Happy birthday to me!
I have so much to be grateful for, including the very practice of gratitude and positivity itself. In the past I would often get particularly depressed around my birthday, since it inevitably lead me to consider my past year, and my life up to that point, and then I would start thinking about how lonely, and inept, and unloved I was. And after my best friend committed suicide right around my birthday, I had that to think of as well.
The first really good thing I remember happening on my birthday was in 11th grade. I very clearly remember getting a big card, from all/most of the girls in my class, with lots of personal messages saying how they liked me. Not as in crushes, just thought I was good as a person. It was totally overwhelming, and kind of unbelievable to me. My view of myself in regards to women was incredibly negative, fed by my extream shyness and thus failure in every respect around any girl I had a crush on. And in general, I had an extremely critical and negativeve view of myself.
I think that card literaly changed my view of myself. Not all the way overnight, of course. One doesn't undo years of negitive self-belifes in a day. But that day I was presented with the strong possibility that perhaps women did not, in fact, think as poorly of myself as I did. That they thought pretty well of me, and so perhaps, I was not a shoddy failur of a human being.
That letter gave me emperical evidence that my self-image was inaccurate, and I begin dragging myself towards a more neutral self-image. So thank you, MSAE class of 2004 girls, for giving me self-confidence (what would that look like, in a Wizard of Oz scenario? The lion got a little heart watch, right? I suppose it would just be the birthday card.) There was more to it than that, of course.
In any case, this year, this birthday, I wasn't with my friends, I was reminded of Dan, and I had a bit of a binge on games and such late into the night, the last two days.
All these things could have come together to create a nice opportuity to really Eeyore it up. But I didn't. I have humbled myself somewhat past my egotistical attachment to self pitty, and past my attachment to... I'm not sure what to call it...
You know when you have a little kid, and they're sad and/or angry about something, throwing a tantrum or whatnot, and then you get them to crack a smile, or be distracted and not sad anymore? But then once they realize they've slipped up and forgotten to be miserable, they're angry at you, for tricking them into being happy again, and you can almost hear them saying, "No! I wont be happy! You didn't give me a dolly!" and they work themselfs back up into a froth about whatever it was. Or if they can't get there, go into a sulk.
That thing. Us adults do it too. We hold onto our pain and angr and lonlieness. We'll even whip out memories and phyisical pariphanalia to stare at and get in deeper with whatever negitivity we're inflicting on ourselfs. I think, subconsciously, there may be some element trying to thereby punish the world, or ourselfs, or another person. Makes me think of the forgivness work I'm doing:
"If I forgive that rat for what he did, then he's off the hook, and I don't want him off the hook. I want him to burn!"
"If I forgive the world for not giving me what I want, and I let myself be happy anyways, then the world won't be punished for not giving me what I want. If I don't punish it, then it will just keep witholding wealth/companionship/success from me. It has to learn it's lesson."
We think that, if we're not angry or hurt, then the worlds going to walk all over us.
I've actually been getting better at both things:
One: forgiving. Forgiving the world, and people, and myself.
And two: asking for what I want and saying no to what I don't want. Being a teacher of young children teaches you how to do this in the "throw him in the pool and see if he learns to swim" kind of way.
In any case, negitive situations are less and less dictating my internal state. Instead, I'm dictating. And I'm saying: I choose happiness.
I have a ritual on my birthday: Soliomancy. I dont' know if that's an official word, but in my mind, it is a word, and it means predicting the future based on the sunrise. Each year, I get up before the sun rises, and go for a wander without time or destination, and see where I end up, and what the sunrise looks like. It often is quiet magical.
But I forgot about that, last night, and it was late, so I slept in. at first, I was thinking that was a bad sign. I could have deathspiraled from there. But then I thought, I guess this just means I'm doing it by the sunset, instead. And that somehow seems very apt. Perfectly apt, as it always is. This year, there are a lot of endings happening. How does that quote go? "Today I put away childish things, and... " well, I guess I give them to the kids I'm teaching.
I feel there are quite a few patterns that are shriviling up and dieing, and may be dead, very soon. Things like my Eeyore-ish pessimism. My harsh self-criticism. My doormat-ness. My overthinking.
I just paused for a moment in thought, and noticed a giant hawk in the tree right outside my window. Paused and watched from as close as I could get for a while, but it could feel someone staring and flew off. It was huge! Red tail hawk. I shall take that as a sign. It makes me think of pride, in a good way. Let this be the year of self confidence.
Anyways, this entry is running loooooong. I really just wanted to leave you with a few birthday tidbits of wizdom, so here goes.
-if you put a single peice of toilet paper floating on the surface of the water in the toilet, before using the toilet, it does something that usually prevets getting any splashback. Wisdom for the ages.
-true wealth can be found in lasting relationships of love and support. Friends, family, loved ones. That is a much better place to invest your time and energy than simply making a lot of money, or going for prestige/power/fame.
-being busy is a blessing. We were not meant to idle around too much, and doing so, behond a certain fairly short r&r period after an intense sprint, is poisonous to our happiness.
-set your dreams without considering wheather they are possible or not. More are achievable than you think, and the way to get there is to have them as visions that you're moving towards, and never give up moving towards them. (unless you decide later that you don't actually want them.) Then you break it up into small, achievable goals.
-God may be omnipresent, but if you want to make his presence concreate, felt, experienced, miraculous: be righeous.
Not in the "cowabunga, righeous dude!" way. In the, "I'm going to do what my heart/conscience tells me is the right thing to do. All the time, no matter what." You won't do it all the time, but you'll keep getting better, and if you are doing your best, that is sufficient.
-Following your own internal sense of righeousness, of conscience, may seem way less fun at first. You may fear that life is going to suck and be boring and bereft of pleasure and joy. But that's not the case. It's actually the most joyus way to live.
-If you're trying to follow the path of your own heart/conscience, and you start having caster-oil face, you are doing something wrong. Probably someone told you some things about God or spirituality or morality, which are not true, and that programming is drowing out your own inner voice. You're hearts path, though perhaps difficult and low in proccessed sugars, is a path of love, joy, and peace. I don't mean to make it sound easy. It's not. But it's worth it, and you can do it, if you keep at it. As you do your best, you find yourself supported and carried, after you've gone as far as you could on your own two feet.
Well, this got interrupted by some birthday calls, and I missed the sunset too! Wahahaha! I don't care! I shall surpass the bonds of destiny, and write my own future. Or co-write it? In any case, I couldn't think of a better end to the day than talking with some of my best friends.
And, in fact, every day, is my birthday. I have a prayer I say, basically every morning, and one part of it goes like this, "Oh lord, I am born now from the womb of sleep." Meaning: every morning when I wake up, it is a new birth, and when I go to sleep, it is a death. That day is a lifetime, in miniature.
It reminds me to value the day. What if that day was the only day I had? I don't quite behave that way literally, or I'd be eating a lot more sugar, and writing a bunch of emails to my loved ones. But in terms of making good use of my time here on earth, it's good to remain cognizant of your own impending, inevitable death. And the fact is, we don't know how soon that's going to be. We can't know the future.
So make good use of your life in this precious moment.
From my Now to yours,
Love,
Isaac
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