long hard road out of hell (Patreon)

I don't blog as much as I used to. but after spending a day going back and tagging every single Patreon post to organize them into neat little categories (that you can browse and find stuff easier in), I learned a few things about where I've been which gave me perspective on where I'm going. 

ever since I've moved here I've been waiting for it to sink in. the fact that I left behind my old life, relinquished the hellscape that kept me prisoner all these years... I started something new, something better... that day never came. it should have been an instant relief, like a deliverance... when the weight of the world falls off your shoulders and just like that you spread your wings and rise up to heights you didn't think possible. that's how it was supposed to feel... 

I still have nightmares about missing a flight to go be with Jack, about everything that could go wrong, everything that could prevent me from seeing him. only to wake up and realize where I am - yet unable to shake the feeling left behind by the imagery. scared and stressed and full of woe... at a reality that has long ceased to be.

and I've come to learn that closure isn't something that happens to you. 

time doesn't heal and physical distance does not separate you from the demons in your mind. and a new life doesn't undo the memories of the old. memories that are still alive, if only just to you. 

and though I breathe the autumn air and hold a purring cat... and nothing is the way it was and my love, he sits right there... and though there is so much to see, yet not a lot to show... in my head I still relive the only hell I've known. 

somehow I don't feel safe yet... like nothing is guaranteed yet... and the more I realize that I was somehow expecting this move to bring about the stability I never had, the more I know that any new beginning, like anything in life, first has to be created. and nothing is ever guaranteed. 

the old must die for the new to thrive, yes... but what is to take its place must first be created. 

new beginnings don't feel like beginnings because they're too awfully similar to their predecessor. I wasn't given the luxury of resolution of any of the things I went through, therefore nothing has really ended. and when nothing dies, nothing else can take its place. that's why we find ourselves in similar places time after time. we take our thoughts with us, for better or worse. 

each day we stand before a blank canvas and we choose to paint with the same colors. the change we seek depends on us choosing a new color and painting a new picture.

this implies the courage to see things differently. some of us need courage to dare to see things from someone else's point of view. but some of us need courage too see things the way we truly feel. since I can remember, I was told that how I see things is wrong and that my story is invalid. that no one would look to me for opinions about my own life and therefore it didn't matter. I learned to ignore it in favor of the world view of the people around me and it hurt so bad to deny my true self, but I learned to live with the pain. I gave up my own world for theirs - my feelings for theirs - my opinions for theirs. and I grew to hate myself.

I never stopped yearning for that feeling of comfort I long since abandoned. I never stopped longing to be with myself. or the part of myself that I knew. but shame is a powerful thing, how it makes you hide away every part of yourself that causes you pain and rejection and fear... until there's nothing left. and though I've spent years trying to reclaim pieces of myself... all it did was make me see I was much more broken than I ever knew... triggering the same shame that caused me to break in the first place and pushing me further away from everything I want so bad to embrace. 

every once in a while I open up to the truth of my internal world and every time I say I wanna make it right... and every time I get triggered and fall back into denial. so you can imagine I don't get my hopes up anymore. I've lost faith in my commitment to be in my own self, live in my own thoughts and see through my own eyes. and yet I know... that I can't move forward if I don't stand my ground. 

the life I yearn to live must first be created before it can be enjoyed. 

because you don't fly out of hell... 

you crawl.

my hell has been living like a failure for years. no matter how many times I succeeded... all this time my story has been that I've failed because I underestimated the time and effort involved in a project, because an idea didn't work out the first time, because I was overwhelmed and struggling, because I constantly felt behind schedule and was constantly disappointing expectations I held for myself that hardly anyone else cared about. any challenge was a sinister tragedy and proof of my incompetence. that's how I was raised to think and feel about the happenstances of life... instead of taking things as they are and learning about progress and resolution... everything bad that happened was due to my personal failings and character flaws. so that's what I focused on. that's how I wrote my life. and because I kept writing it, it became all I knew. so I kept writing it. 

it's easy to see, looking back, where I went wrong. but the future may not be so clear. because until we imagine things differently, we won't know how a better life could look. I thought all it took was putting myself in a different place and it would all be revealed to me... but that's to make yourself a passive observer of life, to forfeit potential and deny your personal power. a new beginning starts with dreaming it possible - ironically, the thing I've been discouraged from doing my entire life. dream... imagine... push the boundaries of the possible... such childish pursuits! to imagine what could be... if you want to be taken seriously, you must surrender to what is and never go beyond! you must only write what you already know - for conceptualizing of something that is yet to be is the most foolish thing! it makes you a fool. 

do you know what the first card of the major arcana is? 0 - the fool. the starting point, the beginning of a journey that will circle all the way around to 21 - the world. in order to bring anything into this world, you must first be foolish. you must dream it possible. 

the journey out of hell starts with a "what if?"

all this time I'd been pushing the limits of my own abilities, pushing the boundaries of creation... and I thought something was wrong when life pushed back! what if... this is in fact what progress is... what if... everything fell into place just fine... 

what if...