What I Don’t Have

Do you find yourself focusing more on what you don’t have than what you do have?  Seriously.  For those of you inclined to explore this, here is some space to do so…

~

~

~

~

This morning, I realized that I really wanted to go for a walk.  Honoring this inclination can seem like a small victory (okay, a big one), because I am a person who spent years afraid to leave my apartment and could easily go into a paranoid fit just trying to get myself to go to the grocery store.  Thank you, PTSD.  After realizing in therapy that I had been abused and had spent much of my childhood terrorized, I started to find going outside difficult.  I had a very strong feeling that anyone on the street would physically attack me.  Sometimes the thoughts and memories would become so overwhelming that I would find myself crying while just trying to get myself a gallon of milk. 

This morning, I managed to have that walk.  I even managed to enjoy it, which can still be a challenge (if I’m alone… if people are with me, these struggles don’t come up nearly as much).  A quarter into my short walk, I started feeling the panic build and the fear whisper in my ear.  For the first time, I was able to break-down the thoughts a bit and at least see what some of the thoughts that overwhelm me sometimes consist of.  I realized that I was focusing very much on what I didn’t have and what I wasn’t doing… and feeling very empty and scared, because of this.  I wasn’t in my soft, new recliner.  I didn’t have my cats near to cuddle.  My boyfriend wasn’t there.  I wasn’t in the place I feel safest – home.  I didn’t have my computer to email a friend for comfort.  Everything that I didn’t have available to me while walking around on the neighborhood seemed to suffocate me…

And, then I wondered what it would feel like if I focused on what I did have available to me right there on that walk…  I started narrating to myself what was all around me: fat squirrels chasing eachother across tree branches, budding crocuses, a laughing man keeping his chocolate lab from peeing on the neighbor’s Salvation Army donations sitting on their curb for pick-up, a pleasant and cool breathe, the comfort of hearing my own breath keeping pace with my steps, my soft red sweat-shirt keeping me warm, a beautiful neighborhood full of budding trees, kids playing in a park, robins all over a soccer field (it kinda looked like they were playing soccer… lol), the soft crunch of a baseball diamond under my feet…  I can’t say that I became free of all my fears, but I did feel better.  I started to enjoy myself…

Have you ever known someone who could make a tragedy out of the best situation?  The first person that comes to my mind is myself.  Sure, I was witty, but not thin.  I was courageously honest, but not thin.  I was an honor student in uni, but not thin.  I could do a challenging work-out on the elliptical runner, but still not thin enough… not only that, but I also can’t run!  I’ve never been a runner… what’s wrong with me that I’ve never been one talented at running?  Nevermind that I can make shots from the three-point line and rollerblade like the wind.  Has your brain been there?  Maybe thinness wasn’t the thing you were stuck on.  Goodness knows I have been stuck on so many things, but since I know so many folks struggle with the thin thing I’ve illustrated with it. 

While it is a helpful human trait to be able to imagine what could be, I think that in this modern North American culture that we discount the value of what IS… what we already have… and the value of appreciating what IS.  In years past, my brain seemed particularly resistant to this kind of thinking.  It was like I was trained my entire life to be a negative thinking ninja.  Maybe some of it is genetic.  Both of my biological parents are very much like this, so is the step-father who raised me.  If some aspect of something wasn’t perfect, then it wasn’t good enough.  That created a situation where nothing was good enough, because ya know… NOTHING is perfect in this world. 

I also know some people who just make me wanna tear my hair out who seem determined to smile through even the most painful events… repressing their pain and never seeming to feel real feeling.  That is definitely not the extreme I’m going for.  I don’t like either extreme.  Happiness seems to live in the gray spaces with space for feeling sadness and pain… and space for appreciating the lovely things in life as well.  Cheers to the gray spaces… 😉

–AngryGrayRainbows