Lemons and compersion
A lot has been going on in my little brain. I have had to admit to myself and others that I am extremely insecure, jealous, possessive and territorial. My claws have been coming out, I have been pacing around my room, I have been getting pissed off and said hurtful things, I have been losing sleep.
Why? Fear of loss. Fear of not being enough.
I have been trying to control a situation that needs allowing. I have been trying to set boundaries where no boundaries can make me feel safe. I have been asking for reassurance that nobody can give me.
Then there are the moments of peace and clarity. They come almost as often as the freak-out moments. In the peaceful moments I am not worried, I am not scared, I know that everything is going to be okay no matter what happens. My psyche has been very black and white lately, and I have almost no control over which color it is in any given moment.
In one of the moments of peace, I called up the person-in-question, apologized and said that I have been an asshole and to please enjoy my boyfriend, and I meant it. I really did; I was filled with love for all of us and wanted to be in a cuddle pile involving all of us.
A week later I freaked out again because of some body language that made me squirmy. At least, after the phone conversation all feelings of resentment and animosity were gone, and they have not returned.
All that was left after that was fear. It feels like a fear of death. I have been quoting to my clients something from The Witch of Portobello :
"Anyone who tries to imprison love will cut off the spring that feeds it, and the trapped water will grow stagnant and rank."
I know this. I believe it. I am trying my best not to imprison it, but to allow it, to give it the freedom it needs to flourish. It's just really hard because of the fear of the loss of the love.
I talked to my aunt last week, and she told me to transform all my fear into love. Whenever I feel the fear, she said to send unconditional love to it. She said every time I do this, my ego will look like it has just bitten into a really sour lemon. So now I keep picturing my ego with a sour lemon face all the time. It makes me laugh. And it really works.
I am feeling love more and more; the fear is not as strong.
Last night shit hit the fan again. I was pacing, growling. Then I meditated on unconditional love. I calmed down. I sent them love. I felt full of love.
By the time Kean got to my house, I had questions and I had things I needed to talk about but I was also full of love. I took a light-hearted approach. I asked what happened and how he felt. I did this without the tension that is usually present. And he responded with much more honesty and sincerity, with less defensiveness and caution. And the honesty made me feel good. Honesty is the remedy to all the worst case scenarios I have been coming up with in my head.
What I am working on now is compersion. When I first started pondering open relationships--before I ever considered one for myself--I knew that the only way it can really work is if you can be genuinely happy for your partner when they get some. That feeling of happiness, of sharing the joy of your partner being with somebody else, is compersion, and that is my ultimate goal. I have been getting more and more glimpses of it, and I know that I am headed there.
Today I feel really good. I feel in love (not in fear), I feel connected, I feel like we have reached a new plateau of support and communication. I feel like we are team, and when one of us scores, we both win. Now if only I can hold on to that feeling. I am getting there.
A year ago I knew intuitively that I had to try out being in an open relationship to see if it is for me. I think it is for me, even if now it is still very hard. Our relationship is getting stronger and stronger, and it is getting more and more exciting. New sexual energy is entering our beds, and we can both feel it. There is no stagnancy, no rut.
From Opening Up by Tristan Taormin:
"[...] they value their freedom and the freedom of their partners, and with that freedoms comes, for some, a greater sense of security. It sounds like a contradiction, but one of the most profound things I have learned from people in nonmonogamous relationships is how confident and content they feel about the strength of their partnerships. One woman said she knows her partners are in a relationship because they want to be, not out of obligation."
I am really starting to feel that, and it's beautiful.
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.: posted by Vera 
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Celebration
This Wednesday was the one year anniversary of Kean's and my first date. We decided to go out on a celebratory date. During the planning of it, when he was describing to me a restaurant in San Francisco he had been to with a friend, I thought of Burma Superstar.
"That sounds good, or we could go to Burma Superstar," I said.
"I think that's the one I'm talking about!"
So that was a nice synchronicity, but we didn't end up going to Burma Superstar because by the time Kean got to my house, it was getting too late. Instead, we walked down the street to Udupi Palace on Valencia. We had South Indian food and Kingfisher beer, and I was in a really elated and chatty mood.
On the way back, we ran into my friend Erin on the street, and she got to adore our fancy anniversary get-ups.
Then we climbed a tree two blocks from my house. We sat in there for a while and rustled with the leaves.
Then we kept walking down 24th Street and into Bliss Bar. And wouldn't you know it, a Drum & Bass DJ was playing there! How lucky. I never expected Bliss Bar to have Drum & Bass. We felt blessed and sat in the cage in the back of the bar and sipped on delicious cocktails.
Then we walked back to my house, googled and looked at pictures of "amazing tree houses" and watched Chaos Theory, which has nice commentary on planning/controlling vs. impulse/whim. Then we made hot screaming love, and then we went to sleep.
