I have a super long post I wrote on the plan ride back from my last Austin Texas Montessori classroom observation. But I don’t have time to finish editing it, so you just get this, for now.
Currently in Chicago, at my final Montessori observation. Staying with a friend, the former director of the Montessori preschool I’m working at. A good person and an excellent teacher and trainer of teachers. The proof is in the pudding, as they say, and you just need to look at her students, her pets, or her daughter, to see that she is good at bringing out the best in people.
OK, that’s all ya get for now. Too busy and tired for any more, tonight.
Monday, April 29, 2019
Monday, April 22, 2019
Spring, relationship, observation, work work work.
Forgive me for what must be an exceptionally short post. So busy. So so busy.
Yesterday, Sunday, I was up at 3:45 to make my flight back out to Austin Texas for my second classroom observation.
I’ve noticed that I can function reasonably well, mentally, on a bit less sleep, but my body let’s me know when I haven’t gotten enough sleep very clearly, by giving me a headache. It’s very clear.
The relationship continues to grow. It is truly a thing of beauty and joy. I did not have high enough expectations, in my first few relationships, and it caused both parties pain in the long run. The quality of our interactions and friendship in this relationship is very strong, and that makes everything else so much easier. It also makes it such a delight to spend time together. I think one of the issues with my previous relationships was that they enjoyed spending time with me more than I enjoyed spending time with them, and at least subconsciously they could tell, so they were sad, and it was draining for me, so I was sad. I had low expectations, I thought I could make do with an ok friendship and turn it into a deeper friendship, a best-friendship. Perhaps that could have been possible, if I’d known about Gottman and both of us had been down for it, but my theory is there’s a certain amount of that deep resonance that you can’t really control, and that is pretty intrinsic to who you and they are. This is part of the, “don’t have a project, have a partner” truism comes from. You need to really like your partner from the get go, so that even if they don’t change at all, you are happy to be with them.
On the other hand, there is a lot of specific stuff on people’s wish lists for partners, that I think isn’t particularly useful in finding a really good partner. Some of the more superficial compatibilities, shared interests etc. Sometimes people give up the really important things, for those things, and that’s like giving up happiness and time for money. Having a high-paying job, but not time to enjoy life or the money you have.
Anyhoo. She is very good. Some day when I have more time, maybe I’ll go through my most recent ‘list’ and talk about her and how she fits, but for now I’ll just say, she has what I call the deep resonance, or the best friend feeling, in spades, which is the most important thing, for me, and perhaps, described a bit differently, with Gottman (I don’t know, maybe I’m just projecting that onto what Gottman’s actually saying, but it’s something like that.) And she is tremendously giving and considerate, which feels so nice, because I also am that way, and it feels good for it not to be lopsided. We both are givers, we both are easygoing and willing to compromise, we both care deeply about how the other feels and want to support them. It feels really wonderful. I feel held, cared for, and so does she. There is quite a lot of mutual... things, in this relationship. But we are also delightfully different in many ways. We’re not too similar.
In any case, we brighten each other’s lives, and make each other better versions of ourselves.
This week is all about my classroom observations, but I really hope and plan to get some work done on the huge mountain of homework I have due before summer starts. I won’t have a huge amount of time, but hopefully I can have at least two hours a night, after the observations end, to start chipping away at that.
OK, goodbye and good morning, I hope you have a good week. ^_^
-Isaac Out
Yesterday, Sunday, I was up at 3:45 to make my flight back out to Austin Texas for my second classroom observation.
I’ve noticed that I can function reasonably well, mentally, on a bit less sleep, but my body let’s me know when I haven’t gotten enough sleep very clearly, by giving me a headache. It’s very clear.
The relationship continues to grow. It is truly a thing of beauty and joy. I did not have high enough expectations, in my first few relationships, and it caused both parties pain in the long run. The quality of our interactions and friendship in this relationship is very strong, and that makes everything else so much easier. It also makes it such a delight to spend time together. I think one of the issues with my previous relationships was that they enjoyed spending time with me more than I enjoyed spending time with them, and at least subconsciously they could tell, so they were sad, and it was draining for me, so I was sad. I had low expectations, I thought I could make do with an ok friendship and turn it into a deeper friendship, a best-friendship. Perhaps that could have been possible, if I’d known about Gottman and both of us had been down for it, but my theory is there’s a certain amount of that deep resonance that you can’t really control, and that is pretty intrinsic to who you and they are. This is part of the, “don’t have a project, have a partner” truism comes from. You need to really like your partner from the get go, so that even if they don’t change at all, you are happy to be with them.
