I’m pretty sure I start every blog saying I don’t write enough. But, it’s true. I forget, I’m lazy, I get busy, there’s always so much going on, and sometimes I just don’t want to be honest with myself enough to actually sit down and write. But we all know how busy and crazy life can be. So here I go again, attempting to actually work on the blog.
It’s been almost two months since this new chapter began… and honestly, things have never clicked more in my life. Granted, I’m terrified. These new skills I’m learning and therapy sessions I am having aren’t easy. I’m relearning how to be a person. I learning how to feel and think all over again. I’m learning how to interact with people in a healthier way. I’m learning, I’m struggling, but I’m trying SO SO hard. I don’t want to be who I have been for the past forever. And yeah, I’m going to have those bad days where I slide back into old thinking/feeling patterns. I can see how much my effort in this journey is paying off when don’t spend every day thinking ‘I don’t want to be here’ or ‘the world would be better off without me’.
The first few week of therapy and skills training were pretty much an overview of things causally mentioned to me, things previous therapists didn’t go into much detail of, things just tossed into the pile of “you should think about”. Mindfulness I was always some thing that was suggested, well maybe not suggested, but brought up in my therapy session. Ive done some studying of Eastern philosophy/religion, and I’ve done meditation and mindfulness in that way. But never really in a way that would really reduce suffering, my suffering, and increase happiness. Or to help experience reality as it is. So this new way of looking at mindfulness was really eye-opening.
Learning about the core mindfulness skills has helped me understand what it means to be in the state of wise mind. Wise mind is like the wisdom within each person, seeing the value of both reasons and emotion, bringing left brain and right brain together; it’s like the middle path. Some people are stuck in their emotional mind; which is mood dependent and emotion focused, you are ruled by your mood, feelings, and urges to do or say things. Things like facts, reasons, and logic are not important when you are in your emotion mind.
When you are in rational mind you are cool, rational, task-focused. This is where you are ruled by facts, reason, logic, and pragmatics. Things like values and feelings are not important. The point of mindfulness exercises are to help you balance emotion mind and reasonable mind, and find your way into wise mind.
I had to start with learning how to observe, describe, and participate in my emotions., my experiences, my life. Observing my body sensations, paying attention to the present moment, controlling my attention, or observing both the inside and the outside of myself, has never been something that comes easily to me. I tend to do a lot of dissociation. So this was the first, I guess, test to help me along towards getting better. It’s always been easier for me to describe something, or to put words to an experience. Although, I guess if I can’t observe something, I wouldn’t be able to describe it. So maybe there have been times where I could describe an experience or an emotion, which would mean I had really been able to observe them as well.
Participating, or being present, in a moment or an emotion, again, has been difficult for me. There’s always a part of my mind that is somewhere else. But times where I have felt that this is easy for me to do are when I’ve been making music. There is no self when I do music. There is just the moment, there is just a flow. There’s no real self; more like a sense of oneness. And I believe finding my way into wise mind would be like living in the sense of oneness.
Maybe I should try to like my reality first 🤷🏼♀️. I have started working on really observing moments and emotions, and learning to describe them in a way that isn’t judgemental. I guess. Finding a way to make the emotions that I am experiencing effective. The hardest thing, I think, so far is learning to regulate my emotions. That has certainly led to a new view of myself and the world.
I bet I’m going to say everything new in this new training, is the hardest thing. It’s all new. I have told my daughter several times when trying to help her manage her emotions, that mommy is learning too. There are times where I overreact and get too upset or angry, and have to take a moment to step away. But I always sit back down with her, and we talk about what happened, our emotions, and better ways to deal with things. And in those times, I apologize that I got upset or that I yelled, and explain to her that just like she’s learning how to deal with her emotions and how to handle them effectively, I am having to relearn that too. I tell her that we are learning to handle emotions together.
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I'm Not Dumb 