THOUGHT POLICE

What would Jesus do in a time like this? He would support the underdog, the common people. He would fight with us against the censorship, the attack on life and the sacred union between a man and a woman. He would fight against the fear-mongering in the media. He would urge us not to blindly react to whatever awful events we’re shown. He would fight division and help us unite again as a people.

He would be totally against cancel culture. He would rally us to celebrate our commonality, not hate our neighbors because they wave a flag that you personally don’t like. This isn’t about you folks! That is the great blunder of this era; complete and utter individualism at all cost. And guess what, it’s costing us a lot. I would even argue it’s costing our beautiful America it’s soul.

Change the conversation…with yourself

If you stop to think about it, we talk to ourselves more than we talk to anyone else. We are our own angel or demon. Our own helper or hater. The way we talk to ourselves is an area of being human that is rarely brought up, even in counseling or mental health situations.

Is your self talk positive or negative? Do you encourage yourself to pull yourself up by your bootstraps as keep going? Or are you your own worst heckler?

I have been on a wild and traumatic personal ride for the past four years. At times I even considered talking myself out. Most of this time was hazy, in pain physically or emotionally, confused and anxious. In short, it’s been hell. Just this year, 2020, have I been able to pull myself up above water. I’ve had to change the way I talk to myself in order to make my situation better.

Like so many others, I was subjected to a series of unfortunate events that broke me. Many days, and weeks, and months I wanted to just give up and succumb to my awful fate of brain injury, cognitive disability and abandonment. Living in a loony bin started to sound nice.

But one fact kept me from giving up entirely: This is not the life that God wanted for me, and my life is not for me to forsake as it belongs to God.

So in my daily, or hourly, or minute by minute struggles I came up with a soothing phrase to encourage myself, “That’s okay, just keep going.”

“But I hate this and it hurts and I hate my existence and I don’t want to do this, I want to curl up and die.”

“That’s okay, just keep going.”

“But my life is in shambles and I started off so good and then things happened and now everything’s fucked, and I don’t know how I got here and I’m so lost and miserable.”

“That’s okay, just keep going.”

And after some months, maybe six or seven, I really have a very poor concept of time, I’ve been able to evolve my self talk as things have gotten better. Now what I say to myself is this:

“My brain is healed. My heart is filled with love and hope. My mind is clear and focussed. I’m happy to be alive.”

And I will continue to say this to myself as I’m waiting in line at the post office or trying to calm my brain down to go to sleep. And when the time is right I will naturally be inspired to make a new phrase.

I invite you with great compassion to play with some encouraging phrases for yourself. Or if it feels right simply use mine.

“It’s okay, just keep going.”

Running up the Furniture

The power of belief is the strongest power we have. It has carried humanity through all the dark times.

But it in order to believe, first you have to be able to imagine that it can be true. That you are worth it to be true. Therefor, imagination is just as powerful as belief.

There is an old cat’s story. A story that the older cats tell to the kittens in the alleys: Once upon a time cats were larger than humans. Cats were the rulers of the land. The humans were smart pets and servants; scurry around fulfilling small tasks; laying on their master’s laps to please them. As cats were nocturnal, the humans were made to be too.

The humans, just as cats now, were free to do as they pleased for the most part. They played together, ate together, slept in communal dwellings and had their own songs and stories.

One day a strong and smart human said. This story doesn’t have to continue this way. We have the power of imagination too. I watch my master wake from a dream, furiously record images and words and then a few weeks later the images from his dreams are real life statues. Real life structures and gardens. If we can all dream that we are the larger species and they are OUR pets it will be so. But we must all believe it can be so. At first many did not listen. They were content with their lives. They didn’t want change, afraid of the unknown. And it wasn’t until wrinkles began forming on his face before the younger humans wanted to hear more. He was delighted, and improved upon his theories and explained how to dream. And one day, not so many moons later, the humans awoke and found cats curled by their feet.

Every day I struggle to take my own advice:

re-create reality re-write your perspectives

dream the dreams to flip the story

If the story doesn’t keep progressing it doesn’t change.

And you become stuck.

Today I am stuck.

I try to talk about it. But it just makes me worse.

My story overwhelms me. Memories rear their heads like cobras, strike, and retreat, only for another to take it’s place.

The things I held onto so strongly yesterday are fuzzy and ephemeral.

I feel lost.

My confidence in knowing who I am, what I’m doing, what my goals are, all melt like ice cubes. I don’t know if I’m right or wrong. I don’t know if my words are worth recording. I don’t know which way is up, or which way is down. I don’t know if I can trust my own version of my story. I have no way to know, in the perspective of the universe, if I have don’t the right thing. Likely there’s no answer. The universe doesn’t care. It is more a mirror trying to know itself anyway.

But again, this is all just my perspective today. Just one version of reality. I’m most likely going to have a completely different one tomorrow anyway. So what does it matter? What does the pain matter? The only reason it doesn’t go away is because you are attached to it and you don’t let it go away.

As I save the file and type the date I realize that it is the five month anniversary of meeting the love of my life. And I have been so fucked up today that I have barely interacted with him. This makes me feel even worse. It’s 3:20 in the afternoon. I haven’t eaten anything yet today. I don’t feel like it. And I know this makes my condition even worse. There are so many details that I tend to ignore all of them, because I feel overwhelmed and out of my mind much of the time. I’m supposed to be healing. It’s been two months since I walked out of my life. Healing is supposed to be my focus. But I don’t think I’ve made very much progress in that direction. There has been so much problem solving to do, so many hard decisions, so many painful unforeseen consequences. And the weight of them all pile up and make it hard for me to breathe or to focus.

Less than baby steps.

More like trying to run up the furniture that is falling down the rabbit hole.

My inner voice sounds like Sam Kenison.