On the other hand, there is a lot of specific stuff on people’s wish lists for partners, that I think isn’t particularly useful in finding a really good partner. Some of the more superficial compatibilities, shared interests etc. Sometimes people give up the really important things, for those things, and that’s like giving up happiness and time for money. Having a high-paying job, but not time to enjoy life or the money you have.
Anyhoo. She is very good. Some day when I have more time, maybe I’ll go through my most recent ‘list’ and talk about her and how she fits, but for now I’ll just say, she has what I call the deep resonance, or the best friend feeling, in spades, which is the most important thing, for me, and perhaps, described a bit differently, with Gottman (I don’t know, maybe I’m just projecting that onto what Gottman’s actually saying, but it’s something like that.) And she is tremendously giving and considerate, which feels so nice, because I also am that way, and it feels good for it not to be lopsided. We both are givers, we both are easygoing and willing to compromise, we both care deeply about how the other feels and want to support them. It feels really wonderful. I feel held, cared for, and so does she. There is quite a lot of mutual... things, in this relationship. But we are also delightfully different in many ways. We’re not too similar.
In any case, we brighten each other’s lives, and make each other better versions of ourselves.
This week is all about my classroom observations, but I really hope and plan to get some work done on the huge mountain of homework I have due before summer starts. I won’t have a huge amount of time, but hopefully I can have at least two hours a night, after the observations end, to start chipping away at that.
OK, goodbye and good morning, I hope you have a good week. ^_^
-Isaac Out
Sunday, April 14, 2019
So much work. budding relationship ^_^ !!! cleaning out the vestiges of old past relationship.
This must be short. I have so much to do. I was going to get a lot of it done Saturday morning and afternoon, but then something big and intense came up, and there went all that time.
Life is good. Having a healthy mutually supportive relationship is a huge cushion for stress. It's also crazy crazy busy though. It is one more big time commitment, and though I am extremely happy to make that commitment and give it that time, it's a new thing in my life and I've yet to figure out how to balance it properly. Like going to work in a new place and figuring out how long it takes to get there, or going to graduate school and figuring out how to balance my work load and get everything done. It's doable, I'll figure it out, but I'm still in process of doing that. I think ultimately it will make me more efficient, since most of the things that wasted my time happened because I was feeling not so hot, emotionally, and having someone to satisfy that deep need for human connection is way way better than watching anime. it satisfies the need much more fully, and for longer, and with less time, potentially.
There was some serious weirdness and discomfort with an ex-girlfriend, related to finding out I was dating someone seriously. It was profoundly uncomfortable for all involved, but I think, I hope, it's done with. Neither I nor (I think) the ex wants any more of that stress etc., so we're just going to leave each other alone. I know that's what I wanted, but I didn't know that's what they wanted, but at least now, it seems it is, so, good that's mutual, and it feels like a huge weight off my shoulders, and I hope it feels likewise for them. They are a fine person, obviously I thought so enough to date them, but for whatever complex reasons that I don't have time to speculate on, it was unhealthy and unhappy for both of us. It feels good to put that to bed once and for all.
I think I've since grown tremendously, I know it wasn't much, but even my strange fantasy long distance kinda-relationship was much healthier and overall very positive, and the current, very much reality, short-distance relationship feels much healthier and more grounded than anything previous.
So that is fantastic beyond my ability to describe quickly, but I'm sure I'll try in coming weeks. I expect things will settle down as the limerence phase switches over to the more settled second phase of intimate relationships, but I don't think they will become less nourishing. That's my prediction, anyways. In fact, as we get to know each other more deeply, I assume it will continue to get even more rich, as even the difficulties we've come across have ultimately only made the relationship more real, fleshed out, the intimacy and trust deeper.
OK, that's all, Next week I'll be back in Austin Texas for another observation. Different Airbnb this time.
Oh, P.S. one of my parents mentioned a typo in the last post, saying I couldn't recommend Gottman, whereas it should be obvious by my fanboy-ing that I can't recommend Gottman enough.
