How do we become aware of our thoughts, emotions and actions? Wake up from the monotony of the ordinary and start truly living the life we want? Why the f*%$ is being a Human so difficult? What the hell's this existence all about?! For me it came down to the word trust. Confused? That's natural. Read on.....
Something happened yesterday that really struck me, though admittedly it's an old trigger... doubt and mistrust borne of illogic, and it really helped me remember just how stuck I get when I'm faced with making a decision about what [or whom] to believe when it’s between Heart and Head… knowing something intuitivly versus believing something intellectually, a subtle difference. F*%# it actually feels quite painful if I’m honest. My husband does shit that is in no way logical, may even defy the very laws of logic in fact! Haha. But then I get it in my head... doubt... thinking he’s lied in some way or is doing something shady based on the gap between my objective observations and the most logical conclusion… and thus the battle begins; the fear palpable. 🐇🐇🐇
Interestingly, I realised that I honestly don’t know what terrifies me more;
He’s lying and won’t tell me the truth no matter what I do, or how I ask (promising amnesty, etc.)… I have NO CONTROL over whether or not he’s lying, and I've tethered myself to yet another person who doesn't think I deserve the truth... which is all I've ever asked for
I’m being duped by someone I love, but also someone who may well turn out to be some kind of duplicitous mastermind that never really loved me (though he said himself he’s not smart enough for that, haha)
When I was young I was lied to by those around me enough to understand it could threaten my survival. Lies perceived largely because I’m an empath, their words did not align with either their own inner emotions nor their actions. My family was entropy so I over-corrected by clinging to orderliness and linear logic to counteract the chaos around me. Now I’m an adult with severe trust issues because I must have subconciously come to believe that everyone I love lies to me... and this sat deeper than I could have ever realised really. As I heal, these deeper more engrained issues become exposed, giving me the opportunity to process them. If I can’t learn to trust, if I keep doubting and mistrusting my husband because his brain doesn’t operate the same way that mine does… then my marriage could be in big trouble over time; a different form of the same threat to my survival. Who wants to be berated with questions all the time like that? I can understand why it hurts him, but f*$@, I’m not having a joy ride in myself either!
Hmmm, ok, maybe I'm not the only wife with this issues 😅
If I trust him I feel like I’m placing my very survival in his hands, someone who I know to make well meaning yet logically flawed decisions. My sense of self preservation, to say nothing of my need for optimisation, fights against that heart-felt inclination to trust him tooth and nail based on those grounds. It is so very bleak to admit to myself, but there’s an extremely toxic false, or at least semi-false, belief there… “If I believe him, I’m a f*%#ing fool who deserves what’s coming”… and ‘what’s coming’ is the inevitable end of not only my relationship, but also life as I know currently know it. It puts everything I have in jeopardy (like half of the shit I own), so it’s increasingly less surprising how terrified I feel with those niggly little brain spiders traipsing about, performing their eight-legged tap dance on my neurons and conducting an analysis where I THINK one way but FEEL another... the outcome is an experience akin to being ripped in two.
It’s not nice to feel this way, nor is it nice to think my husband is stupid, or toblame my family for these entrenched trust issues… These are indeed unhealthy thoughts, but I won’t deny them their right to be there because ignoring them will only serve to perpetuate the torture I experience. As I reflect, pause, and become more aware of them, I can work with them and heal them. At the very least I’m being honest with myself, and daring to hope these things inside me will shift… If that is the best I can do then I’ll do it, even if the mistrust never goes away at least I know the basis of these doubts, then believing them becomes a choice… just like the choice I made to marry a man so very unlike myself intellectually, whose logic is wired completely backwards from my own, but who I know would never intentionally hurt or deceive me. That knowing serves as the foundation for the future trust to which I aspire.
Original Publication Date 12 June 2022, Revised TBD
I'm conscious that I've mentioned healing multiple times but have failed to elaborate on what exactly is meant. Nor have I provided any context around the term; allow me to do so now, if I may be so bold 🐇🙏😉.
"What are we healing from?" one might ask... HUMAN LIFE! I'm willing to go out on a limb and guess that the readers who stumble upon The Rabbit Hole aren't the type of people who've had an overly cruisy existence or are happy with status quo; we are seekers, ready to uncover what lay hidden inside ourselves and others, keen to understand the Universe on the deepest level. I'm also willing to bet we've all experienced trauma in some form or fashion, either through blatant victimisation, a horrifying ordeal, a denial of who we truly are, or simply worn down by the day-to-day rat race of life; this trauma can be direct, misperceived and/or self-inflicted.
