I happened across this piece of writing i did in 2006. it was a meditation i found very effective, and tried to do whenever i had the energy. it could be a template for anyone, but is written obvsly with my specifics
anyway its kinda goofy but wtv.
FADE IN:
EXT. SHOT – DAY:
A long empty BEACH. Sunny not hot. 50 feet from the surf, tall dry grasses, growing closely in clumps.
A WOMAN sits amid the grasses. 25 feet behind the woman, the manicured lawn begins. a little farther off a house, in the distance a drive. On the lawn the children play, self-contained.
She sits in the tall grasses and watches the water breathe. She’s wearing something grey/black and comfortable. She’s middle aged, 35-45, average completely: shoulder length brown slightly wavy hair, med complexion (ethnicity?), average body type, sort of pretty (plain), brown eyes.
She looks at the water; she’s coping with life, good things, bad things, same as anyone, the details don’t matter. Her eyes open and close slowly, a faint smile and slow, relaxed breathing.
Woman (V.O)
Breathe 1-2. Hold.
Breathe 1-2-3-4-5. Slowly out.
She closes and opens her eyes slowly. Pulls her shoulders up and squints out into the horizon. The sun is about 3:30pm. Skimming clouds. A yellowish white hue to the sky, hints of grey clouds offset the greyness of the sea gently arching its great back. She matches her breath to the rhythm of the lifting and lowering.
Woman (V.O.)
It’s OK to let go. Now is all that matters. Now is all that is real.
There is no past. Memories are a creation of my present mind.
The future is imaginary.
Only now is real.
She turns suddenly to look back toward the house when there is a loud shriek from the children. She seems to want to get up, but hesitates, waits, then settles back into the sand. She takes deep breaths, eventually blinking slowly, focusing on the horizon again. Stops, checks over her shoulder, sighs and then resumes the calm breathing, eyes close.
Woman (V.O.)
Breathe in light. 1-2-3. Breathe out all the cares.
There is no “I”. There is only action. There is only energy.
I am not an employee.
Several types of ringing, the sound of typing, distant voices of men. The woman’s face becomes clearer. She appears to be sleeping. Breathing deeply.
Woman (V.O.)
I am not an employee.
I am a timeless source of energy and love.
Breath 1-2-3.
I am not a friend.
Chattering in the air, laughter, indecipherable voices merge
Woman (V.O.)
I am not a friend. Letting go of all external labels to become one
with my true self. Breathe 1-2-3.
I am not a wife.
A MAN approaches her brusquely from behind, leaning over her, hands on her shoulders, intent.
Man
Honey? Honey. A couple of the guys are coming for dinner when are you coming to bed I thought we talked about this already there’s just no money for that right now I don’t care what your sister said
He straights behind her, her eyes remain closed. He fades. Her face flattens slightly. She takes a deep breath.
Woman (V.O.)
I am not a wife.
I am energy. 1-2-3. in this moment.
I am not a sister.
Three PEOPLE materialize on the sand in front of her. One man bounces a volleyball on his knee and grins at her.
Brother 1
Yeah you know you just got to keep it up that’s just how it is. Did I tell you I’ve been doing yoga it’s like I can’t believe it but every time I do yoga I’m like, “I love yoga!” I’m doing this garden weeds diet. they pick up the minerals from the earth right? and you just gotta let things go, I’m like whatever.
Behind him a woman stands askance with folded arms, a loaded look in her face. She tightens up her mouth and then looks away shaking her head. From the right a different man approaches with a limp. He’s bedraggled and dirty. He leans forward, confidingly
Brother 2
Hey sis can you help me out, help me out man I need 20 bucks, I got to pay a ticket, bill, I need some gas, hey come on I’ll get you back, you got 40?
Her face tightens and body stiffens. She bites her lips and breathes overly deep. Some time passes before her brow relaxes again.
Woman (V.O.)
I am not a sister.
I am energy. I move only in this moment.
The memories of past events are for learning only and never to be held closely or to hurt myself. Guilt is irrelevant. I do the best I can in this moment.
This moment I choose to relax and forget about everything else,
because it does not exist in this moment.
There is only the sea, the sinking sun, the sand, the air
and this energy that is me.
I am not a sister.
I am not a child.
An OLDER WOMAN materializes beside her. She is heavy, with ill applied make-up. She seeks with desperate eyes.
