to what a client needs to work on and how. Even writing the the word "needs" seem presumptious. How the hell and who are we to try to determine what the client needs to work on. I get very uncomfortable when colleagues start diagnosing or saying "what they mean by that really is ..." How do we know anything of what the client means, needs, knows unless we have that open communication with them? Anyway SH thankfully said what does that have to do with the fact that boundaries are being breeched and what are the consequences for that? I backed her up as I totally agreed with her. So on a back foot LK complied with our wishes, even though she clearly didn't agree but had not valid argument, only through deflection. I get that though. I mean knowing that I think one way but not being able to back up my argument. I would like to be able to practice saying it ust doesn't feel right to me but as yet I'm not sure why.
Anyhow I thought of her as stupid, really harsh I know but this is how my rage becomes. It's demeaning and cruel which in turn feeds the fury. I witnessed myself bad-mouthing her to a couple of colleagues in another department. I wanted to keep my mouth closed but I just couldn't. The first comment would have been OK but I went on. And then on some more, making sure they knew just how awful things were for me because of her. Puh! Ugly. I knew I didn't feel good about this immediately but didn't know at that time how to do anything about it. Furthermore, their positive comments about her and their negative comments about PD infuriated me even more. I thought "bully for you that she's a breath of fresh air" and was also feelling really angry that they bad-mouthed PD, again! How flipping dare they, they had no idea how good he was and could only see his bullish manner (and actually intolerance of their inefficient and rude attitude, which I agreed with him on but had never found a way to express. PD just never found a subtle way to express himself - at least everyone knew where they stood). Funnily enough as I am writing this I am seeing something that is not quite forming for me. Other people's attitude and the way in which it manifests, all driven by unspoken thoughts and often a lack of awareness of coinciding emotions. I know it, I just forget to step back and invite God into to show me how, what, when.
So there I was stomping about the hospital bad-mouthing here and there, just subtly at times. Little hints at how exhausted I was battling to keep the office together. Grumble, grumble, grumble. And getting more annoyed if people seemed to be nice to her. That even sounds familiar with my dad. I would be furious with the person that was pleasant to him screaming inside "you don't know what he's really like!!!!".
I was aware that I didn't like myself but just didn't know how to stop myself. LK and I had a blow of a situation when talking about staffing needs. It was really SH that insitigated the conversation and when LK fired back at her, I stepped in. I see how drained and angry SH is and I am afraid (there it is again) that she will leave. I don't want to be left by SH. Somehow with PD I feel more secure that he will be around anyway and that I haven't lost him forever. But with SH she is very independant. She has said that she doesn't come to work to make friends she has enough. But I really like her company and like her style. I perform best with SH. I feel safe with her in group. She always knows where she's going. I feel less safe with PD and AW and know that's my attitude to their ways of therapy. I think we all feel safest with SH, well it's what I observe. She is genuine and warm with clients, challenging but in a way that she doesn't generate resistance, often anyway. Only the addic icks out against her not the person themselves. Whereas I can still cause the person to resist me. And PD too. AW can seem very angry in group at times. Actually I'm not quite sure how to describe how she is in group and there are times when she makes spot on observations. I have learnt from SH to not learnt differences in style be away to become split. I want to work with her to keep learning and growing as a therapist. Selfish? It's rare to work with people that can really show me the way. I work with a lot of people that cause me flounder and that's life I guess as it's a common experience for me.
So anyway I have a lot of fear about SH leaving and so find myself backing up things I'm not sure I truly believe in but will argue on SH's side. I notice SH steps back whenever it's not soething she fully supports. So I argued about staffing levels when actually I didn't fully beleive we needed more. But I know SH was even more frazzled than me so I jumped int here and made it my arguemtn. I became raging with fury as she just wasn't listening. When I said this to my sponsor in my daily morning phone call my sponsor suggested that if I wanted to be heard I needed to listen. Oh yes of course, but could I apply this no, no, no. Not until yesterday actually, when once again we were discussing but more like arguing completely opposing views about what consequences should be applied if someone repeatedly relapses. LK's argument was that this is a relapsing illness but as AM pointed out yes it is but it's not a using programme. Loved it! Anyway the point of change in me here is that I actually heard her say "yes you both have your view on this but I have mine too and it's different". I heard this and I acknowledged that, saying that this is something else unresolved that would be good to discuss in supervision and find a way forward as a team. Phew! I stepped back. Thank you God. Thank you. I felt so good about this and actually putting into action the intelligence I know at an intellectual level. And I also see my utter need for control. Nothing can be different you see. If she makes changes to little things, she will change everything and overall it's a damned good programme. Plus she is going against her world. She IS wanting to change things. It's not to say that there will be good things introduced BUT it's against her word and making changes before she fully knows what is so good about the programme. I don't want to lose everything that is so valued, reputation included.
