Friday, November 12, 2010

Wednesday was not fun. I scared myself, and a few other people to boot.  I'd rather have people scared than unresponsive; it means someone cares.


I spent the majority of the day at school trying to read and study for an exam.  Although I brought a bunch of snacks with me, the only thing I made use of all day and into the evening was a bottle of water.  Of course with cooler weather and the time change, and not eating all day long, I was pretty freaking cold by the time I had to take the exam for my evening course.


I had one friend chatting with me via email.  Seems odd to me that I still manage to sound philosophical when on a scale of -10 to 10, I rated myself on a -5. 


  • "if i could cut out the part of me that is bad, i'd do it
    i wish i could cut the pain away"
  • "why does this take so much effort? why aren't we aware of the effort to live on a daily basis?"
It's the second one that strikes me.  Every day, we get up, dressed, eat, and go to work or school.  We do many different things throughout the day, interact with so many different people who seem to be functioning just like ourselves.  But when you're day isn't going right, or week, or month or year, or decade, &c it takes so much effort and energy to do the slightest thing. 
 
 Why are we not aware of the energy and stamina required on a daily basis?  What blocks our perception? What causes us to take it for granted? How did we get to this point in the first place? Could we become aware of it in a healthy manner?  How could this be used?

Wednesday, November 10, 2010

I should do a damage control post, but I'll just say the usual: "been there, done that & have a safe routine to follow".  Phone calls & texts started going out last week about certain impulses.  Friends replaced the role of family long ago.

- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - 


Awesome background noise: Rain


little miss sunshine

my thoughts don't feel safe to share. the less i dwell, the less 'i feed the animals' the less it claws and tears at me
          gloom 'n' doom. self pity is hell. no wonder i dont explore it very often. reality
i'll keep myself as safe as possible. i'll try to drive the speed limit. i'll try to eat. i'll try not to cut

If you want/need a promise, I'll give you what we did in school social work:


The 3+ people I promise to call: Eman, Lisa, and anyone else who'll listen & my most recent former therapist
I promise not to kill myself.  I will try my best not to hurt myself (i.e., cutting) but don't feel safe/able to ensure my word at this time.  If I start thinking of hurting myself in a grayish area between self-injury & suicide I will hand over my booze, migraine medication, PMS meds, excedrin OTCs and Alieve over to a trusted friend for at least one week; along with all my sharp objects (nail cutters, scissors, sewing pins & needles, metal emery board, hand mirrors, and anything else I find a temptation).  I will avail myself to counseling services on campus; may even return to my most recent ex-therapist in Huntington.  If I feel like I'm going to break my promise, I'll find the cop who stands 24/7 sentry at the Hawthorne cliffs and submit to a 5150 (that's what he's there for; that's why people go to the Hawthorne cliffs).



Re-post from March 3, 2010

For me, it's better to feel physical pain than the emotional pain.  I can only handle so much emotional pain in my life, and it triggers memories, which only add to the pain.  So, while others self harm to release pain, I do it to feel a type of pain that has an observable, curable cause.  Emotional pain will always be there, always there under the surface waiting for some one, thing, event to dredge it all up again.  But physical pain, it gets healed and goes away; it is forgotten.

And for the people out there who think self injury is a suicidal gesture, that's not true; you need to go read more psychological literature.  Besides, if I really wanted to kill myself, I've already had 5 depressive episodes in the past 12 years.  I've had my chance, I never took it.