It was a beautiful date. Who knew we would last this long? And not only have we lasted this long, this is also the healthiest, happiest and most exciting relationship I have been in so far.
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.: posted by Vera
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Something about traveling
I have never been a big fan of traveling. When I was little, my family would go on vacation at least twice a year, and sometimes I would rather have stayed home and played with my friends. When I quit my full-time job three years ago, I did not have any intention of traveling. A friend recommended, or rather almost pressured me, to use my savings to live in a cheaper country for a year rather than slacking off in San Francisco for a few months, and all I really wanted to do was hang out in San Francisco, so I did. I have not really had much desire to travel anywhere beyond the states I can drive to or the confines of my own mind.
I have never been to a country that did not belong to the first world, to the industrial world. This has been by choice. I have had no desire to travel to third world countries. I have thought that maybe I would like to visit New Zealand or Japan one day, but India or Tanzania? No thanks. You can go there, but I don't need to.
I can feel that changing now. I am finding myself growing increasingly unsatisfied with civilization and yearning for a more primitive, a more tribal existence, or at least to see it or experience it.
Elizabeth Gilbert's tales of the constant faith-based rituals and "dancers in temple ceremonies" in Bali first made me think that maybe I need to see something new. Then, last night, I watched Powaqqatsi with my friend Antonio, and in it I saw faces of real humans that don't have etiquette and social norms written all over their expressions. They felt much more real than anyone I have ever met in the modern world. I want to meet some of these real humans. I want to be one of them.
And the beautiful thing about all of this is that I know that once my desires have fully crystallized and I know exactly which place(s) I need to go to and for how long, I am going to do exactly that.
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.: posted by Vera
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Prescription
Here is what I prescribed to myself to cure this fall ennui:
- Meditate at least half an hour every day (preferably a half hour in the morning and another half hour in the evening).
- Write evening pages every day (they're like morning pages, except I'm more likely to write them in the evening. Essentially, they are three handwritten pages of all the gunk that's in my head and making me think too much).
- Eat tons of vegetables.
What's funny and awesome is that when I told all of this to Jason the other day, he said that one of his friends is also dealing with a negative mood, and she has prescribed herself almost the exact same thing!
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.: posted by Vera
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Reader poll
I just started reading a lovely book called The Witch of Portobello. In it, a fictional character describes four classic archetypes that women identify with:
The Virgin (and I'm not speaking here of a sexual virgin) is the one whose search springs from her complete independence, and everything she learns is the fruit of her ability to face challenges alone.
The Martyr finds her way to self-knowledge through pain, surrender, and suffering.
The Saint finds her true reason for living in unconditional love and in her ability to give without asking anything in return.
Finally, the Witch justifies her existence by going in search of complete and limitless pleasure.
In your eyes, which one am I?
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.: posted by Vera
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Close encounters of the healing kind
My eyes are burnt from tears. It's the time of the year where I might get depressed. I kind of feel like it's seasonal--the first time I got depressed at this time of the year was 1986, which landed me in the mental hospital. Since then I still get depressed in the fall from time to time, whether it be over unemployment, a break-up or existential ennui. I'm not sure what exactly causes it--the end of summer and thus the end of carefreeness, fun and warmth, or the pressure of a new "school year"?
I am definitely putting pressure on myself right now, getting down on myself for not having achieved more, for not being a more established healer, for not having my online psychic boutique up yet, for not having written any books yet, for still having half a foot in the corporate world, for not having gotten into modeling when I was younger, for still not feeling ready to teach workshops, for having jealous and territorial feelings.
I have had to admit to myself this week that on a day-to-day basis I am not all that happy right now. I have moments of inspiration, well-being and gratitude throughout the day, and the ennui creeps in several times a day, usually right when I wake up, then again towards the late afternoon and especially during the evening when I am getting tired and just want to sleep. And that's another thing I have been getting down on myself for: getting tired around 9pm and not feeling motivated to do anything but go to bed, unless I am hanging out with other humans. I tell myself that it's okay that I get tired, that I can sleep however much I want, that I will write my books when the time is ripe, that I have already achieved a lot in my lifetime, that I am doing the best I can, and these days I am having a hard time believing all of that.
There are two things that can immediately snap me out of my ennui: Caffeine and sex. I think I might be addicted to both.
Last night Kean and I decided to split a chocolate mushroom. I usually go through a little phase of physical yuckiness and discomfort, which after about an hour gives way to bliss. Last night the bliss didn't come. I just felt yucky, and I was also terribly cold no matter how many layers I was wearing. Kean picked me up at one point, and the sensation of my feet having lost ground rendered me speechless--in a good way--and then I suddenly started sobbing.
"Life is just so fucking hard sometimes. There are so many things I have to do all the time," I wailed.
I stayed in this negative, fatalistic space all night. I even hurt Kean's feelings by saying that I wasn't having very much fun. We usually have so much fun together. It wasn't his fault; it was just my mood.