Older Woman
If you don’t call me, no one calls me. Maybe Michael. I’m so tired. I can’t take much more, I don’t know what I’ll do, never have children, I can’t even afford my medicine, I tried to call for someone to come out but he just took the money and ran your dad was horrible he sat on the couch all day watching star trek he never said he loved me not once he packed his bags and left didn’t even want to talk about it never trust a man, I have 50,000 of life insurance for you kids when I die OK sometimes I think about just driving in front of that truck!
She fades and reappears and fades and reappears as dialogue continues, fading in and out. Finally she flickers out quickly with the comment of the truck. Behind her, previously hidden from view, a grave. A BOY squats on top of it, tearing open a fish with his mouth, he looks at her and then up to the sky, to the sound of a jet plane. The woman opens her eyes to look up but the plane is gone, the boy and the grave are gone. The woman hangs her head for a moment and closes her eyes again. Breathes a long, slow breath.
Woman (V.O.)
I am not a child.
I extend from nothing, I go nowhere.
There is only here.
I am not a woman.
Her breasts begin to deflate, and she falls back into the tall grass. She spreads her arms to the sides and her body appears to melt a little. A tear falls, her lips quiver as she breathes deeply several times.
Woman (V.O.)
I am not a woman.
A darkness edges into the sides of the screen, the house falls away behind her, the car on the drive, the drive, the grasses blow as if pressed by a steady wind, the sea begins to rise, encroaching from impossible angles, the sky brightens.
Woman (V.O.)
This is all.
(pause)
I am not a mother.
A wave of pain washes over her face, washes her face away into darkness, a dark cavity grows in the space below her belly button as the crying and laughter of infants intermingles with the energetic voices of children, and she pants now in the growing gale.
Woman (V.O.)
I am not a writer.
The wind dies and there is a great silence as she holds her breath. The sun becomes so bright that there is nothing left but it and the sea which surges beneath her now and lifts her, turning her gaunt body slowly in its salty plume, her arms outstretched, fingers lifting the foamy peaks.
Woman (V.O., whisper)
I am not.
Her body disintegrates into a blue gel that bulges and melds roughly into an undulating ball, giving off sparks of white light. The sea is overtaken by light and there is only light with her blue ball of energy at its center.
CONSIDERATIONS:
USE AS A SKELETON: ADD FLASHBACK SCENES W/EACH LAYER
ALT ENDING: PULL BACK TO WOMAN ON BEACH, STANDS, WALKS BACK TO HOUSE
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so the grinding heartache continues. today on my drive over to the lake where I walk my dogs, i yelled and scream-cried again. i involuntarily yelled something like, “god damn you mother f**ker!” at first i thought i was yelling at him, but it soon became clear that i was talking to myself. “what the eff is wrong with you? whyyyyyyy? why? why? did you stay for so long? whyyy????! when you knew from the first day that he was dark and broken and couldn’t value you? why didn’t you say no when he wanted to come back? because you weren’t sure? because it was hard?! its only gotten harder and worse! every day, every time you got close to ending it. harder and worse! until now! look at this!!! look at yourself!!! and i know you want to think that in time you will find some value in it. that everything happens for a reason. but the only reason is your stupid insecurity and lack of self-esteem! because nothing positive came from the toxic relationships in the past, did it? look at andrew. look at charles. nothing good came from those. there was only wasted time and self- hate. that’s it. and those were only a couple of years!!! this is 10 years! ten years!!!
on and on it went. my poor dogs listening to this. ugh god I felt terrible
so I stop at starbucks to get a decaf mocha, what a joke — what is the point of a decaf mocha but to waste money and calories? it was symbolic. they mistakenly made it with caffiene, so remade, but gave me both and suggested i give the “real” one to a co-worker or friend. it was easier to take it, but i didn’t know what I’d do with it. hopefully not drink it. first, i really don’t want to splurge on junk twice in a day and 2 i don’t drink caffeine now. so when i get to the lake, i see this old guy who’s always there. he’s pretty rough-looking. he always parks his beat up van in the same strip as i do and walks to the picnic area by the playground and feeds the squirrels. he’s bundled up because it’s damn cold out (below freezing), and just so happens to be walking back to his van as i pull up. i decided, fuck it, I’ll give it to this guy. im more of a not-friendly type of person, so this is out of my comfort zone. also, I’ve been sobbing and not about to clean my face up for anyone. but i walk over anyway and offer it to him. he declines, says no he doesn’t drink that sugary shit. hmm ok. i thought maybe he suspected i’d poisoned it, which is exactly what i’d have suspected, but i try to remember that most people aren’t as nuts as i am. tho this guy could be. later on my walk i passed him as he sat on the retaining wall by the lake. i waved. very strange behavior on my part.
obviously I am no longer above acting like a total weirdo in public. i listened to the end of Anne Lamott’s “Hallelujah Anyway” and openly cried as i walked. at one point i bent double and literally almost collapsed onto the freezing path because i was so fraught with the existential angst of her words as she recounts forgiving her father for laughing when a stranger, a fisherman, ridiculed her hair as a child.