Life is good. Having a healthy mutually supportive relationship is a huge cushion for stress. It's also crazy crazy busy though. It is one more big time commitment, and though I am extremely happy to make that commitment and give it that time, it's a new thing in my life and I've yet to figure out how to balance it properly. Like going to work in a new place and figuring out how long it takes to get there, or going to graduate school and figuring out how to balance my work load and get everything done. It's doable, I'll figure it out, but I'm still in process of doing that. I think ultimately it will make me more efficient, since most of the things that wasted my time happened because I was feeling not so hot, emotionally, and having someone to satisfy that deep need for human connection is way way better than watching anime. it satisfies the need much more fully, and for longer, and with less time, potentially.
There was some serious weirdness and discomfort with an ex-girlfriend, related to finding out I was dating someone seriously. It was profoundly uncomfortable for all involved, but I think, I hope, it's done with. Neither I nor (I think) the ex wants any more of that stress etc., so we're just going to leave each other alone. I know that's what I wanted, but I didn't know that's what they wanted, but at least now, it seems it is, so, good that's mutual, and it feels like a huge weight off my shoulders, and I hope it feels likewise for them. They are a fine person, obviously I thought so enough to date them, but for whatever complex reasons that I don't have time to speculate on, it was unhealthy and unhappy for both of us. It feels good to put that to bed once and for all.
I think I've since grown tremendously, I know it wasn't much, but even my strange fantasy long distance kinda-relationship was much healthier and overall very positive, and the current, very much reality, short-distance relationship feels much healthier and more grounded than anything previous.
So that is fantastic beyond my ability to describe quickly, but I'm sure I'll try in coming weeks. I expect things will settle down as the limerence phase switches over to the more settled second phase of intimate relationships, but I don't think they will become less nourishing. That's my prediction, anyways. In fact, as we get to know each other more deeply, I assume it will continue to get even more rich, as even the difficulties we've come across have ultimately only made the relationship more real, fleshed out, the intimacy and trust deeper.
OK, that's all, Next week I'll be back in Austin Texas for another observation. Different Airbnb this time.
Oh, P.S. one of my parents mentioned a typo in the last post, saying I couldn't recommend Gottman, whereas it should be obvious by my fanboy-ing that I can't recommend Gottman enough.
Sunday, April 7, 2019
Life is Good
One of the things I told my self, as I was 21, 22 years old, and still didn't have a relationship was that it was almost certainly a grass is greener situation: the people who had relationships weren't actually happier than those who did not. Maybe some area's were better, but were then balanced out by other areas that were worse. It made me feel dumb, then, that I still wanted one so much. Then I had my first relationship, and I learned that I was quite wrong: when a relationship is working well, it does distinctly improve quality of life. It was however important that the relationship was healthy, as an unhealthy relationship was definitely worse than no relationship. Gottman's scientific measures seem to confirm this, in a more objective way: couples in happy marriages live longer and report less stress and higher general satisfaction levels. Those in unhappy relationships have decreased immune systems and if I recall correctly higher levels of stress hormones in their blood.
It's definitely spring. as I look out my window while pausing in writing this, two little birds are... um, ensuring future generations of birds. Thematically appropriate? In any case, the current new relationship that is budding feels fantastic. It is deeply joy producing. I feel like each relationship I've had has taught me things, and then the next one was better, for what I learned. The last relationship I had, before this one, was actually overall quite positive. There was almost no drama in it, and lots of nice stuff. Though it was certainly weird: almost entirely long distance, before even really getting to know each other.
Anyhoo, I'm getting a bit off topic. Last time I was talking about the crazy roler-coaster of last weekend. I want to be clear, her (the woman I'm dating) feelings that the relationship felt wrong, were not superficial. There was one thing that kind of coalesced all the feelings and worries that were kind of lurking under the waters, but they were legitimate concerns. Ultimately it boiled down (I think) to something like the relationship feeling a bit unnatural, a lack of connection. There were areas where we were both subtly withholding our feelings, trying to 'make' things work. In the proccess of deciding to let the romantic part of the relationship die, leaving the solid deep resonance that is the seed of best-friend-ship, she saw that I was genuinely willing to not grab at her, to not manipulate her, but just to listen, as well as she could listen to herself, to what she truly wanted, and support her in that, beyond any personal interests.