Fear! My reputation is included in the success but can equally be a part of a disaster. Inside this does not need to matter. Practice caring not to care, another pearl from my sponsor.
Thank goodness for FA and the disciplines I follow - quiet time, daily calls to my sponsor, daily readings, weighing and meauring my food, calling out to other FAers. And most importanly for my growing relationship with God. Throughout all of this, this self-hatred for the fish-wife appearance of my rage, the rage itself, I have not over or uner eaten. I have stuck with my food plan and as of yesterday I had lost another 7 pounds since my last weigh-in on 30 January. This is a way of life for me now. A commitment. No flour and sugar, weighing and measuring and following the suggestions just gives me freedom and a confidence that I have so much more space to continue developing as a person to be the person I would olike to be - and more than that too, I now believe, as I cannot see beyond my linits of knowledge from previosu experience. But I do have an inner soul knowledge that there's more. I have faith. Even though I forget to turn to faith and God in every situation, I am practicing more and more to do this.
And because of this I had a little breakthrough on Tuesday evening. I had had supervision as both a team and then individually. How I value supervision. I talked through my rage. PT kindly reminded me he was aware that eh could slip into therpay and this was clinical supervision. He is setting boundaries with me, I can feel them and I appreciated his honesty the other day with acknowledging that he likes me and so can swayed into a sort of collusion with me, this was referring to my case study, but I think I have sensed it slightly in other situations too. I respect his boundaries and feel them. So I enjoyed anyway expressing myself and also my realisations. I was very hectic afterwards, 1:1, brief meeting with a client, dinner, Aftercare. During my dinner break the opportunity presented itself that I had been praying for. CJ one of the nurses was also eating his supper. He made comment on LK's responsiveness to child safety in connection with one of our clients. I seized my oportunity to say only good things about her. And then I went into the office and told her about CJ's complimentary comments about her vigilence. Then even better, I knew that I did not need to speak a sorry to her unless as my sponsor pointed out to me I am making changes in my attitude and behaviour. Of course I hadbeen finding this difficult but with God's help this altered as soon as paid her a compliment. I did by the way say that I appreciated her vigilence too around this matter, never really knowing before how to approach this matters when feeling concerned.  So on the way to work as the love was beginning to re-enter my soul, I decided I would buy her some flowers. Just a little bunch of purple tulips. I arranged them with care, enjoying getting all the stems in a pattern as importably as how the flower itself looked. She said she truly appreciated this. I hadn't known what I was going to ay and wondered too if SH and AW would think I was being a traitor. However, I meant it and the words flowed easily. I said it was just a little token to acknowledge how difficult this was for her just as much as it was for me and that it wasn't personal. I said that I really appreciated what AW had said in supervision, reiterating the fact that she was new and we were all in a state of flux. Well in so mnay words she said this, this is my own version of the actual situation. And I continued to say the same to LK when we were in together yesterday morning before AW arrived. I said that it's going to be a bumpy path but that we will get there. I'm not sure if she heard me (she's deaf too, and wears hearing aids - I think sometimes she chooses not the hear mind you). As I was leaving last evening she once again said she really valued the gesture and said she would leave the tulips on her desk until the weekend when she would take them home. The rage in me thinks she wants the others to see because if she can break through me she might be able to get through to the others too.
I realise I'm not so flexible when things are being desconstructed. Intellectually I know that a deconstruction might bring more that is good. But I'm terrified that it will deconstruct what is good and be replaced with shoddiness. I don't see much yet that gives me faith that she is overall good. Can she make things work? Her fixation on the child protection seems as if she's hanging onto something she feels safe within and the rest she's uncertain about. I fear that she will want to be an "Addictions unit" pure and simple yet we do so much more than that. I noticed i group how she kept things at a very superficial level, but the clients were expressing fears about relapse so it was bearable. I was critical and I can do that with other therapists. Because I want to be more psychodynamic not just an addictions therapist. Well differences of styles are good for the group. If we all did it one way there would be less dynamics in our programme. How wonderful to be able to write about going with the flow. Now I would like with your help God to flow with the flow.


