11/20/2008

My life is a result of a large series of decisions made in a state of desperation.  Because of that, I don’t want to make any more decisions while I am depressed or scared.

11/21/2008

Effectively, nothing in the past ever actually happened.  Nothing in the future has happened yet.  That leaves me with only one real moment: now.

It is important for me to remember that all the things I was most afraid of have already happened to me (and I survived).  I have no reason to continue my life, trying to protect myself from something that has already happened.

11/24/2008

OMG, we really are at war!  “We” meaning Christians.  I received a letter from my pastor’s wife, warning about a book called “Conversations with God,” that is basically making up a way for God to be.  It’s so frightening to me.  As a child in school, we learned to sing, “Away in a Manger” at Christmastime; now we’re expected to say, “Happy Holidays.”  We aren’t supposed to mention Jesus, but now someone is attributing thoughts and philosophies to God and selling them to school children?  Someone already wrote that book—it’s called The Bible.

I think having money will make me happy.  Well, if I look at it honestly, if I got all these credit cards paid down, I’d have money.  Granted, I have a lot of debt, most of which came about out of necessity.  But applying for a new card to buy something I want is plain irresponsible, and I did it just a couple days ago.  The $140 purse that I can’t even carry because of the nerve damage was irresponsible.  I know I suffer from a compulsion, but that’s a reason, not an excuse.  I need to take responsibility for that compulsion.

Funny realization:  I’m happy when I’m at work.  It is not the teaching career I planned for, and I resent the hell out of having a Bachelor’s degree and humping milk at Wal-Mart.  The physicality of it has put me into a lot of pain.  It’s not the $42,500 a year that made me move to the hell that is Texas.  But I’m happy when I’m there.  I love the exercise.  I love (most of) the people I work with.  The days fly by.  And I realize that I just bebop and sing my way through the day.  I’m alone most of the time; I’ve been trained for my job and I’m trusted to do it.  I like it.  If I have to work, I could have done a lot worse.

I need to stop worrying about all my “shoulds.”  Yes, the house is messier than I want it to be.  Yes, there’s step work I need to be doing, and writing for Helium, and meetings, church, Big Book study…all sorts of things I think I need to do.  But the fact is I have a lot of pain right now.  The fact is I don’t have a lot of energy.  The fact is I like to spend my precious time at home with my animals, not running around.  Maybe I need to just accept my limitations.  It’s probably not forever.  My hands will get better.  My finances will get better.  Since the only person putting pressure on me is me, maybe I “should” just back off.

I really want to just give myself permission to be Jesse, in all my goofiness and imperfect glory.  I’m smart, I’m artistic; I’m talented, loving, decent, creative and worthwhile.  I keep believing I should somehow be different than I am.  Why?  Because I think other people think I should be different.  Not that I’ve been told that for a long time.  It’s left over from my past, my parents, my siblings, my husbands.  The people I know now don’t tell me that.  I’m not going to live forever.  I’d better get to being true to who and what I really am here pretty quick.  Effectively (I recently wrote), nothing in the past ever happened.  I need to stop reacting to it.

I want to give me permission to take care of myself.  It’s funny how I’ll impulsively buy a $140 purse, but not be able to go to the doctor because I don’t have the money.  My wants come before my needs.  But I think that’s just an effort to fill the eternal hole.  Maybe if I started taking care of myself at least as well as I do my dogs, I wouldn’t need to pacify myself with stuff, only to later regret the purchase and be angry with myself and feeling crowded because there’s too dang much stuff.