Elemental Balancing Ritual Connection and Truth Month 5

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2-23-2021 I switched over to the alchemical substances for mercury yesterday, which in relationship to connection and truth is all about communication. In the meditation work I’ve been doing lately, I’ve been focused on recognizing contractions, where a block forms because of one’s internal defenses. I think of it as a form of compartmentalization, because this sense of contraction seems brought on by a need to try and dissociate with an experience. Or maybe that’s just my experience with it.

I’ve also been continuing to read The Body keeps the Score which essentially discusses how the body internalized traumatic experiences. Reading the book has helped me more readily recognize my own trauma from past experiences, but also consider how trauma is created and what role you can play in the trauma another person has experienced because of your actions.

2-25-2021 I’m struggling a bit lately, mainly with the pandemic and the isolation. It’s interesting to realize how much you need contact with other people and how online communication really doesn’t cut it. There’s a certain limitation that comes with text only communication, and yet even if you add video in there’s still a context that’s missing that seems to only occur with physical contact.

2-27-2021 I’ve been reading The Body Keeps the Score. The most recent chapter was on abuse and neglect and I found it to be helpful to understand some things about myself. I have segments of my life I can’t remember and I think perhaps there may be very good reasons for not being able to remember those segments, but it nonetheless exemplifies that more may have happened than I know. It also got me thinking about my inner experience, the misery, unhappiness and loathing I sometimes feel toward myself. I have looked to external solutions sometimes, which have never really worked and it reminds me of how important it is that I don’t impulsively look to external solutions, especially when I can do the necessary work internally to address those feelings. And I also realize that these feelings may stem from the abusive experiences that I went through as a kid and in my early twenties and that is helpful because it gives me a different way to acknowledge those emotions and feelings.

2-28-2021 I find it insightful to recognize how much I have tried to look toward external solutions for much of my life. I’ve done internal work for a good portion of my life. It’s work that has seen a steady evolution and change in who I am, yet it is long term work and I can’t say it’s always automatically made me a better person or more stable. Or perhaps it really is that I have sometimes looked in the wrong places for answers. Yet that’s life. You look for answers, you make mistakes, and you hopefully learn from all of it, with as little of an effect as others on possible. The mistakes are just one part of the journey and they don’t have to be the most important part of the journey, but you do have to learn from them and use them to become a better person, instead of repeating the patterns of your life that don’t work. For me, this means I need to work through the unhappiness and misery I sometimes feel, which is a result of things that happened a long time ago, but don’t need to haunt me any longer.

A realization from reading The Body Keeps the Score. I will often apologize for things I’m not responsible for, and its because of the experiences I’ve had where I blamed myself for the actions and choices other people inflicted on me. By taking the blame on myself for whatever, it also makes feel alone, like no one really can understand my experiences or me, because I’m always the bad person.

3-2-2021 During Shen Gong practice tonight, Bruce made the point that the tension we feel in our bodies can be the result of conflict we feel with ourselves because of the doubt we feel. The doubt causes a person to cling to the tension and let it define them, until you learn to accept the doubt. This reminds me of the Sedona method and the practice of releasing which can only occur when you accept what is being released instead of clinging to it. It was a good reminder for me, especially with the doubts I sometimes feel.

I had another realization as well. I realized that I have been caught up in the very same experience that I observed in someone else and how it has been my choice to stay in that experience. It’s a powerful realization for me.

3-3-2021 Today I allowed myself to feel grief for what might have been. Before when I would feel such emotions I would come up with all these reasons to beat that grief down and because of last night’s meditation I realized that it was keeping me from releasing feelings that need to be accepted in order to be released. Sometimes we are the cause of our own obsessions because of how we don’t allow ourselves to accept what needs to be felt and released.

3-4-2021 I just recognized a pattern in some of my relationships or almost relationships. I have been willing to risk everything, and give up a lot for people who’ve wanted their cake, but have not wanted to risk much, if anything, for me. This has happened a number of times in my life and what it tells me is how much value I have put on other people, while not valuing myself very much and also how I have accepted being valued so little by those same people, and yet nonetheless have balked or come to a realization that what I’m doing is insane, because there is so little that is offered in return for what I’ve been willing to give someone. This isn’t true for every relationship I’ve been in, but it’s a consistent enough pattern that recognizing it is letting me also see how much I’ve devalued myself and let myself be devalued by other people.

