I have been a marathon e-mailer lately, and it has been FANTASTIC catching up with some of you great Liz groupies out there, and others as well. As you may know, when I am marathon e-mailing, I am generally very, very happy… I’m either writing because I’m happy, or become happy because I’m writing, or both, and generally deciphering the causal arrow becomes a snowballing chicken-or-egg exercise in futility.
Lots has been happening, of course, to inspire the deluge of e-mail flowing out of my (several) inboxes… and a decent chunk of the “lots” that’s been happening has been of a less-than-ideal nature. I have deliberately shielded the general public (via this blog) from the inanities of the “lots” because of aforementioned desires to keep what’s private private. However, I’m now going to break that pattern a bit, mostly because I just came home having spent an evening engrossed in conversation with one of my Vandy classmates, and talking with her has really inspired me to open up here in a way I haven’t been willing or able to do so before. Apologies to anyone whose feelings get hurt here — it is by no means intentional. Really, this is just about me. Not anyone else. Seriously.
I realized tonight that I really don’t recognize who I’ve been the last many months (years?). Someone recently observed that I “don’t even sound like the same person” this week, and I think that observation is dead on … somewhere in the shuffle, I lost myself, and this really unfortunate, bizarre, shadow version of my fullest self took up residence in my stead. I still don’t quite understand how or why it happened, but the reawakening of my inner self the last few weeks has really sharply highlighted how foggy I’ve been and felt lately.
In making this observation, I am not laying blame or pointing fingers … as I said, I really don’t understand how the Liz I worked so hard to become just sorta, you know, checked out. What the hell?!?! Yet, the conclusion that I did just that is inescapable.
What’s more, something that I’ve been thinking a lot about lately is whether I have ever been able to maintain my strong sense of self while simultaneously pursuing a (romantic) relationship with someone. It is — for better or worse — simply my nature to subjugate my own dreams and independence when I’m with someone; I am by nature a “giver,” and take a great deal (great deal) of satisfaction and comfort in knowing that what I’m giving is appreciated and, yes, even needed. Yet in the process of seeking that satisfaction and comfort, it seems what I want inevitably gets shoved aside … by which I mean that *I* shove it aside, and even consciously so.
This is an uncomfortable thing to realize about one’s self. Is my strong instict to “give” always going to result in a subjugation of what I want? Is it possible that I can have two objects of affection — someone else and myself? It’s a very big question, and one generating quite a bit of subconscious whirring as I try to work it out in that part of my brain that works stuff out without my knowledge. (I just hope that subconscious committee generates a killer report when they figure it out!)
While I’m fully in soul-baring mode here (which, you may note, pretty much never happens), there’s another big life question I’ve been mulling over lately… this one even thornier. It began with what I believe was a rhetorical question lobbed my way by Ma Norell when I was there for Thanksgiving and has stayed with me ever since. Her original question isn’t as important as where that subconscious whirring has taken the subject since… and to (try to) cut right to the core, it has to do with figuring out what unfortunate pathology of mine has consistently landed me in this general situation time and time again in my adult life. Put another way, what is it about the way I relate to others (men, I mean) that has led to a string of long-term, serious, but never-quite-right relationships? As I have been doing some tough thinking in the vein of relationship autopsies (going back a decade, maybe longer), it occurs to me that I have consistently pursued relationships with people who have appealed to very specific bits of my vision of an “ideal” relationship … but, as best I can tell in this post-hoc manner, I haven’t ever pursued a relationship with someone who matched that ideal. I suppose it’s possible, despite voluminous evidence to the contrary, that I have not been the romantic idealist I always thought I was vis-a-vis relationships. But what I feel is the more realistic explanation is that I have never thought I was *worthy* of the kind of person I would describe as my “ideal” (and I am not talking fairy-tale perfection here — just the sort of person who appeals to [a lot of] my many bizarre attractions). A lot of that not feeling worthy is tied up in what has been my lifelong battle with self-image, but it’s also just generally feeling like the kind of person I’ve always wanted to be with couldn’t possibly be interested in me. So why try?
I can trace this mindset through SO MUCH of my life, it’s frightening. It reminds me of one of the most difficult experiences of my life, when my best friend decided he wanted to run for president of this little club we were both involved in during high school … I was horrified, because I had been being groomed to be president. But, rather than fight him for it (or even just ask him not to run), I assumed that he would win (because in high school, I had severe self-confidence issues, not to mention painful shyness), so I didn’t even bother running. I was too afraid I’d lose. Instead, I settled for a very lowly office and won in an uncontested race. I think it says something powerful that the story still has significant meaning to me now, some 14 years later.
So anyway, rather than allow myself to be vulnerable to the sort of person who could potentially hurt me VERY deeply, I am coming to believe that I’ve sought relationships that fall short of that possibility… that I have guarded myself far more than I would have ever admitted. (This realization bugs me, since I am so damn near obsessed with understanding myself and my behaviors … and it turns out, I now believe, I have been a masterful self-deceiver. Dammit, self!) In protecting myself, I have avoided getting hurt deeply, but I have also starved my soul… and geez, what a horrifying realization this has been for me! (Incidentally, this week, I’ve been rereading some of Thomas Moore’s book Soul Mates in stolen moments — great stuff.)
As I mentioned, I have always been sort of obsessively focused inward, trying to understand the things I do and why I do them, and so it follows fairly naturally that during this time of great change and emotion, I’d be quite introspective. I consider myself extremely lucky to have found a counselor at the Vandy counseling center who has, in two 45-minute sessions, really helped me to focus on these critical questions. They are very much on my mind, and if I can manage to finish my two remaining final papers by Tuesday at 4:30 (a very daunting prospect considering I haven’t started writing either, eeeps!!!!!!), I am looking forward to spending a good deal of time over the holiday break sitting quietly and thinking, writing, reading, talking to myself, etc. … all in pursuit of some difficult but necessary answers.
I haven’t shared these thoughts with anyone till now, and this really is a pretty huge baring of the soul for me in such a public forum. But, I believe that what I’m saying may resonate with others, and that it may help some of you who do know me well understand where I’m at emotionally right now. I am trying to make this unfortunate series of events come to have greater meaning for me, which is really the ONLY way I know to deal with unfortunate events (ever the optimist, I am unfailingly determined to find the good in everything). I enjoy focusing myself inward, and right now, I really just wish I could turn that focus outward for a BIT longer so I could get some damned work done! haha
But, the work will come. It always does.
How? In the words of Henslowe, “I don’t know. It’s a mystery!”
