Stop drop and roll

I have been admiring lately, some very honest and personal posts written on Amy's blog. I kinda backed out of the whole writing personal posts thing a while ago, ostensibly because I had my shit together and the whole public sphere confession situation no longer had any attractions. While the second part may be true, the "having my shit together" is a bit of a question mark. Today I think there is need to do a bit of public laundering of personal life issues.

So get ready here comes a long hella-personal post

This morning, after a series of nightmares about housebreakers, dog nappers and people who opened their mouths and had no tongues left me a little, let's say flustered (weeping on couch as of 8:10am). I am making a new plan. To be publicly unveiled here. Mostly so later this fall I can go to parties and people can say; "Oh you're the girl who's decided on celibacy".

Yep, I am definitely going to be celibate until 2008, but it's a rolling deadline, if I still need to be celibate post New-Years there is nothing to stop me. Except myself, ha.

Okay, so let's define the kind of celibacy I am after. Of course I mean no sex, no dating, that's a given, but the wider purpose of this exercise is not to give me more free-time or build defenses against intimacy. What I am trying to do is a restore a balance in my head which I think has been lost for about well, I don't even know how long, maybe it was never there.

So this is not the celibacy of physical/emotional deprivation, it's the celibacy of a meditation, of learning to think differently and by thinking differently, hopefully learning to feel better about life.

I could outline all the things (um pain Miriam don't lie) I hope to ease with this new idea. I could tell you all the unpleasant feelings that brought this on, but in the end that's not really the important part. I think the basic idea is that I have some self-destructive tendencies that mostly reflect a lack of self esteem.

That being said, I'd rather not have to undergo some fabulously dangerous experience or jail time to fix a problem that seems so simple yet eludes me completely. So the basic intention of the celibacy exercise, is to narrow focus to myself in the present to give me a better chance of healing that which bothers my mind, my spirit and my emotional well-being. Which perhaps sounds terrifically selfish, but isn't. Because it is not so much about caring for no-one else, it's about learning to care about myself enough.

What follows is a list of the thought practices (meditations?) I will be doing during the next six weeks. Along with some examples, and if I feel like one exists, or a song that I like that helps me to understand some of the deeper reasons for this new practice, and or to provide encouragement/ a little levity in what would otherwise be as humorless as the AA boat prayer. There are positives and negatives here. Things I should think about more, and things that when I find myself thinking them I should figure out which bad habit they reflect and then move on. I'd say loosely they go from hardest to achieve to easiest. This is like psychological boot-camp with a soundtrack.

Why I am writing this? Because my dear readers, and especially the ones who I see or speak with on a regular basis, I am relying on you all to help me. Keep me on the path, give me any feedback or experiences you think may help me. I don't think this is going to be easy, it's basically reprogramming most of my adult relationship with the outside world, and with myself. But I think if it begins to work I may have made a big step forward.

Ready? 1,2,3, go!

The Golden Rules of learning self-esteem from the ground up

1. No more thinking about myself in the context of others. This means any thought that falls under "what do I look like to ..." " I feel so stupid I just .. in front of ...", "what a stupid thing to have said to .." " I wonder if that so-and so is finding me attractive".. No more, no more thinking about what I am like to the world at large. Recommended action when I begin to feel myself outside myself looking in? Ask myself if I am happy with what I just did or said or am doing. If I am it's time to move on, if not what must I do to become happier with it.

I wish I had an Evil Twin - the Magnetic Fields

2. No more thinking about others in the context of myself. This one sounds easy, it just means no comparing. No looking at what surrounds me, the people I care about, and those that just surround me, and judging what they are doing in life and how it measures up to what I am doing, or how I measure up to them. As Alison writes; "Comparison kills. Do your best, but don’t compare". Additionally, no imagining that what people do in their lives says anything about me. It's negative egomania. (Thanks Jen!)
3. No more living in the future/telling stories to yourself I could probably expand this to say no more dreaming about things that have no bearing on the present. No more letting those dreams color your willingness to understand and make peace with the present. I can't really expand this one more. It's hard for me to describe the habit, but just imagine that you had one life that you lived. And another that happened mostly in your head. And that the life in your head bore only a passing resemblance to the life you led, and none of the actions in your real life had much influence on the imagined future, just as the imagined future had no bearing on life. Imagine the disappointment each time the imaginary future gets exposed. Stop having imaginary futures. Start trying to believe in and enjoy my very own, existing present. Also, if there are people in your imaginary futures that you know in the present, don't make them beholden to what you imagine of them. Don't do that anymore, it's totally unfair. Or at the very least tell them when you're doing it.

Same As It Ever Was - The Talking Heads

4. The past is not predictive, it just happened that way (the lamenting Jew clause). The tendency is to look to my histories to find out what hurts me, why I hurt other people the way I do, but then I guess the fallacy is to think that I am doomed to repeat these histories, and not to get over them, nor learn from my life. But I do get over things. Whatever the situation was; it happened, bits of it sucked and I remember those more than the good parts, that's just how I am, that's why I need exhaustive lists like these.

John Wayne Gacy Jr. - Sufjan Stevens

5. There is probably no real reason to be ashamed. I am probably only ashamed because I am more comfortable feeling wrong and bad. Unless what I have done is hurtful to someone else or to myself on purpose, the shame is only serving to help me feel comfortably not right. It's also a great excuse for laziness, feeling like a bad person makes it hard to get shit done.
6. People are not going to want to take care of you (if you aren't taking care of yourself), they just won't. I think that's one of those fullstop ones. Basically every time I am sitting on the couch wishing someone would show up with a bowl of soup and a back massage I should check to make sure any of my limbs have been amputated and if none, I should use the one that feels strongest to kick my own ass. Unless I have the flu, then all bets are off.

Alright DONE ALL THE NEGATIVES

Phewf.. So assuming I pass a whole day, not doing any of those things. Which would actually be miraculous, then I get to focus on the following great thoughts, which normally take up about 20% of my headspace because I am too busy dealing with all that noise upstairs.

1. What do I have to do today Work? Call a friend? Make some art. Cook something? This is a pretty simple question to answer and then to do.

Here to There - Michael Nyman

2. What should I be doing for my real future? ie; strategic planning, ie; reworking proposals, applying for grants, business development. NOT: dreaming of what the outcomes of any of these activities might be, but actually doing them.
3. Is there anything I'd like to be doing? How will I do it? The proper place for dreams is here.
4. Being courageous in affection, not reckless, not jealous, not trying to get what I want from people by being tender. Sorry that's one of those confusing positive negatives. I will work on being nice for real, as opposed to instrumentally sweet.

La Familia - Mirah

And assuming all of this is actually meaningful. It certainly felt that way when I began three hours ago. Then we have a fairly long winded game plan for the next 6 weeks. "So... off we go then".

Ootischenia - The Be Good Tanyas