I strongly believe that's what real love is. Real love means I want what's best for you, even if that means I don't get something I really want. It means I'll do my best to make you happy and comfortable. It means if you don't want to be with me, I'll help you see that, I'll give you all the facts that help you make that decision, and I'll make it as easy as I can to break up with me. I won't guilt, I won't beg, I won't try and convince you otherwise. I will honor the truth of your feelings and continue to respect and love you and treat you with kindness.
So much of what we call love is mostly deeply selfish. Do what I want, and I 'love' you, but as soon as you stop doing that, or you do something I don't like, then I hate you. It's very transactional. Love me, and I love you, reject me, and I hate you. What about, I love you, period. You feel however you feel, I will just do what I can to protect your heart, whether we're in a relationship or not.
Granted, this woman brings out the best of me, it makes it easier to love and trust my inner wisdom that God knows what he's doing in all things and my job is to just keep surrendering it all to him and listening to the inner promptings for what to do, when common sense falls short of answers.
What's truly saintly is this kind of love, applied to everyone, but intimate relationships, romantic partners, family, are the training-grounds for the more expansive version. If you can't do it with your family, don't' expect to be able to do it with everyone else. Especially in the really deep way that makes the biggest difference.
In any case. I'm dating a girl, and she brings out the best in me. We're very different, but we have the thing that's my #1 on my list: that deep resonance that I find in all my very best friends. The handful of people that I can sit with endlessly, that feel like home, that leave me not tired at the end of a longer hangout, but energized. I noticed this feeling with this woman, close to as strong as I've ever felt it. In addition, I admire her. Her sharp mind, her generous and graceful heart, her beautiful soul (and body, but I'll mostly skip over that, in the hopes of maintaining a PG rating.) We have similar humor, a similar respect for science, inquisitive, questioning minds, a love of nature, a love of nerdy/gamer things, shared friends... much of this stuff is just icing, I didn't have it as a requirement, it was just added grace. But there are some things that are so wonderful... much of how she thinks, her openness to learning, growing, the ability to step outside her own perspective and take others, are some of the dearest qualities of my best friend Dan, who I likely would have married, if one of us had been a girl. The way we could talk, and the effortless flow of just being, between us.
I think what happened with the whole reset, last week, was realizing we'd traveled away from the initial goodness of the deeply honest and authentic friendship that started things. There were additional expectations and things held back, in the name of a romantic relationship, and what made things work was the easy, kind honesty that we both loved so much. We both kind of realized that was where things needed to be coming from: deep, thorough honesty, with ourselves as much as the other. When we are just really honest with each other and ourselves, about how we feel, what we want and don't want, we keep finding a magical level of...what to call it...synchrony? accord? 'compatibility'? Joy, in relationship. And safety, in the honesty. It's not a harsh honesty. Another thing I love is how kind and caring for my feelings she is, how thoughtful in how she shows affection and gives of herself. I do that in my own relationships, and I don't know if it's shared love languages or what, but it feels nice, like we both feel that way, both act that way, and so it doesn't feel like over-giving, it just feels like giving a lot and being given as much in return.
I could write on it for a while, if I had the time, but I do not. I'll try not to gush repeatedly, and leave it at this, but I make come back to the subject, since it's pleasant to dwell on. Suffice it to say, I'm dating someone and they are wonderful, and the relationship makes me feel wonderful, and I'm pretty sure it makes them feel wonderful too. I try not to expect things of the future, so I am just being deeply grateful for the present, the tremendous gifts of joy and of feeling my heart held and loved as it loves. Will it be there when I wake up tomorrow? Quite likely. But I don't know that for sure, and if it's not, I still cannot be anything but incredibly grateful for the grace and love I have already been given.
It didn't happen by accident, I've worked hard on myself, for this, for years and years and years. But it wasn't fully within my power. I worked hard on myself, so when the 'lucky' chance came around, I was ready for it. (I don't really believe in luck, I'm a fan of the karma theory, though what that means is, I think, different to different people, so I may not mean what you think of when I say that.)
