Alchemy, Part 1

I'm not the same person I was on 08/09/09 and I resent that.

I’m sure it is for the greater (and my) good that I learn more about compassion generally and forgiveness specifically, but God dammit! Did it have to come at such a price?

I understand intellectually that forgiveness is a good thing (especially forgiveness of self) but emotionally…that is another story.

When I am on the receiving end of (however unintentional or misunderstood) cruelty, I place as much distance as possible between myself and the offending person/place/thing to prevent a recurrence. I have done this for years. I have done this to myself (placed as much distance as possible between me and myself).

What I’ve come to understand is that there is no running from emotional pain and no matter how much you try to distract yourself from it, it sits and lingers and festers and boils over. Usually at the most inappropriate time.

Of course I understand this about other people (I have been a psychologist for over 20 years). The pisser is that *I* have done what I have counseled hundreds of others not to. I don’t mean this in an egotistical way (“How could this happen to me?!”); I mean this in a who-is-that-idiot-in-the-mirror way (“How could I be so CLUELESS???”).

It was a good 10 years after the last sprint (which took me to an entirely different plane) that I experienced (yet another) cycle of mind-erosion, soul-numbing, and ass-bursting. There were a couple hints that a pachakuti (1) was on its way, but I stayed put. I own property now, so disappearing is not so easy.

After the Cosmic Hurricane left, there was a hell of a mess to clean up.

Rather than just leave, like I always do, I wanted to stay. More accurately, I did not want to leave the situation in the center of the storm. I liked the situation too much. I loved the situation. I did not want it to end. Undergo major surgery; OK. Endure an excruciating rehabilitation; all right. But end? NO.

This wanting to stick it out and re-work and repair…what a totally foreign and incomprehensible thing.

I understand this really is all about forgiveness of self—what we can’t own or face is reflected back to us by others—but…I have really pissed myself off! How could I forgive that and set myself up for recurrence?

What I have learned is that The Lesson is not about prevention. Life is going to happen whether we want it to or not. We are going to hurt ourselves (and others) whether we want to or not. The Lesson is about coping better the next time and minimizing the damage.

Just like it (should) only take one dead battery incident to learn to keep jumper cables in the car, it (should) only take one life-altering cycle to learn that, eventually, God does reset the playing pieces.

Yet some of us don’t understand the first (or second or third or fourth or 187th) time that it’s not really about the dead battery. It’s about how you cope with the dead battery. You know you will eventually get a new one and the car will start. Getting the car to start is the adventure.

There is also a Lesson about commitment here, about finding a situation you want to maintain and MAINTAINING it. I never saw the value of that before 08/09/09; I preferred new situations, still in their wrapping. Once the wrapping came off…onto the next one! An endless Christmas morning for a two year-old.

This all boils down to: I chose to take a grow-up pill and the side effects are uncomfortable on a cellular level. I realize that caterpillars change on a cellular level to become butterflies and that fairy tales are really all about transformation.

However…

My Inner Child is still crying over her abandonment and I just can’t convince her that this time, this time, I will not leave her.

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(1) “Pachakuti” is a Peruvian shamanic term for, basically, “cosmic upheaval.”