The June Silhouette

June has been the most eye-opening, emotional and insightful month of the year so far. It is because of conversations that I have had, both with others and with myself. I have begun to see my fears for what they are, and in this quest for inner peace I have had to realise how much baggage I carry wherever I go, how doubtful I am of what I do and why I do it, how self-limiting my mental dialogue is and how ashamed I am of it all. As "Bohemian Rhapsody" sings, when I look at myself, I see a silhouette of a man. A shadow. There is a light behind me of course, which is why I can see through the darkness to make out an outline. And self-consciousness begins, and self-discovery continues as the silhouette disappears to reveal the truth. Will I like what I see? Will I be joyful, as I have been promised?

I wish to recapitulate some of the conversations, from memory, focusing on their impact upon my perception.

At the start of the month, university courses were ending. Exams were on the horizon so it was time to prepare for them. I was able to concentrate as much as I needed and I am thankful for that. I was to discover things about myself I never realised. I was to face fears and uncover a silent vulnerability that had been building up in me like a balloon, empty inside but occupying my space, my consciousness. "A Course In Miracles" had informed me of the truth that I would need to come face to face with my past, to let it go. I had not expected the difficulty this would bring. I had been much more attached to my fears and grievances than I had realised. I was in search of peace, as we all are on any level. And to find peace, I must accept the moment. I seemed unable to do that. I was lost in my own thoughts, and as I shone the light of consciousness upon my 'problems' so had they intensified and curled within my person, as if in fear. The emotions of course came along with that and turned the whole ordeal into difficulty. Nonetheless, I went on in my quest.

I had begun talking to a friend, a good friend to whom I had not talked much before, about my plight. He decided to make the connection with another friend to whom I wasn't very close yet, and we began a three-way conversation that would last hours a few times a week. It is here that I opened up my wound. I had begun taking off my plaster, and the metaphorical blood started siphoning out. It was difficult to express myself how I had. I told them about a couple of moments in childhood from which I retained my emotional scars. Moments that I hadn't let go of. Baggage. Pain. But finally I was placing them in the light to be cleansed.

On the 8th, I had what I might call the most emotional conversation I had ever had. That night I had two conversations, one with the twosome mentioned above, and one with a dear friend who I was trying to understand, and in doing so trying to understand myself as well. What began as a simple conversation about how he was doing, turned into emotional release, of pain that I held with me. I don't know how he took it, but my despair blew out its dam and out flowed out my hurt. I felt myself vibrate within at how ashamed I was of what I was expressing and I was very conscious of how it might make him feel to know how I felt, about him but more so about me. I wondered about it for days afterwards, if it was really the right choice to share things with them. They are there for me, and I love that. I appreciate it deeply. Gradually I shed my skin and tried to understand what was hurting me so much.

I went from being "easy", two of the three calling me that although I not really understanding why, to a point where I felt "overemotional". If one were to judge by the content of this blog, one may discern that I am quite sensitive. I have been empathetic in the past so that may have evolved with it. I discovered that I had problems of my own, that I had believed in sacrifice of me for the other. I had not really known happiness for what it was but instead as a dependency on other things, things that 'brought' happiness. That's difficult to understand, I imagine. I realised my focus had become split among what my mind wanted to what God wanted to what I wanted to what others 'may' have wanted... Only one of those is true... God, what the hell have I been through?

Courage. Doubt. The first one is what I want and what is growing in me. The second is what I do not want and is decreasing. Through my conversations with the three, they correctly picked out how much I doubt myself. How much I limit what I do by how I feel. I have this filter that I send everything through and it comes out très sanitised and devoid. Empty, and I didn't like that. No one could, it's not who I am. How could I have been making this excuse? Because it was easier to than to be brave, to not let all my childish fears barrage the fun and joy of life. I am so glad they talked to me. I am glad I am learning to become more courageous, to choose love over fear.

Moreover, the conversations continued as June went on. I found myself consciously internalising my reactions and they would render me 'damaged' for hours at a time. I had been uplifted on a few days by my friends, but mostly I left myself in my own corner of the world to suffer because I felt I deserved that for lying to myself, for denying my past, for not allowing me to move on. I realised I wasn't on top of the world and that I never really wanted to be. All I want is love. Love. And all I can really have is love. I do not yet believe this, though I wish I did. It would solve all my problems. But I had also learned that my problems had already been solved ("A Course In Miracles"). I had stopped trusting it at one point but I returned my faith once I realised I was not putting my faith in it before but in my own perceived weaknesses. God, I confused myself, tied myself in knots then undoing them trying to sort out my life, my problems, how I was going to come through. I know I will, I have faith in that. I have undying faith. And faith has me.

I held myself as a person who knew who they were, but while I knew deep down, I kept forgetting. But the time to be authentic and remember is now. Now I am. I wanted to be the best, the hero, the one that receives the attention, the one that is loved, the one that has all the answers. None of those came true. I know that none of those is real. Love is reciprocal. So, its light guides to where I must go, where we must all go eventually. Home. I don't want to spend any more time in hell. I was as lost as everyone else was. Finally, love is coming and washing away my hurt and the sun within is rising. God... I may look like a silhouette now, but I am whole, and as the light grows so shall the truth become more apparent. I hope all my secrets will be exposed, not that there's many of them, but that the few that remain will be known to me and if it be willed, to others. But I want honesty to be my breathing and I want life to live in reality not in an excuse for it. I deserve the best, the only, the all there is. It is not too much to ask, because I already have it. And it's bizarre to say that because I don't understand how I can have something, but I only have it because I am it. Nothing else belongs to me but what I already have. Paradox, whatever.

Love is here.

Unmasked: My Three Faces

I play a social game. When I do, I am lying. I just became conscious of how much I do it. I'm not alone in doing it, but others doing it is totally missing the point here. In this play that stands for life, I act as a victim, as a rescuer, as well as a prosecutor. These are the three main faces of my ego. I am slightly ashamed to admit that, but I can only see that becoming aware of how I act will help me become a better person, the best me.

# Victim
"I want love. I need love. Please give it to me. I need help. I am lonely. I am sad. I am hurting. I am in pain. Please help my lonely soul. Please give me what I ask for. I don't deserve happiness. I am useless. The world is better off without me. Give me attention. Feed me. I need your sympathy. Pity me. I can't do this, do it for me. No one likes me. It's all my fault. I am an idiot. I don't see how the people around me can take my crap. I should rot. I should die."
When I wear this mask, I am the victim of the world. I act, and I feel, that the world is against me, that I am lonely and that nobody loves me. It is an unconscious way of asking for love because it acts from a place of lack. Whenever I am the victim, the role I play is one where I project an image of disappointment to those around me so that they can comfort me and desecrate that image. I desire to be loved, yet I must hurt myself, diminish who I am, to get that love? I must tear myself down before I can be built back up. The essence of the victim is the imagining and projection of a need or a lack towards someone else who can save me.

# Rescuer
"I'll help you. Call me anytime you need. I am here for you always, until the end of time. You can count on me. Anytime. You're welcome. I will always love you. You always have my back. I am here for you no matter what. I will save you! I want to be the hero. Don't kid like that, I didn't save your life. Your life is worth more than mine. I will die for you!"
This should not be confused with the true feeling of wanting to help someone. But that true feeling comes from the healing recognition that the perception of the victim is incorrect, because in truth they are not broken. So rescue in that sense is the correction of perception, the reawakening of awareness of light. That, I gladly do and will continue to do, for it is natural.
This mask is due to me wanting to help others because I can't seem to help myself with my own internal problems. It is defined, in essence, by sacrifice, which my ego feels is righteous and pure. This is a misperception. As a rescuer, I look for the pain in people, for the hurt in their own lives at my personal expense. I want to help them only because after helping them, they will somehow validate my own existence. The mask comes with glasses because they make people appear broken, needing to be fixed. In this state, I refuse to perceive my own lack and attempt to bring out others' lack so that I can fill it. But in my lack, I cannot fill nothingness with nothingness.

# Prosecutor
"Fuck you. Loser. Idiot. Bastard. You suck. You are horrendous. You don't know anything. There's smarter people out there. Dumb shit. I would be better off without you. I don't want to listen to you complaining. I don't want to know what you want to tell me. Why are you talking to me? You are annoying me! Go die!"
This mask normally comes with the emotion of anger or negativity. I feel I have been attacked, so I attack whoever back. I wear this mask lightly, because I don't pick fights with people, certainly not directly. But it is also characterised by envy and other forms of jealousy. This mask comes with an imaginary gavel, too. It reignites drama. It is used to increase my sense of superiority or make me feel less inferior. In essence, once more, it comes out of lack. A fear response is triggered so I feel the need to defend myself. The best defense is a good offence? That's probably the principle at work. I have to be the best, and to feel that way, I have to diminish the rest around me. Yet I meet resistance, unsurprisingly.