my reasons:
I feel selfish
I always take and never give
I have nothing to offer, especially God
If I have anything to give, it's something that God has already given to me.  I can't claim anything as truly my own.
I never add up
She will never love me
She will never see me as a separate entity, worthy of dreams and desires and wants, etc apart from herself
I never fulfill half the obligations I say I'll do for other people; including prayer
I'm a hypocrite
I constantly fail
I'm tired of failing
I'm tired of not adding up
I'm a bitch
I'm all sorts of messed up
I don't want to meet back up with my therapist
I don't want to have to be honest with my therapist; the last one stabbed me in the back
I'm tired of meeting expectations that are not my own
I'm tired of being unemployed
I'm tired of hiding
I'm tired of her never having remorse
Since I constantly fail, why don't you just give me Hell since I already live it
I have so much crap going on in my life I can't hear God
I hate hearing about my 'worth'; it's painful
I'm tired of having migraines and tension headaches
I'm tired of missing events to make sure she maintains boundaries
I'm tired of hiding books, prayer cards, and prayer journals as though they are contraband
Why do I have to take care of her?
Why do I have to walk on egg shells to make her happy, but she can stomp all over me?
Why am I invisible?
I'm tired of being constantly reminded of how I cause problems
I'm tired of being constantly talked to as though I'm a child when I'm her adult child
Why does she get to act like she is 5 years old?
I hate recieving praise and compliments because I don't know what to do with them.
I'm supposed to be entering the convent, but God won't even give me a f-ing job to enable me to fulfill His will.
I have to lie about where I go for church
I have to make excuses for dressing modestly (but prettily)
I can't cry - my emotions take a back seat to hers
I can't be angry at her; I'm supposed to be understanding due to my education and training as a counselor
I'm supposed to provide information but I cannot appear to be intelligent in the matter
I can't upstage her (i.e., cooking, sewing, intellect, etc)
Tired of living under the unspoken rule of "I'll love you when you do ____."
If I try to be my own separate self, its self defeatist
I'm not "up to snuff"
Tired of having to second guess whether something is done simply to be nice or has a motive behind it for later use
[may add more later]

there - all out in the open. now, run for the hills

Jungian Shadow Function

At some point during this past summer, my attention turned to Jungian psychology.  I’ve spent the greater part of the last 7 years in libraries, reading some awesome albeit stretching-the-subject theories on human behavior.  I’ve read studies on everything from economics of behavior to jury selection, from the impact of racially segregated neighborhoods, to cohabitation’s role in divorce.  It’s been interesting.  Between all these different interests, I really developed a liking for social psychology tied in with rational economics; I could never wrap my head around statistics.  Research and any pursuit of a PhD were automatically out.  I remember coming across Jung’s works, standing next to Freud; leather and fabric bindings falling off and tattered.  I liked those books because they smell good.  I love the smell of old books.  But I would pick the volumes up, leaf through it and put it back down. never quite being fully grabbed into the material.  I liked Jung’s exploration of the spirit and soul, and imagination; the things that seem to make us human versus animal.  

I never associated Jung with Myers-Brigg; something led me to cross that line over the summer.  I revel in my personality type; I am reading up on the development of the MBTI, and the different types.  My 'type' not only helps me to see why people don’t like me, and explains so much about why I am serious and am off-putting.  It also allows me the freedom to figure out my strengths, to stretch the possibilities.  Perhaps a precursor to this is the VIA strengths test that was derived from Seligman[i].  However these are character strengths, and in the four years since I was introduced to this material I’ve learned that these aspects of my character are non-negotiable; these are things I choose to make valuable in my life.  On the other hand, personality – its not know for certain at what age it’s fully formed, or if its fluid.  At any rate, it’s given me pause to remember why certain things happened the way they did.

Jung also decided to see Freud’s negative view of the inner mind and made it the playground of philosophy, religion and/or mythology, and symbolic imagination.  As if its not enough to take (and retake: reliability) the MBTI, Jung gave us the shadow functions: the ones that come out to play when you’re everything that you should not be.  When the Introvert spills his emotional guts, with the Perceiver suddenly starts drawing up to do lists and time management tables.  These are the exact reversal of what we typically are and they’re there when we are stressed more than usual.