Sometimes at the lagoon, the water rushes out with furious velocity, but between high and low tide, it lingers, flat, before flowing out to join the blue-gray ocean. I felt a crabby compassion for my father, isolated in his ego, that jocular kennedy persona, exiled from hs family. and anyway, he was not the person who needed my forgiveness. neither was the other man. the men were portals, practice, training wheels: we are always the ones who need to be absolved, taken back into our hearts. i forgave myself for the fisherman’s words and behavior, for taking on his ugliness and making it something i believed to be true about myself. his words had gotten on me and in me, and then i had hoarded them, building evidence that i was right about being fundamentally wrong. i forgave myself for my father’s contempt and fear of women, gently released him to himself, in the same way you gently lift a hitchhiking monarch off your shoulder in a butterfly pavilion.
I curled up with [my memory of] Mom and Stevie. my mother had beautiful english skin, and long dark hair, but these aren’t who she was, any more than my hair was who i was. we are the final inside nesting doll. a baby feels and smells like god…babies are waves, mosaic chips of the unified field…images of tiny things, babies, yeast, and mustard seeds can guide us; things that grow are what change everything. moments of compassion, giving, grief, and wonder shift our behavior, get inside us and change realms we might not have agreed to have changed.
this addressed my self-hate in the car ride over: I must forgive myself. and the quest for the real self: the final inside nesting doll. and the eventual outcome of all this pain: long needed change in areas i don’t even have to be aware of. it will happen. i just have to keep going.
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after all the quotes last night and nietzsche’s questions, I fell asleep surprisingly easy. i slept over 9 hours. it was beautiful. i had a pretty wild dream too. the first thing i remember is apartment hunting with him. we approached this huge complex that was kind of like a project, but with a Hawaiian style. i was not thrilled. next thing i know we’re inside and it’s furnished and kinda cool with its island vibe, but it’s ridiculous. totally rickety. the floors and walls and ceilings are made of these thin wood beams and covered with a thin canvas. you could see down into the apartment below you, and above. so, like, if i got out of bed, the person below could look right up my nightgown at my butt. i remember thinking that with horror. plus it felt like the whole thing was going to collapse. and it was 7-8 stories. as if that wasn’t bad enough, some old dude lets himself in and stomps thru the bedroom indignantly, heading to the bathroom where apparently he lives? he looks at us and shakes his head, “oh no! no way! i told them no young people!” he says and heads to his corner of the bathroom. i turn to my ex and say, “um wtf this isn’t going to work. this place is like match sticks and that dude? with the kids here? i can’t!” he agrees and says he’s going to talk to the manager and get our money back. he returns and says, “so they said if we stay they’ll give us another better unit”. i decided to view it before saying anything. we walk in and it’s pretty nice. real walls, nice antique furniture. im liking it a lot better, but i want to see the whole place. we walk down a hall and there’s a crack in the wall. well, the wall is like a plaster canvas that isn’t covering the whole space, so you can see thru. about 3-5″ is open. what i see is an enormous warehouse, like super old, 200 years old. really old equipment just packed right up against the plaster canvas wall. weird gears, all rusted. i ask the manager wth. im thinking its crawling with spiders. she says oh yeah we’ll get this fully covered. pretty sketchy. but i am distracted cuz he calls me into the master bedroom. first i see the master bath. it’s pretty fricken nice. huge walk in shower you step down into , all marble, bunch of shower heads everywhere. everything super luxe vintage. wow! i think. then i turn to the master bedroom itself and my mind basically explodes. it’s the most luxurious things ive ever seen. remember back, it doesn’t seem all that great, but in my dream im just agog. it’s really long and just huge with very plush carpet and amazing windows. at the end of the room (im running with my arms outstretched in joy haha for real), there is a massive set of french doors. i bust thru them and find a very steep set of stairs down into a beautiful blue-green lush grass expanse. i cant stop running in ecstasy. just when i think I’ll have to stop, i see that the fence is quite low and i can step over it. i keep going and realize that i am in a communal grassy area for 5 mansions. i look at them and turn back to look at