The Open Door

When one door of happiness closes, another opens; but often we look so long at the closed door that we do not see the one which has been opened for us. - Helen Keller

In my last post, I talked about giving myself time to let go, to lean against the closed door and process the natural emotional reactions behind letting go, before looking for that opened door to which Helen Keller referred. 

It's kind of funny how life has a way of telling you it's time to move on. Like having an opportunity you thought was open for you way up the road, suddenly appear before you.

Let me explain.

A few months ago, I began looking into the possibility of furthering my studies. I have an undergraduate degree - and this has opened doors for me in the past and made it possible to work in a job that I enjoyed - but a combination of events has birthed a desire in me to make more of a difference to the world than I am now. 

I had decided that, because of certain financial projects that were in the works for this year, I could go back and get my graduate degree starting in May 2014. It would give me time to take care of those projects and then to save up for my tuition. I even looked around and chose the school and the program I would be taking. 

And then, a door closed in my life. That one closed door had a number of repercussions I had not expected on several of those expenses I thought I would have - and as I sat at breakfast with my husband this morning, he took something I had mentioned in passing last night, and ran with it. He gently suggested that I could go back to school sooner. Much sooner. Like in September - only a little over 3 months away. 

Gulp.

Within the space of about 10 minutes, we were talking about logistics, finances, schedules, and division of labor. 

And I felt it happen. 

"Blank Paper Sheet And Pin" photo courtesy of
Witthaya Phonsawat at
www.freedigitalphotos.net

The page was turning. That open door looked a LOT closer. 

Nerve-wracking? OH yes. Yet, as we discussed it, I recognized the sensation of anticipation - almost excitement, right along with all the nervousness and trepidation. 

I'd stopped leaning against the closed door. I was standing on my own two feet and pondering opportunities instead of regretting what couldn't be. 

It was almost surreal, like I was in a time warp - the world in slow motion around me. Voices muffled; all that existed was this pivotal moment.

The sense of pervading peace and serenity, even in the midst of uncertainty and near-panic, was unmistakable. This was it. This was the next right thing. This was something I needed to do.  For ME. I needed to do this to look after myself, to challenge my limits, to overcome obstacles, to practice self-discipline, and eventually to give back to the world.

Oh, did I mention that my graduate degree (Master's) would give me the opportunity to register as a certified counselor? Oh yeah, I forgot to tell you that part.

☺

There is something very gratifying about turning that new page, that page with nothing written on it yet. For a writer, there's a little thrill when opening a new notebook, sliding a hand across a clean page, and preparing to write that first word. It's almost as if that first word is the most important one, even if it is a small one. 

This is a small word. 
I. 
The next word is a verb. 
I want. 
What do I want? I want to make. 
Make a difference.
A difference in me, a difference in others.

So ... guess what?

The door is before me. And I'm reaching for the doorknob.

Leaning against the door

Helen Keller said once, "When one door of happiness closes, another opens, but often we look so long at the closed door that we do not see the one which has been opened for us."

I understand the sentiment; I do. I know that there comes a time when we must move on. 

However, I also believe that it's normal and healthy to look at the closed door - whatever that is, for a while - and to ponder its meaning, whether or not that leads to restoration. Only then can we move forward. 

I also think that it's perfectly natural, after the door has been shut, to lean against it, to allow oneself to regret that the situation has gotten to the point of separation, to regroup, and to begin to accept the new reality. The scene is common when there has been a quarrel; the person goes out, closes the door and then leans with his or her back to the door. In those moments, the heart can begin to let go, to feel the shock, accept a previously denied truth, and eventually ask itself, "Where do I go from here?" 

How long that takes is anyone's guess. It's different for each person and even for one person, it's different depending on the situation, and/or the nature of the relationship in question. 

Photo "Massaging Shoulder As Very Stressed"
courtesy of Stuart Miles at
www.fredigitalphotos.net

When a relationship ends - for whatever reason - it hurts. That's okay. It's supposed to hurt. 

Sometimes, when the inner pain is deep, it even hurts physically. The mind-body connection is amazingly strong. A person can literally become sick and/or sore because of the stress associated with prolonged emotional upheaval.