It’s not a secret that I’m an introvert, so I’m easily pliable when I’m stressed out.  People get more of a response from me than they would otherwise.  The first instance from the past month alone would be when I had two exams back-to-back; if I was asked a personal question I answered it without a second thought.  The thing with the shadow functions is they are the “what’s bad about” or negative aspects of the opposing type.  I’ll act more extroverted, but in all the wrong ways: saying things I shouldn’t; let the negativity just hang out.  Some types are by nature more free-wheeling or spontaneous; if it’s a shadow function, it’s like an impulse control disorder gone wrong – more likely to pick fights, there’s no mental filter when speaking; behaviorally it can resemble a manic episode (speeding, anyone?).  One of my shadow functions is to focus on the worst-case scenario, or the negative possibilities; I’ll try to reach out and interact with people (Extrovert), but due to the impulsivity it goes fairly badly, I’ll get to the point where I wish others could get into my head the way I usually get involved with my own thoughts when not swayed by the shadow.  Yet, my I(ntroversion) blocks that pathway against all odds; like asking someone to enter my world with a 6 foot ladder to scale a mile high barricade.  Or I don’t chase down the next project: in turning off my thoughts and introversion to just watch television (when I’ll typically write a paper and watch a show simultaneously), or buy something on impulse (a candy bar, an extra yard of fabric, or like last week, 100 tea lights).  At the core, Jung treats the shadow as the natural instinct; usually recognized as Freud’s id, which is where the similarity ends.  The shadow contains the part of us we keep hidden away, its our instinct, our negativity, our evil, although it’s actually amoral.  One’s shadow isn’t determined by natural law, its just our opposing feature: it looks unnatural and evil because it’s the contrast of what we perceive to be good in ourselves.



[i] 1st: spirituality, sense of purpose & faith (shape actions, source of comfort), 2nd: curiosity & interest in the world (nearly all topics are fascinating), 3rd: gratitude (don’t take for granted the good things), 4th:  judgment, critical thinking & open-mindedness (examine all aspects, able to change mind), 5th: appreciation of beauty & excellence (skilled performance)

*sources: One Two Three Four Five (not disclosing the forum) 

Tuesday, November 9, 2010

Some things Don't Change

Mark Twain wrote:
“The land of dreams and romance, of fabulous wealth and fabulous poverty, of splendour and rags, of palaces and hovels, of famine and pestilence, of genii and giants and Aladdin lamps, of tigers and elephants, the cobra and the jungle, the country of hundred nations and a hundred tongues, of a thousand religions and two million gods, cradle of the human race, birthplace of human speech, mother of history, grandmother of legend, great-grandmother of traditions, whose yesterday's bear date with the moderate antiquities for the rest of nations-the one sole country under the sun that is endowed with an imperishable interest for alien prince and alien peasant, for lettered and ignorant, wise and fool, rich and poor, bond and free, the one land that all men desire to see, and having seen once, by even a glimpse, would not give that glimpse for the shows of all the rest of the world combined.”

Does the Catechism provide a specific definition of forgiveness and its relation to the concept of restitution? Have you forgiven a serious personal offense, and did you take steps to prevent that offense from recurring?

Look the difference between you and me, is that I own the Catechism and I have the ability to open it and read it. I don't have special knowledge or training. You have opposable thumbs just like me: pick it up, open up the index and read.

Ask me anything

Sunday, November 7, 2010

301.81 (a poem)



colorful haze
shiny tarnished mirror
rotten to the core
rotted away before the grave
cold, dark and unfeeling
your mirrors
your cards
your haze
shatter boundaries
basking in a glow
not your own
mirrors hide corpses
reflecting only you
undifferentiated
dizzying unison
corpses laugh back
hollow and dry
drowning in revolt
choked by haze
mirrors cut and tear
cards tattered and burning

© Megan Singer 2010

time

I missed my extra hour of sleep, because I was worried about missing Mass.

Birthdays went very smoothly yesterday; someone was very heavily medicated.  I toed the line a few times, and barely got a look.  But it's fake, its a veneer.  Some things were said in jest and if it weren't for the meds, lolz.  She just about flipped her biscuit when my sister joked that she and 'T' were considering certain things for when they get married. Holy friggs, the look on her face, you could see the meds working overtime, like a switch flipped.  At least I didn't get any crap this time about not having a boyfriend; I got jabs over not having a job, though.  Not sure which one is worse.  Just a few more days to go until the actual birthdays pass, then we can all let down the guard a bit.

---Post Edited 11/07 at 3:27pm ---

What a weekend. I'm tired.  Can I get a do-over?
This is one weekend I'm really glad that I don't have to teach.