I've been reading along with you for some months now and I've got to tell you that your growth and ability to understand that often as attractive as the path of least resistance is (eg having your husband in your life under any circumstances) it's rarely the healthiest option. You are making healthy choices every inch of the way - and I can feel how painful that is (I KNOW how painful it is), but it's right .... and it makes for compelling and inspiring reading.
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And I guess that brings me to the biggest revelation of all in this whole week of catharsis for me. I think I have to believe in something bigger than me taking this over. I have struggled with faith my whole life, and I'm agnostic, but I am exhausted from the effort of holding this all together myself and I feel like I have to just try to cultivate trust that God or whatever power is going to make things right for me someday. I don't know what else to do anymore.
This is huge stuff, hey? I think it was Woody Allen who said "If you want to make God laugh, tell him about your plans." (I'm not that thrilled about quoting Woody Allen, but I love that quote).
It's liberating when we truely get that everything is out of our control, except for how we react to things that happen. The ONLY thing we have any control over, ability to successfully manipulate or influence - the only thing we can have sureity of is our reaction to any given set of circumstances. Nothing is certain in this life. Nothing. No thing. Being abandoned by your partner is a big clue to that, ya know. You can be happily going along in your life, with a picture painted of what life will look like in 5 years, what it will look like in 10 years, etc ... and all of a sudden, a vandal slashes the picture and you're left to redraw it - minus one of the key characters.
There have been big floods near where I live this week. 12 people are confirmed dead (including two whole families and one little 4 year old boy who was washed away when he was helping to get his little brother rescued), 55 are missing, many of those are expected to be found dead. The whole CBD of Brisbane was flooded, all those commercial buildings and something like 7000 houses ... it's a mess. As I was watching the flooding it occurred to me how smug we are that we think we can contain nature. Nature is bigger than all of us and no matter how clever we are, her power will beat us every time. So it is with how we organise our lives. We think we've got it together, career is rocking, money's in the bank, house is organised, personal life is OK ... and then a flash flood takes your 4 year old, your house and everything you own.
That's an extreme example, but it happens to us too. We think if I just write the right words in this e-mail he might realise what a mistake he's made and come home. If I just finish this project and publish this article, I'll be successful and then I'll get a promotion and more research funding and then I'll ...... you know, the stories we tell ourselves. None of it is really in our control. Sure - you've got to do the work to put yourself in a position to take advantage of the opportunities when they come - but you've also got to do the work to gracefully accept that the story we told ourselves is not the only legitimate plot, storyline and climax.
I think it's about learning to accept that you've just got to go with the floodwater. There is something out there that is bigger than us and we can kick and fight against it all we want, but maybe we'd get where we're supposed to be going faster if we just let the universe take us.
Keep at it girl - and keep those thought pieces coming.
Cheers, V
V
Never make someone a priority, who makes you an option.