I'd bee working on the very first step: meeting someone who I thought would be great with me. I was prepared for a long haul, but it ended up not taking too long. But most of the Gottman stuff is not about finding someone. It's about all the work that must continually go into a relationship, to maintain it so it is good, and growing, week by week. And I look forward to this work, to learning what it is and putting it into practice, because it is joyful, deep, growth-inducing work. And whatever else happens, much of it will be useful in all my relationships, and all of it will be useful in my romantic relationship, which, hopefully, will account for the longest relationship of my life. So hopefully I can do the work to make it a generally joyful and peaceful and growthful one.
The end, really time for bed now. I'm so exhausted. I slept in, but it was still a kind of busy day, and last night was a LARP with friends, which always runs late and leaves me exhausted, though deeply satisfied. LARP stands for Live Action Role Play and the way me and my friends do it is a bit like a costume party/murder mystery, but the genera extends well beyond murder mystery, into the realm of urban/historical fantasy. It's an amazing thing.
OK, good night, good week, and if you have a relationship, I cannot recommend Gottman's work, especially for men, who need it the most. Guys, if you study this stuff you will have a huge leg up from other men, both in finding someone and in helping create a satisfying relationship. Forget sex manuals, these books are way more useful.
Take care!
-I
It's definitely spring. as I look out my window while pausing in writing this, two little birds are... um, ensuring future generations of birds. Thematically appropriate? In any case, the current new relationship that is budding feels fantastic. It is deeply joy producing. I feel like each relationship I've had has taught me things, and then the next one was better, for what I learned. The last relationship I had, before this one, was actually overall quite positive. There was almost no drama in it, and lots of nice stuff. Though it was certainly weird: almost entirely long distance, before even really getting to know each other.
Anyhoo, I'm getting a bit off topic. Last time I was talking about the crazy roler-coaster of last weekend. I want to be clear, her (the woman I'm dating) feelings that the relationship felt wrong, were not superficial. There was one thing that kind of coalesced all the feelings and worries that were kind of lurking under the waters, but they were legitimate concerns. Ultimately it boiled down (I think) to something like the relationship feeling a bit unnatural, a lack of connection. There were areas where we were both subtly withholding our feelings, trying to 'make' things work. In the proccess of deciding to let the romantic part of the relationship die, leaving the solid deep resonance that is the seed of best-friend-ship, she saw that I was genuinely willing to not grab at her, to not manipulate her, but just to listen, as well as she could listen to herself, to what she truly wanted, and support her in that, beyond any personal interests.
I strongly believe that's what real love is. Real love means I want what's best for you, even if that means I don't get something I really want. It means I'll do my best to make you happy and comfortable. It means if you don't want to be with me, I'll help you see that, I'll give you all the facts that help you make that decision, and I'll make it as easy as I can to break up with me. I won't guilt, I won't beg, I won't try and convince you otherwise. I will honor the truth of your feelings and continue to respect and love you and treat you with kindness.
So much of what we call love is mostly deeply selfish. Do what I want, and I 'love' you, but as soon as you stop doing that, or you do something I don't like, then I hate you. It's very transactional. Love me, and I love you, reject me, and I hate you. What about, I love you, period. You feel however you feel, I will just do what I can to protect your heart, whether we're in a relationship or not.
Granted, this woman brings out the best of me, it makes it easier to love and trust my inner wisdom that God knows what he's doing in all things and my job is to just keep surrendering it all to him and listening to the inner promptings for what to do, when common sense falls short of answers.
What's truly saintly is this kind of love, applied to everyone, but intimate relationships, romantic partners, family, are the training-grounds for the more expansive version. If you can't do it with your family, don't' expect to be able to do it with everyone else. Especially in the really deep way that makes the biggest difference.
In any case. I'm dating a girl, and she brings out the best in me. We're very different, but we have the thing that's my #1 on my list: that deep resonance that I find in all my very best friends. The handful of people that I can sit with endlessly, that feel like home, that leave me not tired at the end of a longer hangout, but energized. I noticed this feeling with this woman, close to as strong as I've ever felt it. In addition, I admire her. Her sharp mind, her generous and graceful heart, her beautiful soul (and body, but I'll mostly skip over that, in the hopes of maintaining a PG rating.) We have similar humor, a similar respect for science, inquisitive, questioning minds, a love of nature, a love of nerdy/gamer things, shared friends... much of this stuff is just icing, I didn't have it as a requirement, it was just added grace. But there are some things that are so wonderful... much of how she thinks, her openness to learning, growing, the ability to step outside her own perspective and take others, are some of the dearest qualities of my best friend Dan, who I likely would have married, if one of us had been a girl. The way we could talk, and the effortless flow of just being, between us.