At the same time, at some point in those moments - or days - of leaning against the door, comes a marvelous gift: the ability to breathe again. Oh, I don't mean the involuntary "in, out, in, out" stuff that the nervous system does automatically. I mean belly-breathing: diaphragm breathing. I mean unclenching those abdominal muscles you didn't even know were wound up tighter than a fiddle string - and allowing the physical tension to drain away a little bit with every breath. It's the kind of breathing you have to remind yourself to do, (medium slowly in as far as you can, medium slowly out as far as you can) or your body only does enough to keep itself functioning. I'm beginning to think of this deep breathing exercise as an internal massage. Or a spiritual yawn - oxygenating the psyche as well as the body, purging the toxins of lingering fear and resentment.

It's all normal; it's part of the process. As I've said so many times before, feelings are not good or bad. They just are. They were created to be a barometer of the inner climate, indicators of attitudes that affect health, behaviors, so many things. Tuning in to those feelings and finding out why they're there (in other words, drilling down to the attitudes behind them) does way more good than denying that they exist (perhaps out of some misplaced sense of guilt or shame, or fear of being seen as "weak.") How much better to carve out time to look after yourself, and to take however long it takes on a regular basis to process events and your emotional reaction to them.

Taking the time to find closure like that is another way to help yourself let go of things over which you have no control anyway (I'm talking to mySELF here) ... and gain the internal strength to look for that second door.

Cowardice - or courage?

When I was a child, a couple of boys picked a fight with my older brother. He was unable to defend himself and got knocked around a bit. My father, man's man that he was, was disgusted that the younger of his two sons would not be able to defend himself. He expressed his displeasure in no uncertain terms, and compared the two brothers, saying that the elder brother could "handle himself."  

What should have followed was a conversation about when it is appropriate to fight back, instead of condemnation and misunderstanding. My brother interpreted his father's comments as an indication that the definition of a man was someone who could beat someone up. It marked him - unfortunately - for life. He spent the next few years learning how to fight ... and funneling all of his resentment against his father into becoming really good at breaking someone's face.

Years later, my two brothers and my father were present when someone tried to goad my oldest brother into an altercation. Instead of punching his lights out, the elder of the two brothers refused to be drawn into a fight, and walked away. The instigator also left. My dad turned to his younger son, and said, "Now THAT's a REAL man."  

What? Talk about mixed messages!!

It's regrettable that, because the conversation never happened in the first place, a teaching opportunity had been lost. My brother never recovered from those two experiences. He'd spent his entire youth building his life on something he thought my father valued, only to be told that it was wrong. 

The truth is that in a way, my dad may have been right in both instances - but he was definitely wrong in not trying to communicate the reasons for his reactions. 

It IS appropriate - sometimes - to fight. It is right and proper when there is something good, something worth defending. I'm not talking about defending one's pride or position. I'm talking about standing up for what is right, the way you stand up to a bully and call attention to his or her inappropriate behavior. I'm talking about telling the truth to someone - even if it hurts. I'm talking about battling injustice to give someone a chance at a better life.

But there are also times when it's better to walk away. Or to hang up the phone when someone is trying to provoke you into saying something you'll regret - only to use it against you. Will that person call you a coward?? You bet!! Is it still better to walk away in that situation? Most definitely, yes!! 

I've been thinking a lot about that kind of thing - cowardice versus courage - because of recent events in my personal life. 

I've spent a lot of years fighting to protect the rights and opportunities of someone I love. Sadly, she must have interpreted my bull-dog tenacity as a tacit message that the rules apply to everyone except to the person I was trying so hard to defend: her. Slowly, the person I once knew died, and was replaced with someone I barely recognize. Through the influence of some of her friends, over the course of the last few years, she has come to view me - and my husband - as people to take advantage of. To take from, always promising but never giving back. To manipulate into being given more. And MORE.

And I finally ended up in the unenviable position of fighting, struggling to

Photo "Woman With Sad Expression"
 courtesy of David Castillo Dominici at
 www.freedigitalphotos.net

defend myself and my husband from her abuse. And from the abuse of her friends, one in particular, who verbally attacked me and is actively trying to ruin my reputation and further undermine my relationship with her. With her full consent. 

