rollercoaster

it's been a rollercoaster ride for the past few weeks. thanks everyone for supporting--sara, you're right, i DO remember you writing those things in!!! and bipolarprincess, if you'd like to link you are welcome to. i'm not bipolar; my significant other is. this blog has become about trying to understand and deal, but it's also about other crap in my life.

today, it's going to be this email that i wrote a while ago. as anyone who reads knows, there have been a great deal of goings-on in the past months, all of which are extremely emotional. i've had an outpouring of support in many forms, but my friend nathan lent me a book that pointed me to another book...and pointed me toward a different way of thinking. the original book is delivered from distraction, which i think i praised a few posts back. but that book suggested a book by a very early philosopher, epictetus, called "the art of living." it's not actually written by him, mainly because he didn't write anything down; all his students did the lecture transcribing. and the book is very good. its main theme is controlling what you can control and relinquishing the notion that you have control over things you cannot control. it's something that i have to remind myself about every day, every hour, sometimes skipping the minutes... (; but i emailed dan the other day, and was quite zen about the whole issue, and it does deal with the control issue. so here it is, my very own zen baby. (;

***

did someone hurt me? yes. did i forgive them? yes. am i working onforgiving myself? kind of. (;

how much do i value their friendship? greatly. am i willing to overlook mistakes and hurts, that i have forgiven, in order to be friends again? yes. am i willing to understand that there are some things i will never understand, because the person involved will never be able to explain toMY satisfaction exactly what i need to understand? i'm working on it.

i feel like some things are going to remain mysteries for me. i can try tocomprehend, but that does not mean that i ever will. the main thing, in the end for me, is how much i value that person. NO ONE has hurt me so badly i cannot recover. NO ONE has hurt me so badly i cannot forgive. yeah, i feel like half my body is missing, and that my brain's been scrambled in an egyptian pre-embalming ritual, but i am trying hard not to worry about the end result--that i don't know when she'll email me back, that i don't know when you'll forgive yourself, that i have no idea ofwhat i'm doing...i feel like (and this is my pre-lunch zen moment setting in) anyway i feel like we're all a bunch of birds, and exxon has spilled.

i think thatMUCH MORE than just your admissions have been released here--there's a lot of things that needed to be opened up and looked at. our relationship,yours with her, mine with her. it's opened up a can of worms too with all of our friends--made them look at themselves and THEIR relationships. the tidal wave that poured out of you has created new ground for everyone to stand on; it's created a new playing field. yeah, it doesn't seem fair,and it sure hurts sometimes right now, but i think that in the end, it's a playing field that will be a BETTER place--again with the patience to get to USE it!

***

so there you have it, my philosophy. colored by my life the way that epictetus' philosophy was colored by his.

and it's time to get ready for work.

cheers all--ombren (: