.SOMETIMES RAW.

While my son and I had breakfast yesterday he asked me if I can explain what a calendar is. This made me think again how fast time flies; we are days into the new year and 2017 seems to be so far behind already. I let the last day of the year pass without putting much energy into thinking and reminiscing about what happened especially in the last couple of months and other stuff that 2017 held for me since I was occupied otherwise. 2017 will always be the year when major things in my life ended and new adventures began.  

In some way, I am feeling excited about a fresh start even though I, of course, cannot predict what 2018 will hold. Nonetheless, it is a new beginning and I am more than ready to leave all the sadness behind and of course, continue to move forward. I made some huge steps and decisions and I mentally grew which shaped me into the person I am today. I decided that it is important to focus on my health now and to slow down. Why those decisions? The only answer I can come up with is that I genuinely needed to. It couldn’t go on like this anymore. 

The goal is to be more intentional about certain things in my life and areas that need the most attention. I had to learn that random things can’t trigger bad memories or sadness anymore. At least not to that extent where they slow down my life. I had to realize that this particular pain can only exist when I hang around in the past for too long so I switch to the present. This past that does not exist anymore. Time heals all wounds but unfortunately not on my schedule. I cannot speed things up because it may do the opposite. I know that by focusing on the relationship I have with myself I will improve. This way, the situation I am in gets so much better to deal with and I am able to figure out the root of my emotions. Nobody knows better what’s good for me but myself.  So all I can do now is respect time. 

I am trying to analyze my emotions. Emotions are a crazy phenomenon, especially when it comes to love. I listened to this and that interesting TED talk recently that discussed the concept of love. Helen Fisher analyzed love as being an apparatus of nature used to ensure we simply coexist long enough to reproduce making sure the continuity of our species continues and nothing else. I try to understand why I felt and had certain emotions and feelings for one person in the first place. I reckon that relationships are not successful based on common interests but rather on common priorities. And when priorities differ too much, it does not work. 

These days I am realizing that all those “scratches and bruises” of failed relationships add character. They give my heart a better feel and look. It is a tough time, yet I will come out as a better person. Nature tends to work out this balance that things work themselves out in a certain way but healing will eventually come nonetheless. I have all the tools to survive this and my broken heart heals. What happened does not determine my happiness; however, the reality is how I deal with those things that occurred. 

By letting yesterday go I realize that some of this pain actually makes a tiny bit of sense yet some other things that happened never will. I do not have this need to make sense of them anymore because it robs me of the ability to enjoy my NOW moments. I simply leave the past where it belongs and let some of the lessons find me slowly like creeping up from underneath my bed. I realized that suffering and going through all this improved my situation and me as a person.  Sometimes new things and situations might be frightening and uncomfortable initially but that’s in some way a recipe for growth as well. I also have to keep in mind that fewer expectations mean fewer disappointments. If certain people still tend to let me down or stop providing and the behavior keeps repeating into a pattern, it is on me to pay more attention and make it stop. In a certain way, blame and power go hand in hand and giving it away may not be the best choice, eh!? Whenever a person let me down, I take the time to figure out if I want to allow that to happen again since the past is just the past. All I am doing now is improving the present choices to hopefully have a better future. Thankfully, I know that my heart is very resilient. I now specifically pay attention to actions over words since they are shockingly revealing in my case. 

Every moment I receive is mine and mine alone. I can choose to waste it in the past or worry about the future or I can simply just be in the present. If people don’t appreciate the way I am or do not want to be with me anymore since they chose to be with someone else, then they simply need to move on without me. The company I keep is also my choice.

I learned that even when things are going well, I have to be prepared for the most horrible scenarios because it will make it less insane when it happens. I don’t have to trust a world or person I cannot control. I am staying focused on my journey one step at a time. There is just so much to experience and learn along the way. Afterall, it is okay to discover, get embarrassed, make mistakes and to be uncomfortable with new things. This life is so short anyway and I have to add now that I did explain to my son what a calendar, days, months and a week is after all those thoughts. 

