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Limitations and Self-care

2/20/2019

5 Comments

 
Does anybody else’s life seem as ironic as I perceive mine?
 
A workshop is offered for female empowerment at a great price and at a place I love. There is nothing I want more now than to be the empowered Me. I’ve been sick for two weeks. I can see all the reasons why I “should” go. And when I imagine it, I feel tired and that it will be a drain on my energy. Do I choose to push and do what I think I “should” again? Draining my life force energy even more and once again? It is the way I’ve always done things. Push and try to be “good” and “right”. My credence has been: Have no limits. 
 
Or I could say “No,” and stay home and recuperate and be gentle with myself, maybe a small quiet walk with a friend. That feels like a relief.
 
The irony for me is that I have an idea of what I “should” do to become Empowered Me. And maybe it isn’t really so. Maybe the empowered me says, “No thank you,” and trusts myself and my body and what feels gentler and kinder, “even though”. Maybe this idea of doing what I should, this doing at all, is part of that patriarchal value inside of me around doing-equals-success. What if the empowered thing is to listen to myself, stay home recuperating and nourishing myself. No matter what anyone else thinks or says. That is the empowerment I do want.
Why is it so scary to listen to and trust myself and act accordingly? What does it take to finally not give a fuck and just be me? Learning doesn’t come easily sometimes. I’m brought to the ground this time. I can do no more acting or faking or pleasing others. Well, I can, but I can FEEL the cost now, which is helpful. I feel how I can’t afford it energetically. Weakness brings its gifts when necessary. 

I grew up in the sixties and absorbed a message of: Love means having no limits. Which has translated into doing things I haven't wanted to do. Putting others before me. Trying to mind-read and please others while ignoring myself. Feeling wrong and guilty if my needs and desires differ from someone else's and trying to change myself to the shape I think I need to be to be loved, lovable and safe - giving others that power over me. Oscillating between anger and fear with a backdrop of bitterness. Hatred of self and others. Self-abuse. Avoidance of people. Secretiveness. Lying. Insecurity and low self-esteem.
 
The other thing that prevents me from listening to and taking care of myself appropriately is that I don’t want to have limitations. I’m accustomed to being able to do whatever I want, all day long. Right now I can barely do one task per day. Today I call a client. Tomorrow I’ll wash clothes. This frightens me. It’s not how I want to be. It harks mortality. It might pass, but it might be the new status quo. How do I cope with that with acceptance? Doesn’t that mean I’ve lost the game?
 
It comes down to accepting myself and my life and being responsible for it as it is, regardless of what culture says is okay. Being there for myself unconditionally, as a present mother would. Perhaps this is an ironic piece of the empowerment I've prayed for. The next instruction I hear is to grieve. Then see what the next step is, accepting its form whether crawling on knees or walking on feet.
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5 Comments
Trish Cannon
2/21/2019 08:57:52 am

I love how often we are connected in mysterious ways my friend. This is an amazingly honest blog and I love you for it! So here I am....I don't know how much I have shared with you of late, but I had a diagnosis of melanoma and had surgery to remove it from my arm. It was caught at an early stage so surgery was all I needed. But....it really shook me. I do have to return to the doc every 6 months for a skin check...oh it was skin cancer...and I found myself faced with my own mortality up close and personal so to speak. How do I want to live my life? A question I have asked my self for a number of years now. Life in Mexico brought me close to my own answer and then a return to the states challenged that answer once again. What I failed to allow was change. I am always changing, along with the outside world. I took a tender, deep look and decided I was done doing all those "shoulds"; having it be ok when really it isn't ok. Letting those in my life know when I don't like what they say or how they are relating to me, instead of doing what is my pattern which is to say "oh that's ok, I understand". No, not any longer! Life is too short to not live it in a manner that feels like my heart is singing. Now this didn't mean I was going to become a hard ass...it means I'm going to be kind, and tender with my precious self. I will be more real with others, and it leaves me feeling honest within. This is a big subject I feel, and one that as a woman we need to share with each other. I'm with you my friend....braking this pattern for me has not been easy, and I see how easy it is to fall back into...and I know that it's so worth my shifting it so that I may live my full life in each moment. Love to you

Reply
Robin
2/21/2019 02:10:49 pm

Oh, Trish. Once again and as usual your honesty, deep inquiry and softening into self-tenderness, stuns me. I hear you, sister. I agree it is important that we as women share about this and support one another. There are hundreds of years of patriarchy that have brain-washed us all, men and women alike, about how to be, how it is, etc.
We are born and living in a time of transition and women taking back their power and wisdom. It IS so hard, I agree. I appreciate your acknowledgement of the value of me sharing my truth here.
I love you so, sister.

Reply
Edward Mason link
2/22/2019 05:03:54 am

I don't think the power issue is necessarily patriarchal. Power is equally emboded in men and women, and men have as many issues with it as women. Most of us don't like power much at all, because it places responsibility upon us to be wise and careful.
Your key insight here, for me, is putting "should" in quotes. People who've stepped away from standard Christian and Jewish values often seem to me have kept the basics of the morality without the Deity or the old set of rules that were hung on it. It comes down to attempting self-rearrangement, but without a very different point of orientation. Thus, much of the time, healing still seems to be about reducing tention related to fitting in better ("Obeying the Law") rather than just saying "Oh, screw it – I am the mess that I am, and so is everyone else. And it's a rather interesting mess." When the world and my own dismay at how I handle it do get to me, I try to remember Oscar Wilde's old line:
"We are all in the gutter, but some of us are looking at the stars."

Reply
Robin
2/22/2019 05:22:31 pm

Edward, thank you for your deep read and sharing. I hear you on all points. Of course men, too would have power issues - and at a basic human level I can imagine that they are as you say, about fear of responsibility, etc. I do imagine that there are gender related nuances due to societie's behaviours and "agreements" these last centuries, and maybe even some basic difference between the genders - but that is a huge and controversial subject. I only know my experience and I am a woman this time so I speak from that perspective.
Regarding all you've eloquently written around the "shoulds," that makes sense and to me seems a profound explanation. The Oscar Wilde quote is great. So well said. Thank you for reading, contemplating and sharing, Edward.

Reply
Connor link
10/21/2023 09:47:17 pm

Love this

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    Robin Rainbow Gate

    I help people midlife and beyond to find their inner power, health and well being through slow, conscious living




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