She made her choice clear. 

Yes, I fought back. I wanted the person I used to know to return to me. I fought to keep her in my life. To protect her.

Until I couldn't take the mental anguish anymore. I had to walk away. 

A large part of me feels like that is cowardice - that I am giving up, that I have failed. 

Yet the glimmer of hope that I cling to is that in walking away, I can teach what I couldn't before - that no matter what the provocation, certain behaviors are simply not acceptable. Abuse is one of those behaviors. 

So I - in conjunction with my husband - hung up the phone, to use a metaphor, to keep from saying/doing something we'd all regret. 

If that makes me a coward, fine. I'm not so sure it does... but that's really not my (or anyone's) judgment to make. 

It's a painful process; in a very real way I am grieving - I've shed more tears in the last 56 hours than I have in the last year. But now that it's final, now that this person is no longer able to keep behaving in that same old pattern, maybe now the healing can begin. On both sides of the equation.

I sure hope so.

Take it all down

Today has been a difficult day, and it's not over yet.

There's a relationship that's broken in my life. It's been broken for years and over time, it has gotten more and more broken.

I tried to fix it starting a few years ago. However, the dynamic of it was such that anything I tried to do, backfired.  The history - and there was a LOT of history - got in the way.

Now it seems broken beyond repair. Lines have been drawn in the sand. Boundaries set and breached, over and over and over. 

In desperation, looking for some sort of sign, a prayer on my lips and an aching in my heart, I turned on the TV and thought maybe I could just put my mind in neutral and quiet the revving motor, the chest pains, the loss of appetite, the anguish. 

What I saw was an episode of a well-known Canadian home renovation show. The host was examining a floor that had water leakage problems and nobody knew where the leak was coming from. After excluding the obvious suspects, he decided to rip up the floor.

It was a beautiful hardwood floor. Shiny, glorious. "Take it all down," he said. "We'll find out what's causing this problem." 

Out came the crowbars. Up came the wood - splintering in all directions as the workmen did their duty. It was ... obscene. All that beautiful wood. 

"Danger" courtesy of
Michelle Meiklejohn at
www.freedigitalphotos.net

But underneath ... underneath it, someone had put plastic between it and the concrete slab. The concrete was cold; the wood was warm. The plastic made a perfect place for moisture to condense and cause the problem. 

Just a piece of plastic. Put in the wrong place.  Dear God.  

That's when my sign came. 

Sometimes, to fix something that is very wrong, everything has to go. It all has to go out the door, and be done right  -  and the right way too  -  from scratch. 
 Time to make a clean break. Splinter even the good things so that they are unusable, clear it all out, lay a good groundwork and do it right this time.

In my relationship dilemma, I believe that means (although I am scared to death) making a clean break as well. The way things have been going is not good; it is time to put an end to it, to say goodbye, to remove the source of the situation and lay the proper foundation: one based on each individual taking responsibility for his or her actions. 

No more who did what to whom first. No more majoring on minors. No more trying to do the same thing, over and over again, expecting different results. 


No more enabling. No more wheedling. No more manipulation. No more intimidation. 

That's going to take some hard work. And the hardest of all will be when the relationship crowbar comes out. When we (with much fear and sadness) say goodbye to what was. 

Even if it hurts. And it WILL hurt.

A LOT.

Reflections from 3 am

It's amazing how the barriers come down when you're tired.

Last night I couldn't sleep - the reason isn't important right now - and I got into a conversation with another insomniac. I was upset about a few things and this person listened to me and calmed me down enough for me to be able to sleep - mind you, it was 3 am before my head hit the pillow and some time after that - perhaps 3:30 - before I dropped off. 

And - I was awake again this morning at 6:30, exhausted, with a brain fog that would put London, England to shame. But once I'm up, I'm up. (Maybe tonight I'll toddle off before 10:30.)

One of the things we talked about last night was how my whole attitude on life and on relationships has changed in the last 4 years. This lifestyle has become "the new normal" (in itself a miracle!) - but once in a while, it's useful (and encouraging) for me to look back and remember what I was like back then. And it's also a great check-up for me to see if there is any slippage back into old attitudes. 