I think what happened with the whole reset, last week, was realizing we'd traveled away from the initial goodness of the deeply honest and authentic friendship that started things. There were additional expectations and things held back, in the name of a romantic relationship, and what made things work was the easy, kind honesty that we both loved so much. We both kind of realized that was where things needed to be coming from: deep, thorough honesty, with ourselves as much as the other. When we are just really honest with each other and ourselves, about how we feel, what we want and don't want, we keep finding a magical level of...what to call it...synchrony? accord? 'compatibility'? Joy, in relationship. And safety, in the honesty. It's not a harsh honesty. Another thing I love is how kind and caring for my feelings she is, how thoughtful in how she shows affection and gives of herself. I do that in my own relationships, and I don't know if it's shared love languages or what, but it feels nice, like we both feel that way, both act that way, and so it doesn't feel like over-giving, it just feels like giving a lot and being given as much in return.
I could write on it for a while, if I had the time, but I do not. I'll try not to gush repeatedly, and leave it at this, but I make come back to the subject, since it's pleasant to dwell on. Suffice it to say, I'm dating someone and they are wonderful, and the relationship makes me feel wonderful, and I'm pretty sure it makes them feel wonderful too. I try not to expect things of the future, so I am just being deeply grateful for the present, the tremendous gifts of joy and of feeling my heart held and loved as it loves. Will it be there when I wake up tomorrow? Quite likely. But I don't know that for sure, and if it's not, I still cannot be anything but incredibly grateful for the grace and love I have already been given.
It didn't happen by accident, I've worked hard on myself, for this, for years and years and years. But it wasn't fully within my power. I worked hard on myself, so when the 'lucky' chance came around, I was ready for it. (I don't really believe in luck, I'm a fan of the karma theory, though what that means is, I think, different to different people, so I may not mean what you think of when I say that.)
I'd bee working on the very first step: meeting someone who I thought would be great with me. I was prepared for a long haul, but it ended up not taking too long. But most of the Gottman stuff is not about finding someone. It's about all the work that must continually go into a relationship, to maintain it so it is good, and growing, week by week. And I look forward to this work, to learning what it is and putting it into practice, because it is joyful, deep, growth-inducing work. And whatever else happens, much of it will be useful in all my relationships, and all of it will be useful in my romantic relationship, which, hopefully, will account for the longest relationship of my life. So hopefully I can do the work to make it a generally joyful and peaceful and growthful one.
The end, really time for bed now. I'm so exhausted. I slept in, but it was still a kind of busy day, and last night was a LARP with friends, which always runs late and leaves me exhausted, though deeply satisfied. LARP stands for Live Action Role Play and the way me and my friends do it is a bit like a costume party/murder mystery, but the genera extends well beyond murder mystery, into the realm of urban/historical fantasy. It's an amazing thing.
OK, good night, good week, and if you have a relationship, I cannot recommend Gottman's work, especially for men, who need it the most. Guys, if you study this stuff you will have a huge leg up from other men, both in finding someone and in helping create a satisfying relationship. Forget sex manuals, these books are way more useful.
Take care!
-I
Monday, April 1, 2019
Roller-coasters and relationships . Honesty and authenticity vs. expectations and attachment.
I don't have time for much--you should know this already by the fact that I'm not posting till after Sunday. There would be so much to cover, I can't, I'll just have to summarize.
trip to Austin Texas to observe at the Montessori school: excellent, strange (in regards my airbnb place) and deeply inspiring and instructional (watching really excellent teachers do their thing, each with their own style but all with some core similarities.)
Relationship: really good and budding long distance, then I arrived, had a date (a real date, not a "not date") that was both wonderful, because being the person is wonderful, and kinda bad, for reasons neither of us expected. we over-ate, had stomach aches, and decided to watch "the last unicorn" as our date night movie. If any of you have nostalgic memories of that movie like we did, beware: if you watch it again you'll find some beautiful music and forast montage scenes, and interesting story, a whole bunch of nightmare inducing horrifying things, a bunch of acid trip kinda things, and a super blandly acted, relatively small love story that ends pretty sadly, though the ideas are interesting. Don't show this movie to kids. I think kids remember it so well because it scared the living daylights out of them and so they will never forget it. Also there are some nice scenes of unicorns prancing in beautiful gardens, which is nice.