3-5-2021 After yesterday’s realization I ended up questioning whether I was being unfair in the assessment I made. Did I expect too much or want too much? Was I wanting something unreasonable? Maybe. I tried to look at the situations from the other perspective and consider the results and consequences if I had followed through on the commitment I had been willing to make. I realized that I wasn’t owed anything and that it was my choice to make, but also that the level of return commitment or lack there of was an indicator in its own right about the value I had and the value my choices had for the other people involved. I never really felt like I was valued or wanted for me. I was valued and wanted for what I might do or how I might help them, and in consequence what I was offered in return for what I was offering was reflective of a sense of we’ll see what happens, as opposed to a commitment. And what I wanted was a commitment, because that was what I was offering by risking so much. All of this also helped me appreciate the people who have made such commitments to me, and also recognize how I’ve taken those commitments for granted sometimes. It’s something I’ll never do again.

I’ve also been reading up on narcissism and the symptoms of it, partially for my own benefit and partially to examine some of the relationships I’ve been in. I’ve come to recognize that I have displayed some selfish behaviors in the past. It makes me feel a sense of regret and shame and sadness for those behaviors and how they’ve shown up and impacted other people. I recognize that my dad was a narcissist and that how I grew up played a role in my own behaviors, but it doesn’t excuse those behaviors. Yet I also have been drawn to relationships with people displaying similar behaviors. I’ve displayed the recognition seeking and the insecurities I’ve felt about my own sense of worth, yet I’ve also been drawn to people who’ve done the same.

I think the last few years in particular have helped me address and recognize my own selfish behaviors. Failing at my businesses ended up being a blessing because it forced me to face my own flaws and failings. Losing a friend because of those flaws and failings forced me to see how I hurt that friend and others with my behaviors. I’ve become vigilant against such behaviors on my own part because I do see how harmful and toxic they can be, and I don’t want any part of that. Part of this work is also figuring out why I’ve been drawn to some people who seem to be narcissists. I can’t say all the people in my life have been narcissists, but a few have displayed behaviors that could fall under the symptoms of narcissism and I’ve been drawn to that as much as I have displayed some of it. And clearly I have work to do around this, because I don’t think some of my past interactions would have happened if I’d been more cognizant of such behaviors and knew what to look for, both within myself and other people.

3-6-2021 I ended up picking up a few books on narcissism to understand it better. I’ve read through one already and part of another and I would say that while I’ve displayed some of the behaviors (The desire for recognition and the grandiose belief in myself at times) I don’t fit all of the behaviors. And recent years have helped with those issues quite a bit. At the same time, reading the books has helped me understand how such people may have shown up in my life. I also think social media has encouraged narcissism, in both overt and covert ways. This deep dive is helping me appreciate the people in my life, in a new light as well, in the sense that I really do know who my friends are, and what the difference is between them and people who’ve just wanted to benefit from what I might do for them.

There is one behavior though that I recognize in myself and I’m not proud of it. Sometimes I’ve let my hunger for recognition get the better of me. I’ve done it because of poor self-esteem and because I wanted recognition for my work and I felt like it was overshadowed. I did this a lot more in the past, and when I realized how problematic my desire for recognition had become, I started making changes. Now I’m much less concerned whether or not my work gets recognition. The right people will find it and it will help them…that’s really all that matters. Letting go of the need to focus on self-esteem and focus instead on values has also helped, but this is a behavior I’m going to continue to carefully monitor in myself, because that’s not how I want to show up and yet sometimes I have shown up that way in the past. I see that behavior for what it is and I’m going to continue addressing it.

3-10-2021 I was reading the Obstacle is the Way and there was this quote from Mike Tyson: "If you're not humble, life will visit humbleness upon you." Absolutely true and it makes me glad that I have had humbleness visited upon me by life. I think I’m far more appreciative of my life as a result. These last few years have been hard years in some ways, but its taught me so much and it is in these times of adversity that you really discover who you can be and you make the choices that define your life.

In the Body Keeps the Score I was reading about traumatic memory. That entire book is really been eye-opening, in terms of understanding the effect of trauma on the body. I find myself reading each chapter and thinking yep this is something I’ve experienced. I wish I hadn’t, but learning more about this stuff and other topics is proving to be helpful, if hard. I found myself depressed today, about a lot of things, but I carried on as best I could.

