Human Cannonball

I am more up beat today which has emphasized for me how valuable the sessions are and the 'space' going to the hospital gives me.  I went back this afternoon and had some time in the computer room.  It is a space to think without any respnsibility or concerns. 

I found a wonderful website which fed my soul; full of Scottish artists.  I fell in love with about six paintings and one sculpture.  It was great for me because I could get close to the images, something that tends to set off alarms in galleries and cause concern in a commercial gallery - especially if a guide dog is about and there are installations or floor based sculpture!!!  Rainbow eats tea-lights at worship services if they are on the floor - you see the difficulty.  Taize is accompanied by munching.

I've been given a lot to think about and consider.  This feels just about the right time in the programme of treatment for me to shed a few more self-limiting assumptions and explore who I am now and what action I can and should decide to take.  Time to be challenged.

The experiences of my life, and perhaps most particularly the accompanying trauma that some violent and abusive events have had on my psyche have given me at best some uniqueness of understanding, empathy and the odd bit of intuition, but at worst, an extraordinary sense of feeling different.  Differentiated in some sense; dislocated and disinterested in many of the preoccupations which seem to make most people's lives go smoothly and relatively uneventfully round. 

Hence I have sometimes wondered if I suffer from Asperger's.  Recent insights have felt like I have an opportunity to remove another few items of this particular Emperess's new clothes and continue in a different manner my exploration of what human authenticity - living my life truly vocationally - means after this illness.

Today I have realised that there are other folk around who know the sort of differences I am talking about even if their actual life experience has been different.

Tonight I am knackered but I feel I am slowly owning the depths of myself whilst relying on others, for the most part, to remind me of the heights. 

Today I think I made some important connections regarding why I self-sabotage.  Ironically, compared with many people, my SS moments happen when I encounter success or the sniff of serious success in the air - not when I am feeling I am failing.  Weird. 

Maybe coming from a family of theatre folk and growing up seeing the impact fame has on people, has left its mark.  I can remember a couple of very well known,  in their time, comedians - and not just in the pathos sense of the true clown but because their shyness and lack of an independent emotional self - which resulted in their sense of isolation.  Hancock was before my time, but a classic example, I'd guess.  Kenneth Williams' diaries reveal similar traits.

When I experience genuine success - publication; a painting I am proud of; a poem or meditation that has written itself but has been created by me and just feels as though it has leapt onto the page - I withdraw.  Partially in disbelief; dislocation - "It can't be as good as I think it is".  "You are just a fantasist".  That sort of rubbish.  (Mean voice still seems pretty non-plussed by recent insights.  Good.)

Emptiness at least provides plenty of space.  I am not thinking too hard, but day-dreaming different realities for now.  Vocationally so much is already in place and evolving with the setting up of a religious and lay foundation - and the vision and realisation of The Sanctuary - but I am going to be of most use when I am most fulfilled and that's why I have worked hard and discovered.  I hate the sense of torment and the darkness - but I do believe the journey is about making me more fully who I truly am.  It often feels like two rounds and a knock out, but I will get more experienced in the strategies that overcome the sticking points and blocks - the rest is believing that the treatment works and does help.

I self-sabotage by:

i)  Living vicariously and not giving enough creative and emotional energy to my own creative channels.  I live 'professionally' and am accountable with checks and balances in my professional work - when I am working - but they are about spiritual in-fill and being held accountable through oversight and supervision.  I haven't given enough time to my own creative needs and certainly not taken into consideration seriously my aspirations or talents.  They come after everyone else is comfy or working on their own stuff or I've finished being a partner, mother and daughter, or a cook and worship facilitator - or earned a crust.

ii)  I am frightened of success.  I become really distressed about anyone knowing what I have in print, or have broadcast and always use other names.  It sounds affected as I read this back; rather precious.  I have always argued it is a craving for independence and privacy in my creative work.   I worry as opportunities increase with my creative writing that I just won't have the stomach for all that goes with it.  Maybe it all sounds a bit over the top - "You should be so lucky".  Well, the reality is I seem, after a lot of hard work to begin to be getting some serious interest in my work and as I do that - so I self-sabotage. 