I just submitted my final course paper for graduation and the research I worked on all summer and fall. I cannot believe I finished both. It feels awesome and I will never forget what I have been through while trying to focus and write. It was the toughest time in my life, yet I continued with incredible strength. I had help from very close friends who listened patiently to every word I said because they care. They love to spent time with me and help. This is when I started to realize things about my life as this year comes to an end.

Many things came to an end in the last couple of weeks while other fantastic things happened. Some people in my life chose to walk on different paths from now on. Others even do this with another person and became less trusting while I am fortunate to build trust with the ones that actually really matter. 

One of the most important questions I asked myself at this point in my life is, “Why?” Why did certain things happen in my life that threw me around and kept me breath- and speechless, sad, disappointed, angry and in intense pain. I had been thrown out of a situation I valued and been kicked into a new world that felt cold and unknown. I felt worthless, scared, sad and cold. Everything I thought I knew, that was familiar to me or I believed I understood disappeared quickly into nothingness.

What I realized is that the heart doesn’t break the same way when something more intense comes along the way. It is this injury on the inside that lingers around like a bad cough and I mostly have to rely on the mercy of time to heal – time that usually does not work on my schedule. This helpless feeling and sickening pain as if I would be drowning thankfully eventually stopped. 

Certain things kept me occupied that I almost lost track of my research and work for a bit. Then friends pushed me out of this dark place of thought and misery. I just felt vulnerable and tons of hurt and in pain. A valuable realization dawned on me as I paused and took a long deep breath. A clear realization that things need to change since I do not want this to go on like it did for the last several months or years. I question this path I followed for several years now because of a situation that caused shock in my life by shaking me awake the hard way.

This situation made me pause, reflect and ask “salient” (cool word mostly used in academia instead of important to sound smart) questions. And yes, I spent countless sleepless hours in bed staring at the ceiling. Nights are tough these days but I am not afraid of them anymore. I appreciate my thoughts, observe them and understand. Thoughts come and go like clouds but I don’t let them affect my health. My health is what is most important to me these days. “Don’t break, get back up!”

These moments of sadness led me to a new path that is a lot better aligned with the goals I, me, this person typing this, wants to reach. I asked why too many times and determined that I simply have to recalibrate my actions around the new goal and purpose. Believe me, it was not easy. Of course, there are other important questions that are easily overlooked, yet they are important to ask to eventually reach a moment of revision and clarity. For example, questions like, “Why am I doing X, Y, and Z in the first place?” I asked myself this questions a million times throughout my research, yet I am about to send out the application and proposal for my Ph.D. The journey is valuable, as valuable as the destination, I reckon. This notion influences what I do on a daily basis and it also in some way determines the outcome of it all since I consider who I may involve to come along with me; even if it might be on a spiritual level for now while considering the bigger picture. 

A ton of pressure went off my back since I accomplished what I wanted to do. These days, I love to do absolutely nothing. I love to just sit quietly, with no music or other distractions since I can even do this why my son plays upstairs in his room. I either keep my eyes closed or I stare at the wall for 15 minutes and it feels awesome to just be for a while. 

To just be for a while is a great way for me to stop over- thinking and analyzing things. I crawled out of this dark hole and I see more clearly now while at the same time looking at the situation very critically. I used the last three weeks as a valuable time to outsmart myself and be a better person by controlling things in my life again. Would I have listened to my inner voice, I should have heard the tiny whisper that resisted a long time ago. This tiny whisper that made me see things usually in a negative way and sometimes trust blindly. This tiny whisper is quiet now. I won’t mistake incompatibility for my personal worth since my personal worth is determined only by me. I realize that all I have is NOW. Yesterday does not exist anymore and the future can only be assumed. Change is the only consistency in life, eh!? Everything is just temporary and looking at the grand scheme of things, I realize how little it all matters since choices had been made (not by me) a long time ago. So, I focus on adapting to the new situation. Moving on.

I am healing and turning again to what I love the most. My son, myself, my health and writing. 