I slept really erratically and kept getting down on myself for having been in a negative space. I felt lame for having ruined the mushroom trip for myself.
As soon as we started talking in the morning, I started crying again. And I started getting really afraid that Kean wouldn't want to be with a crying, depressed person. That made the whole thing worse.
"I have this idea in my head that nobody is going to want to be around me when I'm depressed," I said.
I had collected plenty of evidence over the years. My parents didn't want me to be depressed, my past boyfriends didn't want me to be depressed, every time I started crying around a friend in Germany, they had begged me to stop. Of course people didn't like it when I was depressed: They loved me and wanted to see me happy. And I had translated this as: It's not okay for me to be sad. It's not okay for me to be depressed. It's not okay for me to cry. People will not love me unless I am happy and fun.
For years I have been really afraid of showing people my down sides when all I have ever wanted is for people to see me at my lowest and to not want to run away from me. And Kean said "I'm trying to prove that to you." And I'm trying to prove that to myself as well: People can see me at my lowest and still love me. That's why I have taken the risk and have started showing Kean my depressed side. I am terrified of what will happen and feel that it is the only way for me to move forward. If I want all of myself to be loved, I have to start owning and showing all of myself.
"I'm trying to prove that to you." When Kean said that, I started crying even more, and this time I was laughing too. I feel so blessed to be with somebody so unconditionally supportive. And maybe it's my very own blessing: Maybe I am more compassionate and loving with myself now, and Kean is merely reflecting that back to me.
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.: posted by Vera
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So much murder in my past
My last name is Fleischer. It means butcher. There have been many generations of murder in my bloodline. It feels like just another karmic inconvenience I am dealing with in this lifetime.
I wonder, if humans were congenital herbivores, i.e. their digestive systems weren't equipped to handle any meat at all, how different would this world be? Would it be more peaceful? Less of an elbow society? Less of a dog-eat-dog world? Would we still have wars? And what if all animals were herbivores and didn't eat each other either? Sometimes, in bed at night, I fantasize about a wholly herbivore planet.
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.: posted by Vera
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Updates on living
- I am still in the process of listening to all of my music at least once, now that I have my new laptop. I am now on artists that start with U, so not much longer until I am done.
- I am reading Eat Pray Love and absolutely eating and loving it. It is not so much inspiring me to do certain things or feel certain ways as it is validating what I'm already doing and how I'm already feeling. It's always nice to be mirrored and to feel understood.
- My sister just went to a huge healing conference in Germany and told me all about it today. She got to participate in an authentic Native American healing ritual. Now I want to find me one. I do live in the land of the Native Americans.
- Speaking of Germany, I just booked a flight for two people and two weeks. Kean and I are going to Germany in March! I am excited to bring Kean, who represents many of my new values, to the land that taught me a lot of values I don't believe in anymore. I am hoping that melding the two will help me achieve some of the balance I am seeking.
- A few days ago marked the 22-year anniversary of my being delivered to the mental hospital by my parents. I had a good cry about it and also looked up my psychiatrist from back then and even found a picture. I started writing him an email and then stopped because my main message would have been that his diagnosis launched years of feeling that I was not an okay person, from which I had only recently rid myself. Also, I thought that he might not care.
- I have had to admit to myself that I was soul-crushingly unhappy working for Adobe. Even though I was only spending about 15 hours a week there, it was affecting my entire life in a very negative way. I am currently on call for two weeks (meaning I don't come in unless they call me, which they haven't) and not entirely sure I can endure going back.
- Somehow I attracted two translation projects last week. They were both relatively boring, but sitting at home all day, typing away on my laptop, sculpting language around felt infinitely more pleasant than working at Adobe. You could almost say it restored my sense of well-being.
- I have no idea what's going to happen next and I feel hopeful.
- And yes, I did get my nipples pierced, and I'm surprised the entire internet has stayed quiet about that.
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.: posted by Vera
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Something is calling me and I don't know what
I'm definitely feeling this one reflected in my own judgments: San Francisco feels like a place where the rich live. I am also feeling the undertone of this sidewalk print reflected in my own judgments: I feel judgmental about "the rich." In my mind, it is not "good" to be rich. I am not rich, and the rich own all the buildings in San Francisco and charging us non-rich almost unsustainable rents. That is why it is not "good" to be rich.
I also see where this kind of thinking can get problematic for me. I can never be both rich and at peace with this kind of thinking. I will never own any property in San Francisco if I keep separating myself from "those rich, property-owning people."
I don't know if I want to own property in San Francisco. I don't know if I want to stay here anymore.
Am I already rich? I do live here. I live in this city they call the sanctuary for the rich. Does that make me rich?
I wish I didn't care so much about nightlife--clubs, warehouse parties, fashion shows. If it weren't for those, I would move somewhere else, somewhere cheaper and quieter. After over six years of being here, I am feeling a little bored and unsatisfied, disillusioned I think is the word.
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.: posted by Vera
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