Anyhoo, there was some more, I haven't mentioned the main thing that happened that set things askew, and I won't, not having time to properly write about it, and wanting to chew it over some more privately. Suffice to say the next day I was feeling sick to my stomach and wondering rather strongly if the relationship was going to end when I saw her again in the afternoon.
The we both finished with some Sunday work and got back together to talk it out, and basically after talking about it for a while I helped her identify how she was feeling and helped her break up with me in the most kind and supportive and respectful way I could. We ended up still best friends, because we just are that, no matter what. But somewhere in there, perhaps partly because of how good I was about breaking up with her? (this makes me laugh inside still) we ended up getting to talking like best friends again and then talking about all the tension and expectations that had been building up and the little ways we'd been trying to force things and not being totally honest with each other, holding things back, and then things ended up feeling so much better and so good we realized without knowing it that we were back together and stronger than ever, though a bit more wary about trying to un-naturally speed up the getting to know each other process.
So I've just been on a crazy rollercoaster, super high ups, quite low downs, and though I'm at a place of deep peace right now, I'm a little... well, I've had a nights rest, so I'm doing better, but at the end of last night I was totally exhausted. We'd both been on quite a trip, in a short period of time. I need a rest. Aaaaand, now back to school! It sounds kinda crazy, this 'no breaks' thing, with the Montessori training I'm doing, and it is, but at least now that I'm getting regular hugs I'm feeling a bit more buffered from the stress, in general.
Ok, that's definitely all for this week.
Hope you have good week too, all you out there across the glass screen from me.
trip to Austin Texas to observe at the Montessori school: excellent, strange (in regards my airbnb place) and deeply inspiring and instructional (watching really excellent teachers do their thing, each with their own style but all with some core similarities.)
Relationship: really good and budding long distance, then I arrived, had a date (a real date, not a "not date") that was both wonderful, because being the person is wonderful, and kinda bad, for reasons neither of us expected. we over-ate, had stomach aches, and decided to watch "the last unicorn" as our date night movie. If any of you have nostalgic memories of that movie like we did, beware: if you watch it again you'll find some beautiful music and forast montage scenes, and interesting story, a whole bunch of nightmare inducing horrifying things, a bunch of acid trip kinda things, and a super blandly acted, relatively small love story that ends pretty sadly, though the ideas are interesting. Don't show this movie to kids. I think kids remember it so well because it scared the living daylights out of them and so they will never forget it. Also there are some nice scenes of unicorns prancing in beautiful gardens, which is nice.
Anyhoo, there was some more, I haven't mentioned the main thing that happened that set things askew, and I won't, not having time to properly write about it, and wanting to chew it over some more privately. Suffice to say the next day I was feeling sick to my stomach and wondering rather strongly if the relationship was going to end when I saw her again in the afternoon.
The we both finished with some Sunday work and got back together to talk it out, and basically after talking about it for a while I helped her identify how she was feeling and helped her break up with me in the most kind and supportive and respectful way I could. We ended up still best friends, because we just are that, no matter what. But somewhere in there, perhaps partly because of how good I was about breaking up with her? (this makes me laugh inside still) we ended up getting to talking like best friends again and then talking about all the tension and expectations that had been building up and the little ways we'd been trying to force things and not being totally honest with each other, holding things back, and then things ended up feeling so much better and so good we realized without knowing it that we were back together and stronger than ever, though a bit more wary about trying to un-naturally speed up the getting to know each other process.
So I've just been on a crazy rollercoaster, super high ups, quite low downs, and though I'm at a place of deep peace right now, I'm a little... well, I've had a nights rest, so I'm doing better, but at the end of last night I was totally exhausted. We'd both been on quite a trip, in a short period of time. I need a rest. Aaaaand, now back to school! It sounds kinda crazy, this 'no breaks' thing, with the Montessori training I'm doing, and it is, but at least now that I'm getting regular hugs I'm feeling a bit more buffered from the stress, in general.
Ok, that's definitely all for this week.
Hope you have good week too, all you out there across the glass screen from me.
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