Not long ago, I was reading the blog of Hiro Boga. What I took away from reading her post was about one's congruency between the person you are in your private life, vs. the person you are in your public life, and how important it is to have congruency between the two, instead of keeping them as fragmented and as far apart as possible.
Suddenly, the wheels in my mind began to turn, which led to a long round of internal clarity and questioning. I realized with a start, that I'd been anxious around people for most of my life, because many of them did not, could not, or would not practice that congruency, for many reasons. People who act like that (one way in private; a different one in public) have always freaked me out.
My first lessons in dealing with others weren't much better, as I was taught that most people could not ever be fully trusted, despite me wanting desperately to be able to do the whole trust thing with other people. Dishonesty and distrust were skills I was going to have to pick up, like it or not.
Of course, being me, I had to flip that around and ask myself if there had been times where I had been incongruent, and of course, there were, and from there I had to ask myself why--naturally, it all came back to roughly the same thing.
I had the feeling though, that there was something more, and I was right. I sensed the beginnings of a pattern starting to emerge for unravelling, beginning with that whole trust thing.
From there I skipped to a side issue of Armoring. Physical armoring. Weight, clothes, usually making the effort to blend in when I really wanted to do was shine. Finding myself frequently alone and having
to be tougher, smarter and more capable than everyone else in the room to be thought of as half as good.
Occasionally doing everything in my power to push people away.
Being surrounded by either a physical, paperwork , financial or social mess as a reminder of that I exist. Or as a punishment for existing. Or, as protection from others--but could it be I want to protect them from me because I am terrified I will hurt someone as I've been hurt before, because I just might be a sleazball?
After some consideration, I realized that all of the salient parts of this essential distrust and disconnection were all old stuff, and that I'd spent a lot of time, and more than a few relationships of any stripe, going over this old stuff that, for me, was just...well..old and not service-able anymore. I didn't need, or want, to do all that anymore. It doesn't fit who I am. And I realized all at once that my deepest fear about myself wasn't correct. Thank Goodness!
I felt a shift inside myself then, to ask what I needed, in order to move forward into a reality that feels much, much better. I need space. I needed to give myself compassion and meet myself where I was. I needed to give myself the feeling of 'home' I've always craved. I needed to realize that I'm not at all sleazy, as I'd feared.
I do, however need to pay more positive attention to myself and meet my own self-needs, and have an eye on my own self-worth.
I need to start looking at making some new friends, while keeping the old ones that seem to want to stick around for the best of all possible reasons.
My lesson for today seems to be that all of my values, qualities, feelings, experiences, etc. are not just fragments, as I'd been treating them for oh-so-many years. They are parts of a whole, and there is still a bit of work to be done to bring them together. I I know now, that it's nothing scary, it's just all just part of the face that I show the world, personally or professionally--and it's OK.
Until next time....peace.
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