Went to Karen for help.\u00a0 I\u2019ve been really struggling with depression since I got so sick.\u00a0 I had no energy for anything right after the training which was April 10.\u00a0 It was good to see her.\u00a0 I told her about being sick, and then getting depressed, about the energy medicine workshop, about the weekend, and new friends.\u00a0 I told Karen about accepting myself just as I am and accepting my life just as it is, and how that helped me feel better.\u00a0 Karen said when I\u2019m badly depleted, there\u2019s not enough of my Self there and I\u2019m very vulnerable.\u00a0 Finally I lay down on the couch, and she put a blanket over me and stroked my hair.\u00a0 I just cried and cried.\u00a0 Karen said \u201cThat poor little girl\u201d and I saw the image of Little Jenny, and how I\u2019d come to love her.\u00a0 I realize that when I see her face, I don\u2019t see the image mother reflected back to me, of a selfish and unloving child.\u00a0 I see a little girl with a lot of love, and creativity and generosity, who just wants to give what she has to the world.\u00a0 I also see the person that other people see and love.\u00a0 That\u2019s a surprise.\u00a0 I have trouble believing it, trouble taking it in, but when I see that it\u2019s Little Jenny who they love, and I love her too, then perhaps there\u2019s a way to be able to take in the love people have for me.<\/p>\n
I think there\u2019s a way I have given up: given up trying to heal, given up trying to get better.\u00a0 If I can work so hard, and still collapse into depression, then I can\u2019t say \u201cI\u2019ve healed.\u201d\u00a0 Although I\u2019ve healed a lot, am much more resilient, and can manage myself a lot better, but at the same time I can see how fragile I am.\u00a0 In some ways I think I\u2019m more vulnerable than I was because I\u2019ve dismantled so many defenses.\u00a0 I can see that it\u2019s delusion to imagine that someday I\u2019ll heal, and I won\u2019t get depressed again.\u00a0 How I am now is the best I can hope for, and my task is just to take care of myself as best I can.<\/p>\n
I started reading Pema Chodron \u201cWhen Things Fall Apart,\u201d but it\u2019s not really speaking to me.\u00a0 I don\u2019t have a carefully constructed self that \u201clooks good.\u201d\u00a0 I\u2019m not sure why \u2014 possibly since nothing I did was acceptable to my mother, I didn\u2019t have the raw material \u2014 parts of me that are \u201cacceptable\u201d \u2014 from which to construct such a self.\u00a0 It\u2019s possible that my \u201cfalse self\u201d is the one Mother projected on to me, who \u201cthinks she\u2019s great,\u201d who\u2019s selfish and never thinks of others, who doesn\u2019t have any talents or gifts worth developing.\u00a0 I certainly haven\u2019t spent a lot of time trying to hold that one together.\u00a0 Instead, I\u2019ve worked very hard at disproving that image, and haven\u2019t been able to see how successful I\u2019ve been, that most people don\u2019t see her at all.\u00a0 I think of that letter from Lynn Thorp, and how surprised I was by the positive things she said about me.\u00a0 The other paradox is that my shadow self is creative, exuberant, generous \u2014 I try to keep it hidden, or pretend I don\u2019t have it \u2014 and yet everybody around me sees it easily.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Went to Karen for help.\u00a0 I\u2019ve been really struggling with depression since I got so sick.\u00a0 I had no energy for anything right after the training which was April 10.\u00a0 It was good to see her.\u00a0 I told her about … Continue reading