Saturday, October 26, 2013

Grief: Looking At Myself Objectively

Ha!   Did you laugh when you read the title?  It is difficult to look at ourselves objectively.  Some people say, "Follow your bliss." as if it were easy.  I say. "I do follow my bliss, it just runs more quickly than I do."  I admit I am suspicious of people who say they are happy all the time.  I know too many people who wear that as their public face and are very different in private.  Maybe there are some folks who can transform whatever pain they have into joy immediately.  If so, they are lucky folk.  I am not one of them.  It takes work and practice for me.

I had a mother that was always very critical.  If I got a 98 on a spelling test she wanted to know why I got a word wrong.  When I published a short story she said, "I'm proud of you, it's too bad you wasted so much of your life."   My mother has been dead for many years but the sense she gave me that I cannot do anything right lives on in my bones.  Let's take yesterday for an example.  It was a day that had no social obligations - nor does today - so I can take care of various things.  I am tempted to talk about how much time I wasted.  I slept too much.  I didn't accomplish everything I set out to do.

Why do I do that to myself?  I wouldn't treat my friends or family that harshly.  If I had done nothing that would have been okay too but I did several things.  Oddly enough, the most important thing I did was take a shower and wash my hair.  My husband used to have a post-it note that said, "Take a shower."  I teased him about it.  Now I understand that taking a shower means I am taking care of myself.  I'm not seeing anyone I know today.  I took a shower just for me.  Sometimes the dark side of grief appears in personal chaos.  Taking proper care of my body, taking proper care of my environment makes me feel better.  Unfortunately, so does eating ice cream and being lazy.  For me it's always about shifting the balance.  I'm never going to get it completely right, so I have to learn to be proud of the parts I do get done.

I finished reading a book.  My husband and I always read together.  Part of the fun of reading was sharing. I used to read 2 or 3 books a week.  I haven't read much since Artie died.  That I chose to read was a good thing.  That I actually finished reading the entire book was a very good thing.

I did other things, went out to deposit checks, did my Facebook page Grief Speaks Out.  I'm someone who has a difficult time sticking to any routine, any practice.  The fact that I have not missed a day posting on the page and responding to other people's posts is a totally new behavior for me.  Why do we look at what we haven't done instead of what we have?

The same is true for our emotions.  I hear all the time that the pain is unbearable.  This can't be true because we are bearing it.  We have strengths we don't acknowledge.  We say we cry all the time.  At the beginning I cried a lot but I don't think it is physically possible to cry all the time.  I keep saying I have the fifth year blues.  I do; but only some days, some moments.  There is a technique where you put an imaginary black cloud in the palm of your hand.  In that black cloud you imagine all that is making you sad, angry, lonely, everything that is part of your pain.  You picture the cloud clearly.  Then you blow it away.  You know why I am telling you this?  Someone I had taught this technique to reminded me of it.  I had totally forgotten I had ever learned it.  She asked me to step out of my black cloud.  The truth is I ignored her because when I read it I was too comfy being sad.  But then later I paid attention and blew the black cloud away.

I had one day where I felt sluggish like I was walking through quicksand.  When I finally got dressed and out I felt like the light itself hurt.  My body hurt.  I kept walking.  As much as my mind insisted on chattering I kept forcing it to look outward at all that was around me.  The longer I was out the better I felt.  The physical pain went away because the body likes to move.  The light didn't hurt any more.  I won't lie.  I was glad to get back home to my safe little hideaway in my black room.  But it would be wrong to say it was a dark day.  Only part of it was a dark day.  Sometimes going outside and walking is a lot.

I spend time with grieving people who tell me they are always sad and lonely.  Yet, while we are together they laugh and smile and tell interesting stores.  I need to catch myself when I use the words always and never.  I am not always anything - or never anything.  It is always sometimes.

There are people who are arrogant and act entitled.  Many more people, though, have a hard time recognizing the good in themselves.  It is objective to pay attention to your strengths as well as your weaknesses.  It is objective to focus on what you have accomplished not on what you have not gotten to yet.  Artie was the person who made me feel loved and lovable.  I know.  I know.  It's supposed to come from inside.  Well, a lot of times, it doesn't.  When he looked into my eyes and I looked into his you could feel the solid energy of the love going back and forth.  I say this all the time - I am lucky.  I have a lot of people who love me.  It's not the same as that one special person loving me.  It doesn't have to be a husband - it can be anyone who has died.  We miss that person's physical presence so much.  It leaves a gap.

To look at yourself objectively probably means with more kindness and acceptance than you do now.  You have to feel the love from someone when you can't see them any more, can't touch them any more.  Grief can make you feel you are paralyzed.  If you feel you are paralyzed wiggle your fingers.  You aren't.

I still have to do all the things I didn't have the will to do yesterday.  It won't help me get them done if I add to the weight I already carry by thinking badly of myself for not accomplishing more.  It never helps to compare myself to other people.  I don't know if the person I think is achieving more than I am is scared inside knowing they are a failure.  I don't know if the person I think is farther along in the grieving process than I am cries themselves to sleep every night.

Looking at myself objectively means feeling good about what I am doing - even if it is just breathing.  It means noticing where I can improve but without judgment.  Here are my strengths, here are my flaws.  Appreciate the strengths; work on the flaws.  When someone says I am inspiring or amazing the answer should be "Thank you." not" Oh, no I'm not - not really."

I'm not there yet.  Kill your critic.  Don't bite the hook.  I know what I know and forget what I know or am too whatever to practice it.  That's the word.  Practice.  I heard a professional piano player working on a new piece of music.  It sounded terrible.  It didn't matter how good he was, he hadn't practiced enough yet.  If I go ice skating and I've never practiced, not only will I not be in the Olympics - I will probably be sitting down most of the time.  Transforming grief into something that makes you feel fully alive is like that.  It takes practice.  Having memories make you smile instead of cry takes practice.  Loving yourself takes practice.  Noticing your happy moments takes practice.  Noticing the beautiful things in the world takes practice.

Maybe some day I will be someone who leaps out of bed and enjoys every bit of my day and goes to bed at night to dream sweet dreams.  Probably not.  That's never been my nature.  That's one of the reasons I miss Artie so much.  He knew my damaged parts, as I did his, and loved/loves them as much as the rest of me.  Be easy on yourself today.  Keep practicing, keep searching.  What is lost can be found, and if it is lost again can be found again.  Maybe we need to take self pride and self satisfaction and clip it on like a child's mother clips on their mittens so they don't get lost.  (Do they still do that?)  Take good care of yourself today.  You deserve it.  xo

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