the building from which I’ve come. its huge and brick and the windows are like deep black pits. it’s haunted, i think, but i don’t care. i turn and keep running towards the ocean it seems. i reach the ocean and know that its the atlantic. there is a small bait and tackle houseboat there and i go inside. a handful of yuppy boys are running it. my joy has ebbed and i go to the counter and wait for someone to buy a pack of cigarettes. he opens the pack and the cigarette is shaped like a small crab wrapped in rolling paper. i buy my own pack, but ask for a different one. i feel defensive. i open mine and they’re smaller crab shapes wrapped in paper. i go to the back of the building and find a mattress on the floor with some haphazard bedding. the guy who bought the first pack joins me, altho we dont speak. im fiddling with my weird cigarette and he lights his and passes it to me. he says its weed. basically they just wrapped buds in paper without breaking them up. weird. but i take a few hits and the guy and i start talking. turns out it’s Lip from the show Shameless. after a while i realize uh im really into him rn. i start poking him with my toe. he’s like “what”, and i dont say it but wow im suddenly completely turned on, and he pretty much knows it. then there’s overly romantic cuddling and kissing, which i vividly remember being not great, and then some kind of dry humping that was really, REALLY amazing, and then! i woke up.
typical of me to have a sexy dream, but no sex. 
I know there’s a lot going on in that dream, but im just not even ready to think about it.
today I felt a bit happy, that’s the good news. i lost my temper once and yelled “fuck!” when i lost a stitch for the 4th time on this cowl im trying to knit in time to mail to the UK by christmas. embarrassing cuz my son was there ughhhh sux. i did apologize. not for cussing, but for startling him, poor guy. but other than that it was a pretty damn good day. i walked, i did yoga, i made good food choices, i connected with two friends, i even told an old friend who i love how hurt ive been that she’s ditched me the last 8 months when i really needed her most. she got defensive and nasty, like i knew she would. but i wanted to be honest and vulnerable with her even though i know she hates that. im actually not sure how thats going to work out. it could end the friendship, but if so, guess it’s meant to be. im not wasting my time contorting myself to please selfish, passive aggressive people anymore.
oh another thing is, the kids mentioned casually that he has been texting them, and that he asked them to come visit him this weekend. I wanted to rip the phone out of their hands and read the texts, but i played it a little cooler than that. like, i asked a few more questions than i should have. when they said why don’t you just text him and ask him yourself i dropped it. dang. wish I’d asked nothing. i dont want them to know he and i aren’t talking for december, because they would think it weird. i dont want anything to seem weird or stressful for them, becasue they have so much going on with their senior year and sports and work etc. i dont want to add to it. but basically i discovered that every day he asks them the same questions: how are things at home: lots of cat barf? (not so cleverly disguised attempt to see if im ok, i’d guess), how is school? how is the college thing going? also today he asked if they’d like to come hang at his place. they said no we’re just too busy, which is true.
ive really been thinking a lot about christmas and his visit. its only 6 days into the split and I can’t stop thinking of the best way to handle that. ive gone from one end of the spectrum to the other, but i think i need to let it go for a while. there’s time.
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today I received my books in the mail. the first one i got is called, “who am i without you? 52 ways to rebuild self-esteem after a break up.” by Christina G. Hibbert, PsyD. I was drawn to the self-esteem part, because i have really been slapped in the face by my lack of it lately. interestingly, the first chapter is “you are not alone.” i scoffed at first because that’s ridiculous, but one thing she said struck me:
you’re right: no one can understand exactly how you feel. we each have our unique experience of loss after a breakup. however it’s also true that you may be feeling many of the same things women have been feeling for years…
I would have said “people” instead of “women”, but there is something comforting about the thought. that my betrayal and agony is just the same human emotions that pretty much every single human being, and maybe animals?, has felt since forever. yes…misery really does love company. my specific situation is super complicated and bazaar, but ultimately it’s the same vicious pain. so, it’s the opposite of being alone, really.