One thing I would like to write about here is the part a conversation with my dad last Tuesday will haev played in my escalating anger. Having been to the hospital on Tuesday morning, where they prodded and pulled at the very heart of my femininity, painfully, I decided to call my dad en route to work. It was a longer jounrey that normal as I was at QA hospital, Portsmouth. I was very tearful actually, wanting my mum. Wanting to be held in my tearfulness and feeling violated in some way even though I knew they were just trying to help. They had performed a little operation tehre and then, removing a polyp. This she said was the cause of the bleeding, but I've been bleeding ever since. I hope she's right and that it's just been the gradual healing of the removal of the polyp. The pain in my pelvic region seems to be consistent, if not worse at times. I hopet he scan on 13th March reveals an explanation for that and it's not complex or corrosion causing. Before I called him I realised I wanted binge foods. A great bif bag of stuff and lie on the settee chomping through sugar and flour products watching endless films or TV rubbish. Remembering what was said to me during a phone call with an FA person; what is it your actually wanting from the desire for a particular food?, well in this case it was comfort; to feel snug and warm and comforted, hugged and held. I recognised this and even though I had to go to work knew that I could organise that when I got home and started looking forward to curling up on the sofa in my big red comfort jumper and watch a film, all cosily. IN the meantime I needed to get through work, which was challenging to say the least. I kept feeling tearful and of course this added to my resentment fuelling my rage, stomping about telling people how affronted I was with her comment about the note. Anyhow, I couldn't get a hold of my dad. So afer work I called him again to say Happy Birthday - 84 years old. Blimey. He thanked me for his card and so I made a remark about him liking Spike Milligan, t which he cut me down and disparaged him. I felt hurt. I tried again saying how I remember watching him laugh when I was a little girl and laughing with him not knowing why. I mentioned my truth in that I'd been to QA, sadly a reglar haunt for him and his wife. Then someone called out and he said he had to go but ould call soon. He didn't though. Being vulnerable with  him for instance telling him really what's going on for me. And the insanity is expecting him to be diffrent. And then the hurt that my rights haven't been met. Huh! Rights? No acceptance at all of him as him. But as always I absorb this inwardly, almost clamly but in a sinister way and then WHAM! Which int he past has manifested itself through wild partying, drikning, drugging, sexually acting out and either anorexia or overeating. It wasn't like that to being with but gradually built up to be exactly that regularly. But that's how this addiction escalates. Not one of them was enough on their own in the end or only some of the time. A poly addict!
Today it's so different. I talk about these thigns with my sponsor and other FA'ers. I can also talk about this at meetings now as I've achieved my 90 days. I can write here in my blog, whether anyone reads it or not is of no matter. I write because it's gorwth and clarity for me. It's eventual clarity sometimes as in the midst of things it is difficult to see the wood for the trees. But writing, talking, sharing, not acting out, asking for God's help this all contributes to picking my way through the trees and back to the path. This is enlightenment. Not all at once even though that's what I think I need. Oh no, this is enlightenment through experience, contemplation in quiet time and mulling over ideas with people who have also experienced life's tapestry, insane thinking an all.


Thank you God.
And you know what? As God's love started filling me it occurred to me yesterday to call my dad and tell him I love him. And so I did. A little clumsily admittedly. There was a lot of fumbling on his part and off he went in a flurried click of the phone line. He called me back - angrily because he couldm't get hold of me. I explained I was at a meeting to which he again fumbled about with " oh oh one of oh". He cannot or will not accept anything to dow ith me being an addict. And he then muttered about meeting up and hurting his back again. I said look I am off next week so can drive down to Hayling and meet you somewhere there as he had aid in a recent call that he prefers to meet me on his own. Good that suits me better too as clearly his wife doesn't want to have anything at all to do with me and I feel the same. She strikes me as very angry indeed and quite nasty but I don't really know. So he will call he says and arrange a day after I've submitted my essay. Which I need to start working on now.


Thank you for reading if you've got his far ....


Bliss
XX