And I must admit, there has been some. Without going into a lot of detail, life hasn't been a feather-bed for me in the last few months. There are a lot of stresses on me from various areas, and one of the most stressful has been the area of my relationships. I've discovered that it's easy for me to feel responsible for others' choices when I don't need to, especially when those others try to put the blame on me for not doing things that are their responsibility to do. The old me would have shouldered that and borne it, not said a word, and taken up the slack just to "keep peace" - but more and more I am realizing that boundaries are important to establish and to maintain. That forgiveness is given but trust is earned. And that - hardest of all to discover - love can be slowly poisoned and murdered if one is mistreated long enough. 

"Tightrope Walker" illustration courtesy of chanpipat at
www.freedigitalphotos.net

It's also easy to be ready to do anything, say anything that will influence the other person's outcome. (This ALWAYS backfires; I don't know why I have to keep learning this!) 

"Tough love" is toughest on the one exercising it. 

Knowing where the line is between caring and meddling, between concern and enabling, between love and being a doormat ... and between letting go and writing someone off ... this is quite possibly the hardest line I've ever had to walk ... and where the line is, keeps changing on a daily basis. 

It's not easy. In fact, at times it's downright painful, and often people around me don't seem to understand why I need to keep working at it - if it's so difficult.  However, the possibility of regaining my sanity and maybe even seeing the pain lessen ... is a great motivator. 

I've been in the place of obsessional control-freaking, freaking in general, and the doormat mentality (all the while growing resentments in some kind of resentment-hothouse.) In fact, I spent most of my life there, and it nearly ruined my marriage ... and made my kids shut me out.  No way do I want to go back to any kind of behavior that remotely resembles that kind of dysfunction. 

I am learning that I do have the right to have feelings, that I do have the right to say what they are, and that I do have the right to have a life of my own, enjoy my free time and my own possessions, and choose to share them if I so wish; I am not obligated. I also have the right to expect others to respect my boundaries, but I must make them clear, or there WILL be misunderstandings, guaranteed. 

I am learning that in relationships, problems arise if all of the compromises are made by only one person, that there needs to be effort from both parties ... or nothing works right. If it's not working right, I can look at my own part in what went wrong, but I need not take responsibility for the actions of the other party. 

These are basic truths I am only beginning to learn in practice. 

And I need lots. And lots. Of practice.

It takes what it takes

I make no secret of the fact that I don't like to see something unfinished. Especially in my life. I want so badly to "skip to the end" and see the final result.

Unfortunately, life doesn't work like that. It's messy - and there are always loose ends, incomplete "works in progress." Not just one or two, but all over the place. This relationship, or that project, or maybe another as yet unmet objective. Even times when I think something is just the way it should be, only to find out a crucial step was missed - and I have to deconstruct it and build it back the right way. 

Even if it's hard. Even if it takes a long time. Or a lot of work.

"Winding Road" photo courtesy of pixbox77 at
www.freedigitalphotos.net

And so, I am always reminding myself that "in progress" is the status of a life being lived, that the journey is as important as (and perhaps in some cases more important than) the destination. 

"It takes what it takes," I repeat to myself. "Someday I'll look around and it'll be the way it's supposed to be. And I won't even have noticed it."

Someday.

There are setbacks. Obstacles. Times when it feels like two steps forward, one step back. Or ... maybe even three steps back. 

Stuff happens. People change. 

Someone enters my life; someone else walks away. Or maybe I need to be the one walking toward - or away from - a particular person or group of people. 

People misinterpret intentions. They take advantage of my desire to be liked, to not have conflict - and I find myself being the doormat again. Or I become so passionate about helping someone that I lose sight of that person's right to choose, and I end up trying to control the outcome. 

It happens. 

The up side of all this is that at any moment, I can choose to stop what I am doing and take a different route. Sometimes that means making an apology - or setting (or enforcing) a boundary. Or I can choose to stay the course and see things through, depending on the situation. 

Along the way, I need to be sure that I'm looking after myself, or (as one friend put it) being kind to myself.

I never know how long something is going to take, or when (or even IF) a situation will be resolved. I never know what the outcome will be. That (maddening and discouraging as it is at times) is part of the journey. 

And ... it takes what it takes ... however long it takes.