The card by my desk which says:"What would you do if you knew you couldn't fail?"  should be reading in my current life scenario - "You're setting yourself up for a severe fall - don't bother - you're so not that good.  Give it a miss.  You're no Lucy Hawking, Maya Angelou or Jane Austen - put another duvet on the sofa and log on the fire old girl and curl up - you're much better at that".

iii)  Acute fear of criticism from people I do not respect and trust.  Funnily enough the ones I respect and trust I learn from their criticism because I know at the deepest level we are neither competitive nor are we seeking anything other than a mutual understanding or evaluation.  So I can hear praise and criticism from a spiritual or academic mentor.  Likewise from a colleague who I know holds a similar integrity and commitment to authenticity.  The sense that with success often comes less control over your life - not more - is a worry, combined with a fear that I may actually be a one novel wonder.

iv)  Fear of the additional expectations and responsibilities that the respect of others and being taken seriously brings.

The question over the months ahead will be: have I the balls to free fall and take the reality which was once a dream even further, or will I play it safe?  I've never thought of myself as a human cannonball (no comments thank you) but essentially that's what I am asking of myself.  This time I must learn the lesson FINALLY that I thought I had grasped years ago - no wearing my knickers outside my tights - super heros are not my thing.  Save the world - important - but watch out that I don't sacrfice myself in the advocacy. 

Fly.  Free fall.  Go and be what I have now discovered I might like to become.  Suggestions on a postcard please.

Long journey - but I need to see whether this is all just words and pretty turns of phrases or whether it really does sink into my psyche and marrow.

Whether it takes is the main thing.  Much more to work out concerning strategies for the future and lots of advice and support needed.  But on hospital days I almost always feel a lift; listened to; encouraged and sometimes pushed to make a bit more effort and trust I can.  Mean voice has decided this is an appropriate moment to remind me that I am essentially a lazy slob.  Yes, a bit of me is.  But most of me although still feeling pretty ill - recognises I am making a kind of progress - no quick fixes - but solid re-laying foundations stuff.

Comments

[carolynn]

Dear Jane
It is wonderful to see signs of hope and future and life in your blog again....viriditas!
Hold on to those green shoots when you can and trust that those working with you can nurture you so they grow.
One day you will see my first painting entitled Viriditas......
With much love
C

[S]

Know yourself loved . . . good days, bad days, highs, lows, ecstatic, morose, feeling up, feeling down, . . . Know .

[Gwen]

Amen to all the above. Go fly free, trust those around you. It is so good to hear the You. Hold on tight and know you are loved and supported every step of the way. Much love G

[Jane W-G]

THanks Carolynn for the 'buzz' in your comment. I went a bit down hill last night as bedtime approached - but this often happens. I am determined now to try and in sort out some sort of routine to getting up etc... so the next plate is spinning on the end of the stick in the air!

Can't wait to see the painting.

I have completely muddled my hospital days and am now seeing my new person today and saw my 'regular' yesterday. I had a great idea which was to ask if someone from the hospital will come with me to have my hair cut - at the moment I resemble an Old English Sheep Dog! I guess it could be a celebration before discharge.

I think I've been a bit caught by how pressured I felt realising that normally there should be just three more weeks to go - a standard three month involvement - but I am trying hard to think I can at least try to make it to the gate rather than sit back and feed my insecurities. The last thing I want is to develop a sense of dependency on the hospital. Gratitude for saving my life - yes - but dependency no.

How are you? E-mail if you can.

J.

[jane W-G]

Hi Gwen,

As always your encouragement means so much. I am back at the hospital this afternoon and a bit nervous because I will be seeing a new person - but I am a big fan of the hospital day centre so she would have to be Cruella de Ville for me not to be able to listen and learn. If she is I will keep Rainbow on a lead - she may want him for a fur coat.

How's Tom doing?

J.

[Jane W-G]

S.,

OK, what are you after?

J.