Me and Mildlife and...III

[CT1118]

CT

I do wish to ask, is this where the truth meets the training? Where I am at? Where one is just one?

The short answer is YES. At the end of the day, being able to just be YOU and feeling comfortable with that is the place to be. To know that your words, statements, actions are consistent with you being open and honest (i.e. no passive aggressive, no hidden agenda) is ……imo, perfect.

Amen. I do feel really good.

rather where you just know what you can express of your belief in you and know what you say, in the face of whatever you face, is going to come out like you mean it, because you do?

Exactly!

Double quoted so I don't forget it was said.

Be gentle with yourself. This journey imo, never really ends. I believe that as people we continue to grow and evolve. You may find that you have mastered one thing today…and then months later realize that you still have a little work to do in an area or two.

I think that is the elegant lesson in all of this.

Ether way, my dad always told me, "your name is all you ever really leave behind, it's up to you how they speak it"

Your dad was a smart man.

Old southern men come off that way, but I will tell him you said that.

Thanks Eric, always enjoy it.

[ericmsant2]

CT

Just wanted to stop by and wish you a great weekend. Hope you have something fun planned.

[Mach1]

CT...

I wanted to bring this over here because it is that good..

Have a great weekend..


Andrew -

Did you ever make that trip to OBX to see your daughter? If so, how did that go? If not, when does it come up? I spent my summers growing up there, on the Pamlico sound where my grandparents lived. I am older now and have traveled a bit - other countries, to my mother's heritage in Germany a few times, central America, the Caribbean...my favorite place has been the Florida Keys - many visits. But in my mind, those dunes, the seabirds, the tall tired grasses, and the impossible access of the North Carolina Outer Banks is forever my spiritual home.

I don't live far from there now, close enough to go there for breakfast, stay to dinner, and be back home to sleep. One of the most insular things my spouse did to me was to make that location her weekend getaway for her A. It crushed me, and this is putting it lightly. I have come so far, but the idea of such an adult betrayal embedded in the midst of possibly, if not the only place my childhood mind felt peace from the sustained abuse I generally experienced - well, you can imagine the mental trespass my spouse committed. Knowing I felt this way, I began taking trips to the OBX with my son despite how I felt. I had to do something which made it my own again and I wanted to hopefully build something for him.

The first time I went there after (mostly) knowing what my wife was up to - I felt so lonely. It was January/February of 2016, the wind can be so brutal over those isthmi and those islands in winter. We were hiking the dunes and went to the sound side for some restitution from the chill - much warmer there in the afternoon sun. My son had our dog and was playing with him. I sat under a live oak which was drowning in the glacial movement of sand. I wept. I mean like a f-ing child, if not arguably worse. My son did not see it, for which I was glad, not b/c a grown man was crying, but b/c I wanted that place to be happy for him.

In the time since, I have taken it back. Not by frequent visits, I have only been there about three times (and all with my son) since January/February. I took it back in my mind. And how I did is so eerily opposite of the words you have chosen for this thread: "lost in the woods"


Andrew - You trust me by now, I trust. My better posts (I think, others are the judge of that) tend to have some help embedded in stories or narrative from my life as opposed to straight up advice, so I hope you get this now. Above, that is true. That sukced so horribly for me to write, b/c I had never actually solidified what I did with those memories of how bad I was hurt regarding my spouse and that location, which is only geographic, but means so very much more in my mind. But I was very much aware I had to reclaim, even before I found DB, this need was instinctual. My point being, more importantly relating, to all of your chosen imagery bout paths and being lost in the woods...

Buddy, my canuck brother, if you know the terrain you don't need a path. You can't get lost in those woods if they are your own. I know the dunes, grasses, and waterways of those barrier lands so well that they are like the skin on my hands - and nobody gets to take that away. Whether the 'woods' you speak of are euphemistic or a real place, are they yours? If so, fk that path buddy, you do not need it, you know the land.

For what its worth, the above is what I felt compelled to offer. Till the next time, leave some footprints brother.

[CT1118]

Fk....


..........


This is the hardest thing I have ever done. Facing me...once realized, it is about no one else but me and my choices.....just.....

.....Composing myself....

Sorry, it's just f'ing me....I am so very much great with that....great w/me...just hit, for real hit...with reading that. But, that's not true, its not just me, this has not been a solo journey, Overwhelming. Its overwhelming....

I can't put it into words, if you could see me now, know my how this just hit, know that I just read this and what it took
just to write this little bit....

I really needed that, at this moment...not a passing grade, not a trophy, just thank thank you for doing that. I would have never guessed my own reaction...


....right now, to something so simple.I have to sign off now. Thank you so very very much.

[AndrewP]

I'm grateful that you have shared so much of yourself with this community and have been a companion on my own journey.

We are never alone as long as we have friends. Even when they are not present we hold them in our hearts.

[CT1118]

I was washed thru last night with,...freedom I think. Today was pretty chill - I still don't sleep much, but at this point that may be a remnant of my sitch b/c it is certainly not my sitch at this point. Lazy morning. Then took s5 to friend's bday party - first party where parents were asked to leave. I asked no questions, hit the beach. Laid around in sand for an hour, took a walk, scooped him up. Small world, neighbors from old house which spouse and I sold happened to have their s6 at same party. Not my neighbor any more, still nosy. Didn't care.

