Day 9

As we get older the past gets longer. I have visited back there often enough. I rebel. This is not the way to heal. At some point it gets morbid, self-indulgent, and creates more stuckness than it releases. In the present, I find myself gripped by indecision, the need to ask permission, the need to be told I'm OK. So today, I want to encourage myself. I went for a walk today on the bike path. It was not extremely vigorous, but it was a half-hour, which ought not to be a big deal, but for 3 years I have been afraid to walk. I thought it was just laziness for awhile, and felt ashamed, but I know it was also fear and avoidance. I could enjoy the brightness of the day, the gardens and the houses, but I had a scrim preventing a real feeling of connection (like the clarendin (sp?) commercials. I was aware of physical twinges, and I tried to notice them and let them pass. Maybe I could do that because it was not severe, or maybe not severe because I could do that.

This week my task from physical therapy was to go on 2 bike rides, and I obsessed so much about it that I didn't do it--yet. You know, worrying about the helmet and the lock as if those were major obstacles. And my day 9 SEP says go back to the past and tell again about what happened Back Then and how I felt. I think the bikerides would be better for me.

Obsessive loops continue. Is that always so? Was it always?

If rage is so infantile, then everyone has it, and I had TMS as a newborn! The psychoanalyst Otto Rank (1924) theorized birth trauma as the source of psychological pain, and what does one do with that? Not be born, or accept the human condition that life itself is a mix of trauma and transcendance. In my infantile intolerance to milk, severe excema, allergies, sensitivities, separation anxieties, perhaps I always had TMS. But early childhood was not hell. I remember the street games, the firefly evenings, the security of rows of identical houses, the hours of imaginative play. I have spent too much time back there, and I think it is time to move on from the past. I do. Sitting in the past is some of what got me here, I think. I need now to get out of the loops. The SEP is a tool, not a mandate.

 

Hi. riv44. Your pain may not be from childhood memories. I think you've spent enough time journaling or thinking there. Time to move on to the present. Maybe something there is causing you anxiety and pain. Being afraid to take the bike rides could very well be the cause. Fearing physical damage by something like riding your bike, making you worry about falling. I suggest you wear a helmet, although I never did while biking. If it gives you security why not?

Ride for as long or short as you want. Try to ignore or accept any pain during or after.

Look into your personality traits instead of your childhood. Are you a perfectionist or "goodist," wanting to help everyone and be liked by everyong?
Are their job concerns or relationship problems? Does the news and war anger you and make you feel frustrated?

We all have worries and anxieties. We live in that kind of world. Be glad you were born and are alive now. It's up to you to be happy. Think positive and you can be happy.

Forget the loops that make you unhappy or cause you pain. Live in the present moment and practice deep breathing.

 

I agree. It is in the present.