The second book I got is Anne Lamott’s “Hallelujah Anyway.” I have this on overdrive too and listened to it today while i walked the dogs, and i actually LOL’d which i very rarely do in response to media. this book also spoke directly to some of the things I’ve been feeling since he left (and before) about the idea of “the real me”. feeling like i’ve never known a real self. if i were to “just be myself”, that would be
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being overly nice
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ridiculously forgiving
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hypertolerant
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eager to make things easy for people, smooth things over
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sacrificing myself for others without a thought
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feeling fulfilled by caregiving
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desperate to make people happy
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desperate to be loved
it actually makes me queasy to write all that out. there are some serious red flags there. how can that be a real self? but that is the default after trying on different personas. these other personas can get really real. ive philosophized the shit out of them, and some have lasted me years. the main one is a cold-hearted, apathetic, mediocre person (champ?). this is where i lived ever since i got booted from home until i had my kids at age 25, except for a brief foray into deep emotionality while dating an artist who i think was my only love-relationship. anyway. the “champ” was super awesome in that i could do anything, go anywhere and nothing hurt me. no one could affect me. i was homeless for several of those years and an addict. i felt completely liberated and at peace. but it was fake right, since i was actually just in a deeply repressed state? idk there’s a part of me that thinks maybe i had things figured out then. but the separation between mind and body at that time was almost complete. and that can’t be good. it wasn’t good.
but look what I read in Lamott’s book today:
mercy is radical kindness. mercy means offering or being offered aid in desperate straits. mercy is not deserved. it involves absolving the unabsolvable, forgiving the unforgivable…the idea of accepting life as it presents itself and doing goodness anyway, the belief that love and caring are marbled even into the worst life has to offer…when we manage a flash of mercy for someone we don’t like, especially a truly awful person, including ourselves, we experience a great spiritual moment, a new point of view that can make us gasp. it gives us the chance to rediscover something both old and original, the sweet child in us who, all evidence to the contrary, was not killed off, but just put in the drawer…kindness toward others and radical kindness to ourselves buys us a shot at a warm and generous heart, which is the greatest prize of all.
all of that seems a little undeniable, and also a little like my puppy dog default self. this can’t be right. isn’t this the christian/slave mentality I have fought to escape?
finally, I read this quote by Nietzsche, translated by Daniel Pellerin:
Any human being who does not wish to be part of the masses need only stop making things easy for himself. Let him follow his conscience, which calls out to him: “Be yourself! All that you are now doing, thinking, desiring, all that is not you.
Every young soul hears this call by day and by night and shudders with excitement at the premonition of that degree of happiness which eternities have prepared for those who will give thought to their true liberation. There is no way to help any soul attain this happiness, however, so long as it remains shackled with the chains of opinion and fear.
no opinion, no fear…so, basically, “don’t know, don’t care”? uh huh. yes. i can get into this. this is like my cold-hearted af self.
but the next part gives a real test of self, that tangible thing ive been wanting:
How can man know himself? It is a dark, mysterious business: if a hare has seven skins, a man may skin himself seventy times seven times without being able to say, “Now that is truly you; that is no longer your outside.” It is also an agonizing, hazardous undertaking thus to dig into oneself, to climb down toughly and directly into the tunnels of one’s being. How easy it is thereby to give oneself such injuries as no doctor can heal. Moreover, why should it even be necessary given that everything bears witness to our being — our friendships and animosities, our glances and handshakes, our memories and all that we forget, our books as well as our pens. For the most important inquiry, however, there is a method. Let the young soul survey its own life with a view of the following question: “What have you truly loved thus far? What has ever uplifted your soul, what has dominated and delighted it at the same time?” Assemble these revered objects in a row before you and perhaps they will reveal a law by their nature and their order: the fundamental law of your very self. Compare these objects, see how they complement, enlarge, outdo, transfigure one another; how they form a ladder on whose steps you have been climbing up to yourself so far; for your true self does not lie buried deep within you, but rather rises immeasurably high above you, or at least above what you commonly take to be your I.
ok. so.
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what have I truly loved thus far?
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what has ever uplifted my soul?
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what has dominated and delighted it at the same time?
an aside: i have to admit, the word dominated is forever sexualized for me now, which sux. and this Nietzsche quote is seeming hella masochistic, but um.
the point is…I have these three questions now! and i have very convincing supporters of both my angel and my devil sides. (disclaimer, i don’t believe in good and evil.) so that is what I’ll be mulling over tonight.
better get my nightgaurd
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Station H 