Came home w/ s5 and had space time. Plays action figures for an hour. Grocery store. Home for dinner, the Flash cartoons (his favorite superheros is the Flash). Put him to bed. Feel good.

Filled out my application for graduation spring 17. Awesome.

[lt0402]

CT, just visiting your new home over her bud. Appreciate the continued support from you brother! Will catch up on how things are going with you this evening.

[CT1118]

Mach 1 - There was something missing, something I left behind. One of those mental ticks, but you can't put it together at the time. Present and recent past merged today in my head. You had said:

What about it worked ? And who did it work for ???

C, when we come through this via the DB route, we become so much more enlightened in how we respond rather than react, we become aware of our communication, we are light years ahead of our WAS's in that regard...

Whatever she has been doing for all of these months, I highly doubt that SHE has been working on becoming as self enlightened as you have...

You responding as the new you ?

What I could not remember at the time was what really worked, something you said earlier:

And a WAS can smell that, like a drug dog on a Cheech & Chong movie set...

The memory of what you said came back to me today. Granted, you were referring to a different context at the time, but in general, words and actions; the WAS knows the fake from the authentic. Perhaps because they have been trying to master the belief in themselves to fake, to lie, to ignore how they truly feel? The LBS trying to master the belief in themselves for the authentic, the truth, to embrace how they truly feel. From this context, the WAS may not have been working all this time on becoming as self enlightened as we have, but they have been working on covering up self. Perhaps to this degree, that is how they know fake? I could not help but think, the WAS was learning how to fake it long before the LBS was learning how to make it - the two year head start.

One person walking away from something that they feel they are not, the other walking towards something that they feel they can be; there is bound to be some overlap of reality in there while both are studying. That is how they know what the dry runs look like. Not that I did not believe you at the time, but when paired with the later comment posted at the top, it seemed like a culmination of knowledge hit me today. This was a big day for me, despite the s-show that was my work day, I managed to hold my thoughts down all day towards not forgetting these ideas (painfully difficult w/ the issues I got, but used the phone to record mindset).

Long story long, and hopefully to connect, my IC this morning:

My IC session today was kind of a two part series from the week before. We speak about my son a whole lot. A story of something he was doing which involved breakfast scenario from the story which resulted in the 'what worked' conversation w/ you was on the table this morning (not talking about you, just same story). The IC asked me "when you told me she responded differently, as in she paid attention to you, said she missed you, what about you do you think was different that could have prompted that" Essentially a very similar question. My answer to her was not altered in theme from what I gave you, but it came out much smoother with her - and I did not make these connections until after I had left her office later today.

"I believe what worked is that I was genuine. It was feeling like the for the first time I owned my own self. Not just with her, but in general, I am really beginning to feel like I own this (I motioned with my hands towards my head and body). I continued, "I felt like an actor who has been preparing through dress rehearsal for many months. I read so much, rehearsed so much, had so many runs through the scenes...except that morning, it wasn't a dress rehearsal anymore, it was the real thing, it was the show. I was on stage, except it wasn't a performance, I had become the character to the point where we were one in the same - and I had owned it in body language and words, it was not performance, it was me. And the audience understood it in a way so simply that there could be no other way. I was who I set out to be."

"What did you call it before, loving detachment? I love that term, it's so appropriate.". (she had heard me say it a bunch of times before)

I told her it was not my own, I read it in an online support group, but I took ownership of the credence, I fought for it. We spoke of other things I should get to later, it was a big day. Plus, I just insulted actors, I know nothing of the craft. I do think done poorly, it looks like lying, done properly it looks like an authentic persona, done perfectly it looks like a human being being a human being in front of you; which is to say, flaws exist, words are not perfect, idiosyncracies remain, but all of it is believed by the person both behind it and the person in front of it.
Except this is not acting. I am a real person. I have studied who I want to be. I am still learning the part, but the balance between was and is, that is blurring...or perhaps becoming more distinct. Not sure just yet. But I know that I am getting better at it.

[AndrewP]

Well written as always CT1118 and certainly thought provoking. I originally went looking for the obvious Shakespeare quote but stumbled on this. Pythagoras said that this world was like a stage / Whereon many play their parts; the lookers-on, the sage

We often don't truly know ourselves until we can look at ourselves from the outside which you my friend have been doing a better job than any I can recall. We, your audience can speak from our seats but we ourselves are also on our own stages. There was an interesting discussion lately about us all watching each other's hurricanes which says much the same thing.

I quite liked the discussion about the WAS knowing fake from real which is where I've always struggled with the standard DB philosophy of "acting as if". My W has known me for more than half her life. She's watched me sleep, she's watched me weep. That is where your comments about accepting the changes that we make on our journeys as part of our own soul as I believe you say as I had become the character to the point where we were one in the same.

In my few interactions with my W I think that she has always seen the real AndrewP as I think your W saw the real CT1118.

[ericmsant2]

CT

Just stopping by to say that I've loved your last few posts. Keep digging inside yourself. You are doing an amazing job from what I can see.

Peace,
Eric