Re-Learning...

It's been quite a while since my last post, and in some ways things in my life have changed tremendously and in some ways not at all. I have to laugh at myself because I need to learn again what the 'me' writing the post about control a year ago was saying. That's one of the funny (and sometimes frustrating!) things about life - I feel like I am having to learn the same things over and over again, because I never quite get it the first (or second or third... :) time. 

What I'm contemplating these days is again, how I try to control things. I thought I'd given up trying to control circumstances, I thought I'd given up trying to control people, but what I was left with was still this intense desire to be able to control myself. Maybe that sounds funny, but I really want to be able to understand and control my emotions, my moods, how I react to things - and it's harder than you would think! Especially when I find myself in a chaotic state, my mind goes into overdrive and I launch into trying to figure out what's wrong so that I can fix it - so that I can be ok. 

But analyzing doesn't really help - it only gets me worked up more, making the chaos bigger and me feeling trapped in it. And withdrawing doesn't help either - my walls come up to "protect" me from others seeing my chaos, which I can't explain or fix, but those walls trap me as well. As counterintuitive as it is for me, though, that's when I need to break down my walls the most - that's when I need to let people see me in all my mess and allow them to speak into it and be present to it with me. It's vulnerable and scary but also healing...just as letting go of control is terrifying but also freeing. 

The song in my head lately reflects where I am on this journey... 

"Dark Side" by Kelly Clarkson 


There's a place that i knowit's not pretty there and few have ever goneif i show it to you nowwill it make you run away
or will you stayeven if it hurtseven if i try to push you outwill you return?and remind me who i really amplease remind me who i really am
everybody's got a dark sidedo you love me?can you love mine?nobody's a picture perfectbut we're worth ityou know that we're worth itwill you love me?even with my dark side?
like a diamondfrom black dustit's hard to knowwhat can becomeIf you give upso don't give up on meplease remind me who i really am
everybody's got a dark sidedo you love me?can you love mine?nobody's a picture perfectbut we're worth ityou know that we're worth itwill you love me?even with my dark side?