As one may have realised, none of these faces satisfy or fill the gaps they imagine. The ego never does, never will. Switching between my masks gives the illusion of progression, but it is only until I have taken them off now that I can truly see.

I am so glad, thankful and blessed that the people around me do not always play these games with me. It sort of infuriates me that I do play them, but there is only room here for forgiveness. If I stay angry, I am prosecuting myself, which turns then into a victim mindset, and later maybe into a rescuer. There is no way to stop acting unless I take off the masks. And I know I only did it because I thought it was necessary to my happiness, but I thought wrong. I think right, now. I only have one face.

I may have hurt you in the past, I am sorry. I was not myself. Realisation has come, so as I get off running life on auto-pilot, please know that I am awakening. I am going to find the light in me, and I am going to see the light in you, both of which will increase the light in both of us.

Readjusting The Focus

Today I realised I didn't really know how people and life worked. I thought I did, with my expertise and experiences under my belt. But I don't actually. I have made the present into a very complex image based on the past and it didn't turn out as simple and easy to interpret as I thought it would be. So I got some advice from some good friends, about living life and breathing. They told me to take it easy, to chill out, to not think everything means something. We give meaning to things, I should know that, and now I recognise it because I see that this is what I have been doing. I am the one that places value on Facebook, on clothing, on imagery, on things said and unsaid. I am the one that allows doubts to be placed in my mind about the most trivial of things. I decide what's in and what's not. The basis that I have been making these sorts of decisions on is experience. Things I learned in high school don't apply as rigidly to life in general. For example, friendship in high school taught me that friends were around all the time and the ones that you stuck with in the cluster/clique were the ones you would leave with and that would be happiness. The world is not high school. There is a much much wider variety of forms and people out here, and that certainly adds a touch of flavour to this great moment we call life. I have learned that I have put my faith in the images I have of people instead of the people themselves. Mistake made, lesson learned. People are more than just what you see, and the surface isn't just a cloud of irrelevance. Faces, particularly eyes, lips, cheeks and teeth, are used to make connections. I've gone for the quick version of getting to know some people, straight to where I thought was the heart but was instead just a piece of paper with a heart drawn on it. People have to let you in. And I admit, there is a sense of urgency that makes my own search for people seem desperate. I recognise that and am willing to change my gears and my approach.

In the back of my mind, there used to be a voice that was saying how I was manipulating everyone, that I was a controlling bitch, because I was able to make friends by building them up instead of breaking them down. That voice never got loud until this year when making friends suddenly became obligatory and more unconsciously feared and now I thought there had to be a process involved. That was a mistake, listening to the voice. Manipulation comes from a lack of security, a fear that people acting autonomously would mean my demise. Now I know that not to be true - manipulation causes people to stop understanding you and forces them to interact with a projected image of yourself, of someone better, of someone you think they need. And this is how it complicates things, because then the friends you are trying to make no longer comprehend how your world functions. Mine didn't. I was torn between manipulation/seeking attention and authenticity, an imbalance which is poisonous to relationships because it injects confusion and blurriness, and what we see then is not what we get and the complexity suddenly becomes very foreign.

Life is simple. I see now that I looked at people and discerned what their problems are and somehow made that part of who they were in my mind, thereby somehow giving me a way into their hearts if I could repair the damage. But this is a misperception. If you only see the problems in people, you stop seeing people and see problems instead. And how can you befriend problems? People carry problems with them, but as a person who understands that they carry them, I realise that what they carry is simply their past, which is no longer here, so they are in reality carrying nothing.

The aforementioned friends made me realise this because they were looking at me as a person, as a friend, not as somebody with a perception problem. And I awoke. I was making them into what they were not. The removal of my filter made me see that I had made a big error. I was seeing broken people, but people are not broken.

So I thank you for the lesson :)

I think the following reiterates it well. It came to me in the library while I was taking a break from studying for exams.

"I want you to know that in each of us there is a light, a light so bright that it penetrates through our grievances, our guilt and our mistakes. It radiates from within our soul, so this light keeps us always warm, always at home in its peace. And whenever we are lost, it is only because we stop seeing it when we close our eyes. But it never ceases to shine, and neither do we, for we are that light."