3-11-2021 When I was young I promised myself I would never rely on anyone. I tried to be as self-sufficient as possible. It was a natural result of the way I was raised. I learned that I could not rely on the people who were supposed to help me. But as a result I pushed other people away in an effort to protect myself, because I had been hurt so much. I have realized that over the years, and I see how all of that has created that core part of myself that has been miserable for so long, lonely, and empty. As I continue doing this work and talking with Kat and others and truly opening up I feel like I am releasing a lot of baggage that has weighed me down. Some of it may always be there to some degree because that’s how trauma works, but how I relate to it is continually changing.

3-12-2021 I’m reading The Covert Passive Aggressive Narcissist. This is the last book I’m going to read on narcissism, but it is proving helpful in looking at the problematic behaviors that narcissists engage in. Reading it is helping me see that while I have been a selfish asshole sometimes, I’m not a narcissist of any type. Yet it’s also helped me contextualize some specific behaviors I have observed in the past. It’s simultaneously been affirming and depressing to read because its helped me stop doubting the experiences I had and my role in them, but it also highlights a need to be vigilant. And even though I can say I’m not a narcissist of any type, I am nonetheless aware of certain behaviors of mine that I am taking responsibility for, because I can always do and be better as a person. It also helps me appreciate how lucky I truly am to be with my wife and how loving and good she is for me.

3-15-2021 One of the realizations I’ve had is around my flip-flopping, which I recognized has been hurtful to people in the past. I’ve made a decision, then reversed that decision, then reversed on that and its enough to make any person’s head spin. It’s a mindfuck and its unfair to anyone who’s experienced it. I’ve never done this out of malice, but because of indecisiveness and fear on my part but its something I need to own and do better with. It’s not something which has happened very often, usually only with huge decisions, but those decisions have usually been made impulsively and it has hurt all involved when I’ve flip flopped. I see this pattern for what it is and I take responsibility for it.

3-17-2021 I read this comment today about a person not having his needs met and as a result when he did magic to get those needs met it radically changed his life. It makes me think of the working I did in June of last year to get me out of the job. I needed to get out of that job and within a month I was handing in my two weeks and had left the job. When I’ve operated from need, it generally goes better. When I operate from want, it gets more chaotic. It’s something to mull over further.

I had another realization as a result of a post of a friend who talked about how addiction to the hormones in our bodies can cause to self-sabotage in order to keep those hormone levels up. Thinking about that point made me acknowledge how I’ve always lived within a certain threshold of stress. If it’s started to decrease I’ve not always handled it well, because it’s something going on in the background that I’m used to. It’s made me reflective of some of my choices and how much those choices are informed perhaps by a physiological need for certain levels of stress. It makes me wonder how people will handle being relieved of the stress of the pandemic as well.

3-18-2021 Today as I was meditating Raphael came to visit. He told me that this last month has been a clearing out and purification of my energy so that we could resume transmission work. It makes sense to me. I basically haven’t connected with the archangels meaningfully in the last half year or so because of how complicated matters got on the personal front. I felt grateful to reconnect with him today.

3-19-2021 I woke up this morning and ripped the band-aid off. I’d been advised to do such in another reading I did and it really helped me understand something. I’m worthy of a yes, not a maybe and all I got was a maybe, so I know I made the right decision and its time to fully let go. Then I had a dream where I was in my early twenties and writing and I lived with my step-mom, but then moved out and ended up living in Astoria, writing and working at a job, while I tried to save up for a house, so I could live in my own place. I felt She Who Watches come through and she told me this is my home, my place. “You are one of mine.”

3-20-2021 I had a vivid dream this morning that I was walking with my Dad. He had a mustache, the way he used to have one when I was a kid, but his appearance was subtly different. We got to the door and in the foyer, I asked him if he had any last bit of advice to give me and he said, “Learn to let go.” Then he collapsed into a pool of blood, as if he was dying and he told me that in his life he’d never learned to let go of his anger, his lust, his passion, or anything else, and it had defined him and the mistakes he made. He told me that he didn’t want me to make the same mistakes he made, because I would end up alone like him and that learning to let go would help me with the obsession I’ve been grappling with. Then he told me this was the last time he would visit me because he was transitioning onto his next destination and I could feel that with him, because he didn’t feel the same to me as he had. I woke up feeling bath sad and hopeful. He’s passed, but knowing that he’s truly moving on is a form of letting go…and also hopeful that I can continue to let go and release what I’ve been holding on to and isn’t serving me.

3-21-2021 Today I wrapped up my work with Mercury. I made a request to Raphael to do some healing work for me around what I’ve been processing this month. It’s been a rough month, but I’m glad I’ve done this work, because not doing it would just leave me stuck in regrets. The healing will help me continue to move forward.