For me healing is healthy development of our inner awarenessso that we can own our BULLSHIT and avoid spreading that shit onto others, because trust me, that's not the type of fertiliser our World needs 💩🙅. It's ending our own contribution to the collective human pain cycle, laying aside prejudice because that's how we were conditioned to think about a different race, boring others by constantly repeating the same pain stories from our past, preventing ourselves from hating or mistrusting everyone because one person screwed us over or our parents failed to provide for us as children, liberating ourselves from suppressed emotions that drive unhealthy behaviours, smiling at a stranger instead of telling them to f*%@ off, learning to take a compliment and/or accepting love because we no longer see ourselves as a worthless piece of shit. Perhaps most critical, it's avoiding shooting random strangers (or ourselves) because of some deeply held fear, or need for power, that we couldn't recognise as dangerous until it was too late... F&*#-ingBLEAK!😅
As I attempt to explain what, in my humble experience, does and does not constitute the healing of which I speak, please bear in mind that I DO NOT have any prescriptive answers. The lists below are what I've gleaned through my own twisted healing adventure, are decidedly biased towards my own experiences, and are in no way exhaustive. Hell, I'll discover many more weird and wonderful ways to heal I reckon. The steps along the healing path can and will look different for each of us; but I dare to assert they will not be linear for anyone brave enough to forge ahead.
What Healing Is:
The processing and release of subconscious and/or suppressed emotions
Confronting our inner fears and shadow-selves, embracing them and learning what they have to teach us
Activating our most useful tool, the light of ourawareness, and shining it into our subconscious to gain deeper understanding our ourselves and what drives our thoughts, emotions and actions
Accepting the fact that we cannotcontrol anything outside of ourselves
Becoming gratefulfor all the ass-kicking gut-wrenching life lessons that hurt us, yet shaped us into who we are
Tears, snot, boxes of tissues and/or rolls of toilet paper... sometimes while laughing at these inane emotional outbursts
Beating pillows, yelling in our cars or closets, throwing rocks into a river... sometimes while laughing at these inane emotional outbursts
Tough conversations with OTHERS who we've held resentments against, or with whom we need to ask forgiveness (accepting they may not give it)
Tough conversations with OURSELVES, also to confess long-held resentments and to ask for forgiveness
Re-wiring habitual unhealthy thinking patterns by learning to recognise self-sabotage and limiting beliefs
Taking accountability for the part we play in perpetuating negative cycles by making the same shitty choices time and again, or failing to opt for change over status quo
Consistent and deliberate reflection; journalling sessions, meditation and long walks spent sorting through all the rubbish going around in our minds
What Healing Is NOT:
Superficial spiritual Facebook memes that state WHAT to be without any indication of HOW to be it
Constant teddy bears and warm fuzzies
Inauthenticself-love and acceptance (i.e., it's a forced concept or flecked with residual judgments)
Soft leather couches and therapists who focus on explaining how great they are at healing others, or only serve to repeat back things we've said (talking to a mirror will do the same thing and cost a hell of a lot less)
Pharmaceutical band-aids that don't address the underlying issue(s)
A clean, clear, straight-forward or finite process
Remaining unwilling to take-on honest feedback(from ourselves or others)
Feel-good hippy-dippy bullshit, toxic positivity or perpetual happiness
A sense that we're in control
Yes, sounds great... how the f*$@ do I do that or know WHO my 'Divine Self' even is?! 💩😠
The Universe operates in IRONY, so the more lost, confused and hopeless we feel, the closer we are to gaining some traction on the healing path.
Healing requires courage and my own sordid adventure lay entrenched in the many rabbit holes linked throughout this article, but here are some discrete examples, if for nothing other than their entertainment value. 🐇💖
My first break-up left me with a deep sense that something in my wiring wasn't quite right, and fearing I'd be left unable to cultivate healthy romantic relationships I became determined to start rooting through the baggage of my psyche by practicing mindfulness and remaining in the present... Thus Analytical Ramblings of a Scientific Mind was born, my first attempt at articulating mucking through not one, but threecolourfulmentalillnesses (because I'm an over-achieving perfectionist in all that I do! 😝).
Thinking I'd learned it all and 'fixed' myself as a result of the above, I was devastated to find that after a psychotic episode I was left amongst the ruin of yet another relationship and had landed yet another diagnosis! OCD, yes, given my history with obsessive and compulsive thoughts stuck on a song entitled 'self-judgment and punishment,' I could understand that one. But then a fateful session with my unconventional counsellor (whom I will be forever indebted to), hilariously set off my inner light bulb by frankly stating, while laughing, that "I didn't have OCD, I just didn't f*%#ing trust anyone or anything." In that moment I could've been knocked over with a feather, realising the obvious and confronting fact that my utter lack of trust left me dependent on an addiction to control; nothing in my mind could heal until I constructed a foundation of trust... and thus the Rabbit Hole was founded along with a deeper sense of what it meant to truly heal.
Smaller, but no-less significant, realisations came which allowed me to tweak and refine along the way;
Opting for Inner Peace Over Happiness: For one, chasing perpetual happiness is utterly exhausting and rather fruitless... hear me out 🐇. Happiness is at one end of an emotional continuum, seeking it constantly doesn't allow for the natural spectrum of other emotions to occur and will eventually knock us off-balance. I'll even go so far as to say it can be unhealthy, particularly if we start 'blaming ourselves' for failing to achieve happiness; thinking it's the healthiest way to be. We need the clouds to fully appreciate the sunshine, and so to do the gloomier emotions enable us to enjoy life's simple happy moments. Additionally, when/if shit turns pear-shaped (because this is life and it eventually will to some degree), we're left without a sense of resilience or capability, missing the opportunity to let tough and painful situations cultivate healthy coping strategies. I opt for peace because it is dynamic and calming; it's congruent with self-acceptance. I find peace can exist anywhere along the depressed to elated spectrum. Perceiving inner peace through our own tears is an odd yet rewarding experience.
Forgiveness is for Good People: An interesting activity in one of the many mind-altering books I read provoked quite a powerful shift in a deeply engrained detrimental mindset, though when I reflect on this I see one part miracle, one part f*%@ing insanity, and three parts hilarity 😝. I have always been a perfectionist, driving a tendency towards perpetual self-punishment, observing misperceived failures, and leaving behind sentiments of 'Not Good Enough.' This activity had me ask, out loud, while in a meditative state, 'What had I done wrong to deserve to be treated that way?' Good-golly-miss-Molly did that jar some shit loose! Before I knew it I was literally screaming and crying at myself in a closet. The obvious had finally dawned on me... Nothing. I had done absolutely-nothing-f*$@ing-wrong to deserve the constant punishment I loved to heap onto myself. My intentions were always good, and having faith in that moral compass finally allowed me to be more accepting of my otherwise inexcusable flaws; most importantly, I found the compassion needed to forgive myself for the years of inner torture.
Confronting the Ticking Clock: One fateful day a long-held subconscious fear bubbled up to the surface. A sensation like popping a huge infectious pustule that had been building under the surface from my mid-20's to mid-30's. The stimulus for this infection was a common little bug known as the fear of running out of time (full story described in this link, it's riveting!😅). I was getting on, all my friends were married with babies or buns in the oven... yet I was still single-Summer with only a couple of failed relationships on my bleak-as track record. Still worse, the dating pool was looking more and more desperate, and soon I'd be a tried and true spinster. It was only after bursting this infection however, that I could heal it; challenge this limiting belief that did not and would not serve me well. I say that because rushing against this clock has driven many a rash decision when it comes to choosing a life partner, and it usually doesn't turn out to be an overwhelming success... the term 'settling' comes to mind. Once I was aware of this fear, I set to treating it with kindness, understanding and patience. Miraculously, completely in line with how the Universe operates, as soon as I learned to appreciate this fear and love it, heal it, instead of running away and/or suppressing it, I met my husband. 💕💫
This one is a bit more helpful... It takes practice, and lots of it, but I know this is possible because I've done it and so have others. 🙏💖
I love a list, so here's another 😝... The benefits that healing has to offer;
Gradualshiftsin our mindsets, from survival fear-based thinking to dynamic growth-based thinking
Greater sense of security, which I'd argue is far more profound than confidence
Physical connection between our heads, hearts and spirits, and overall sense of Whole-ness; realising that each piece is on the same teaminstead of pushing individual agendas
Be brave, dig deep, keep asking why, probe those thoughts, emotions and behaviours, laugh, remain kind and non-judgmental. Trust it can be done... 💖🙏🐇
Original Publication Date 06 June 2022, Revised TBD