I had a pretty productive day today. Finished some important work for my research and course and edited my book manuscript that I will hopefully publish soon. I have been a hermit for the last couple of days/weeks and either hid at home in my office or at the library to get as much work done as possible. Not much human contact at all besides spending time with Petit Joel. When it was about time to pick him up from school today I thought he would be really happy to eat a cake pop so I headed to the nearby coffee shop. The little things. 

While I waited in this humongously long line to place my order I realized the woman in front of me silently crying. She stared at her phone, scrolled nervously through messages, put it in her jacket pocket to just take it out again two seconds later. Out of the blue and catching me completely off-guard, she suddenly turned around and we started talking. She told me her husband fell in love with someone else and she just found out a couple of days ago. “Do you think this can be fixed? Do you think we have a chance? Do you think he will stop seeing her? How can I ever trust him again”, she asked me while I handed her a napkin from the little service counter where you can add milk to your coffee and get a lid for a coffee-to-go. [Yes, the line was THAT long!] I smiled at her. No clue why, but I did. I reckon, no matter how heartbreaking a situation is I figured what could make her feel better. Maybe a stupid joke (I am good at that, too), something kind, true, funny or wise may help her. She continued talking while we slowly made our way to the counter feeling like I traveled back in time. She went from frustration and despair to hate and back to love. “We have two children! How can he cheat on me? Okay, we haven’t had sex or good sex and conversations for a while but why would he do this to me”, she sobbed. Her tones kept shifting from complete hopelessness back to being hopeful. “This line is very long, eh”, I said while handing her more napkins. 

What do I know about relationships, marriages and all that? I am not a genius, I made and make mistakes but it felt I am giving this woman a private therapy session while waiting in line since I gave her this feeling that I understand what she is talking about. It was just fascinating to witness. She told me so many great things, too and it seemed like she figured things out by talking to me. We spoke for about 15 minutes and I want to share some of the lessons that were most memorable to me. She told me that time won’t heal her but actually what is happening throughout this time. She told me how she tries to build trust and affection back up after her husband has been unfaithful by using time and action wisely. She added that she does not want to end her marriage and wants to work on it. “Time will tell, I need time to move forward with him. Time will put everything back in place. I just need to wait”, she said why I silently hoped that this line will move forward. Don’t get me wrong. This conversation was good but I was late to pick up my son and this woman is crying, devastated and this is most certainly not a good, calm place to talk peacefully since it seemed everybody in the café was listening at this point. Besides this, I told her that she has to give the time meaning and a shape to make this work. 

She told me that there is a difference understanding her husband mentally and emotionally. It is important to really listen to the other person and have a decent communication and trying to understand the partner. She said, “sometimes I talk to him and I have this feeling he does not get it, he does not understand what I try to say, he does not connect or cares about it. He hurt me and I try to understand”. I told her that it seems they are stuck in some argument and discuss this over and over. Maybe it is time to change the approach and see things from a different perspective that could inspire new levels of honesty? The woman felt understood while we made our way to order cake pops. She said that the weirdest thing for her is that her husband constantly talks about what happened to him and why he “needed” to cheat on her but leaves out what he did to her. “He never said I am sorry or I feel bad for you”, she said now with an angry tone. “Maybe you just need some type of acknowledgment of your experience from him rather than an apology”, I suggested. Who am I? A marriage counselor or what? 

Studying linguistics, languages, and discourse I learned how powerful words can be. Sometimes by just changing the tone,  language and the way we speak things experiences look different instantly. Sometimes repeating the same thing over and over does not make sense, is hurtful and useless. It is like running around in circles.

While we were about to order our coffees she told me that she just realized something. “I realize that I never listened to my husband anymore. I did not ask what he wanted or even considered his pleasures, fantasies, ideas, thoughts, and desires. He came home every night from work, we ate supper, talked a bit and he was off doing something. He fell asleep on the couch. No conversations anymore; no being truly intimate adding pleasure. When did we stop listening and hearing each other?”, she added. 

We ordered our coffees and pastries, paid and she thanked me for listening. Then she left. Just like that. I realized that this quick conversation just scratched the surface of her story but I could see this woman and maybe see myself in her a bit which sparked more room for thought and conversations I must have with myself and my life.