ME

I am ME….just the way I am. All of it: the good, bad and ugly. Seems like I’m stating the obvious, right? But at some point, I actually need to embrace this idea. Although I am constantly evolving and growing, from time to time, I need to remind myself that self-acceptance is a vital companion in my pursuit of happiness. I fantasize today about what life would be like if I had freedom of self-loathing or self-imposed punishment. Perhaps even freedom from the habitual need to apologize for who I am, as if being ME might somehow inconvenience you. I vacillate between setting boundaries, being assertive in getting my needs met, and being sensitive to others perspectives. For most of my life, it has been such a struggle to balance on this extremely tight rope.

I was raised to be accommodating. Manners were of upmost value to the point of always putting your needs behind the benefit of the group. In order to get my needs met, I felt I had to rebel and fight to retain some control which of course, always created more resistance around me. Somehow the message I got was in order to have acceptance and love, I would need to comply. So I tried and when I couldn’t anymore, I rebelled leaving a wake of destruction. And so this exhausting cycle continued.

Lately, I have experienced an opening of Johari’s window and gained a bit of opportunity to see myself as others do. With this awareness came great realizations about how there is actually ways to get my needs met without being a bully. I think I was caught in this cycle for many years, I wasn’t even sure what I needed or who I actually was. In the past, I would inadvertently make the other party feel guilty or wrong so I would I somehow deep down be able to justify deserving what I was asking for. I had all kinds of tricks all based on the fact that perhaps I didn’t deserve it …just because I was ME and I was worthy. And since I’ve always said having DMD in your life is like throwing miracle-grow on your already existing character defects, I can admit adding the guilt I carry for DMD, propelled this issue to a new level. Looking back, I see I have been on a mission for a long time to justify my existence. I also see how many of my actions and decisions have been indeed driven by this force.

So, I’m finally starting to understand there is no shame in asking for what I need. I can just be me and stop apologizing for it. I can make peace with people in my life without overcompensating to the point of feeling the part of the occasional doormat. Now, I understand wellness lies somewhere in between. I can simply say no to things I don’t want to do, or ask for what I need without causing a tsunami to do it. I can simply, inexplicably be me, without qualifying my every wish. And I can do this with no guilt because being ME does, in fact, include looking out for others, being sensitive and giving myself freely.

When I am connected to who I really am and what I need, I can give freely without losing anything or compromising my own integrity. There is a way to do both. I JUST never knew.

Things I’ve learned lately…

• I know much less than I thought I did

• I can handle a lot more than I think I can

• The more I act like a martyr or victim, the more my son feels like he’s a burden

• I need to teach my community how to support me and my family. They want to, they just don’t know how

• I can’t do it alone and I cheat my boys and friends when I try

• Fair doesn’t mean everyone should get the same, it means everyone deserves to get what they need. Everyone doesn’t need the same thing

• Life can change in just minutes with new information

• The more I beat myself up, the worse I perform

• I don’t have to do more than my best

• What I focus on expands- good or bad

• When I play to my strengths, I am more successful

• Everyone has a story

• We ALL have special needs

• “Fake it till you make it” actually works

• It could always be better, but it could always be worse

• The more I need it to go my way, the less it does

• I’ve spent a lot of time worrying about things I now can’t even recall

• Authentically connecting with others means so much more than accomplishments

• Sometimes when I thought things were ending, they weren’t. They were only changing

True Love?

I remember pleading with God once asking why he couldn’t just send me a man that would love me unconditionally. I remember hearing the answer as clear as day, “I did…. I sent you two”. That’s right he did…my boys. It was then that I started to question what true love really was. Was it just limited to the romantic vision I had conjured up and believed most of my life, or was it way bigger? Was it even possible once we are gown ups to experience unconditional love the way a child does? Isn’t that an example of true love? Maybe we need to be that trusting to see it. I don’t know any of these answers but I do know this: you are either in fear or you are in love but you can’t be in both places at the same time…or should I say, I can’t. And if fear is permeating your life, it’s hard to imagine even having a shot at true love….whatever that may be.

I grew up thinking true love should be a combination of perfect intellectual foreplay and rousing companionship. I thought that if this “soul mate” of mine and I were completely in sync, we could virtually breathe one another in. I also somehow arrived at the notion that true love meant my beautiful one was supposed to love me unconditionally for who I was ….all of me. However, I never once acknowledged that I would be doing the same for them. In fact, looking back, I had very rigid views of the box they needed to neatly fit into. And in order to escape my constant disappointment, they needed to adhere to the version of them I had created. And I had no problem listing the criteria for them as if they were filling out a job application. So it’s no surprise that’s how it often ended up feeling, like a job.

These days, after surviving half a lifetime of both excruciatingly painful hanging on to one leg as they leave love, as well as deliciously wonderful I can climb any mountain love, I have safely arrived at a new point in my ability to define. Now, please note, this comes from a single gal. I have yet to learn how to gracefully survive in a committed romantic relationship. And in retrospect, my search for love looked more like a long determined trek, chasing what I believed to be utopia, only to find a mirage disappearing as I arrived. But after being able to surrender my outdated version of romantic love, I believe I am a lot closer to my truth than I used to be.

Today, for me, true love means loving someone for who they are, not for their ability to fill my agenda. It means wishing someone the most happiness they can find, even if that doesn’t incorporate me in the way I had envisioned (or at all for that matter). I believe true love includes listening to the other person with an open heart. Maybe even listening to them from their experience, not my own. Because even when I believe I’m listening, but I’m spending the whole time trying to tie what they are saying to my own experiences, I still do not hear them. I think to really know someone, I must be able to hear them from where they are speaking from without me all tied up in it. I believe only then can I see them for who they really are. And If I try to love them without really seeing or hearing them authentically, then I am only honoring the parts that appeal to me or that I have created. In the past, that’s how I did it. Inevitably, I was always caught off guard when that person turned out to be someone different than I had so beautifully painted them out to be in my mind; which ultimately led to punishing them for letting me down.

They say when a heart breaks; it grows back stronger….and perhaps, if you let it, even bigger. It sure seems to have worked that way for me. My ability to love is constantly evolving. I do seem to be getting better at it. I have come a long ways in understanding expectations and how dangerous they can be. I understand how perception works now and I am flexible in learning from others rather than being stuck in the rigidity of how things “should” look. It used to be about the search to find someone that fit the secret list I had hid under my pillow. Now I understand, most of the people that come into my life are just a reflection of me and where I’m at. So now, my relationships and interactions have become more about the expedition of truth, a discovery of my own light and love, and the attempt to steer clear of fear.

Looking back, I think to date the most selfless and true love I have ever really experienced was when I loved someone enough to let them go. In doing so, I was able to honor what they needed and where they were at. I remind myself today that real love isn’t holding on with an iron grip. I believe when I am stuck in my self –centered thoughts, all I am able to see is what I could or should get from someone else. I know now that is just being in fear. It’s a way of grappling to hold on to what I believe to have been robbed of throughout my life. Because I carried a backpack of pain for so long, I unconsciously approached love from a place of entitlement, always searching for compensation.

But perhaps I had it backwards for so long. Maybe when you challenge yourself to step off that edge, stop coveting love, and find it in yourself to give it all away, that’s when there’s change. It’s changing for me, right before my eyes with each time I am able to bravely try a new way.

Today, I practice loving people the way they need to be loved, not the way I need to love them. I try to love them for exactly who they are, not who I prefer them to be. And as I feel myself open up and freely give, I watch it all flood right back as if there’s no end to the source. And somehow in that, I am experiencing more of what I believe to be, true love…. every day.