I have always been one. And like I think nature sometimes struggles, I too, have had a hard time using this will of mine, rightly.
I seem to always miss my mark. I kind of feel nature is that way too...like all the hurricanes that hit the shores, Mother Nature is like “Oops! Should have started that one a little further out!”
When one area gets too much rain and another not enough....”Dammit! I did it again, it is so hard to predict who needs what...ok, next year less rain here and more rain there! Got it!”
But like Mother Nature, I am not completely and totally sure what I am doing. Or perhaps more accurately, I am not ever really sure what effects I shall cause with this most instant behavior.
I am a thinker. And have been accused of over thinking which I maintain there is no such thing! Fuck all of those people who tell you that! Thinking is an amazing asset and, just like everything else, when used to excess, can cause more problems then it solves. But in general, thinking through an issue, a problem, an idea, a thought, a feeling is a good idea. Jumping into action the first time something crosses your mind, usually not so much.
And because the world we live in is perverse, there are many things you would never do if you didn’t jump in: have a child, leave a job, fall in love, get bangs. And there are other things that you really, really should think through before doing: have a child, leave a job, fall in love and get bangs. See what I mean? Perverse!
So all this thinking has fucked up my life and saved me at the very same time. So I have just learned to kind of roll with it. And ride the tides of my own extremes and have found some peace in this process. But make no mistake, I am still a force.
When I want something there is almost no stopping me. It is like I am possessed with these almost superhuman abilities. If I want something, I have tended for most of my life to go after whatever that thing was: a job, a man, an idea, a move, a thing and nothing can get in my way. I have this amazing will and like most others on the planet, I have had a very hard time learning to use it wisely.
Or, as I am finding out now, not use it at all.
See I am decider of things. I think things, then feel things and then I do things. And then I think and feel some more things. And then I do some more things.
Vicious circle really.
But I have come to a place in my life where I have learned restraint. I have learned to refrain. I do not launch myself headlong into things as much anymore...mom, and Dalis, I said as much!
Whatever I never got before that I am getting now, is that perhaps, just maybe if that guy didn’t seem to want me back, or the job, or the friend group or whatever the fuck I was hellbent on attaining, it honestly never occurred to me that perhaps there was a reason. That despite all of my thinking and feeling, perhaps that job wasn’t right for me. Perhaps that guy wasn’t a good fit either. Perhaps those clothes that I just HAD to HAVE were better left to hang in someone else’s closet.
So I have spent the better part of the last four years learning, well I will be honest, agonizing over learning how to refrain. To just not launch myself into whatever the fuck I think is next, or who I think is next.
And as arrogant as this is going to sound, I think it never occurred to me because I usually got whatever I went after. And I don’t mean that everyone who I wanted, wanted me. But I think I have been pretty successful and completely duped by successive approximation. Like, the guy didn’t fall madly in love with me but we had a good time. Or perhaps he was hard to convince but I won him over in the end. I will fully and most ashamedly admit that my improper use of will has been most blatant and egregious where men are concerned.
So it never occurred to me that my modus operandi wasn’t effective and a good idea. But about four years ago, I was given this instruction by someone who tells me all the fucking time to WAIT!
Don’t call
Don’t text
Don’t start something new
Don’t end anything on going
And I have done my best to follow this missive. I have also failed a great deal. But despite those glaring failures, I am doing this far more often than I ever have before. So there is progress! (Yes, Dalis this is where you jump in and nod in ready agreement! - I always think that I don’t get enough praise in my compliance with this directive and that is because it has been FUCKING HARD FOR ME! So, of course, I believe I deserve more credit than what I am getting...).
And I will tell you the only way I have been able to get to the place where I am now, this more passive existence where I just let things happen or not, as the case may be. The only way this strength of waiting, of allowing things and beings to enter my life, is because I have this amazing faith in this loving kindness and benevolence in this world. I also believe, though I am loathe to admit it, that the more I refrain perhaps the more I will be rewarded which is really just a subtle violence against all I am currently attempting to work on and with...again, still.
But me learning to temper and tame this force of nature that rises like a Tornado in the South, awesome in its size and magnitude, deadly in its rise to power, this storm, deep within my soul has softened. And that makes me incredibly sad and somewhat shocked and awed. And for the life of me, I can’t figure out whether this is making me a better version of myself or a sell out.
There is a very large part of me that feels like FUCK IT, this is who I am. I am pretty much reckless and relentless and if I want you, or it, or them, I am going to go fucking get it. And then there is this part of me that really doesn’t like that part of me all that well and would really like the opportunity to just be living my life and have someone else’s force of nature decide that I am worth all that effort.
But in the end, am I really just sending my force underground. Am I not marshaling all my will and need and want and desire into some sort of underground storm, like an earthquake that stills and levels life above?
So what the fuck do I do with this raging tide within me? Allowing it to unfurl, gets me results but perhaps not the ones I ultimately want. Then again, this new found and barely developed skill of waiting, impatiently, isn’t really bringing the results I want either.
So I am confused. And impatient. And also, tired. Marshalling and managing CAT 5 storms is exhausting, all day every day. And so the respite from deep within my own storms has been lovely actually.
And I suppose, ultimately, my benevolence to the pause, the relinquishing control and dominion over that which is not really my business anyway is probably for the best.
But if you see me out there in the world, and I look all serene and calm and rested, do not be fooled. A rising tidal wave resides just below my surface and threatens while it also promises a great deal, every day of my life.
For today I remain in my benevolence, my pause of the cause. However, I will also admit that I am not fully in charge of this awesome, raging, roiling storm within my depths. I do my best but sometimes, like Mother Nature, I overshoot or completely miss my mark. I get it wrong. I get it very, very wrong. But, and I mean this with the most sincerity I can muster, I know that along the way I have gotten it very, very right.
So when you see me at the market, or a meeting, or at the beach walking my dog, know that there is a great force of nature within and I am barely able to contain it on a good day. So be careful in your approach...be sure you want to ride those roiling tides. If not, you’d best just walk on by. Because I can promise my storm has an attendant amount of fun, but it also brings a fair amount of peril too. And trust that I am learning, very fucking slowly, to just allow you safe passage...I have gained the ability to just let you walk on by...
And fuck if I haven’t been doing my best, the whole of my life, to find some middle ground, some balance between the peace within and from the storm that solely resides within.
Again.
Still.
