Be free to live, be alive to love.

Whoever thought the notion of denying, suppressing, repressing emotions makes us strong resilient individuals would have also denied the levels of difficulty, skill and pain acknowledging, experiencing and exploring the thinking behind how we feel in order to have control as opposed to reactionary controlling. After all, if being relaxed with our authentic self was easy we'd all be doing it. An unexpected outcome to no longer running from myself is now being subjected to feeling all my nerve endings on fire waking me in panicked attack each night and causing trembling unrest during the day but, and I say this trepidatiously, I'm becoming more aware of what I need and ready to pace, heal from within as best I can.

No longer a desperately fueled drive to face fears beyond my home, I know my greatest anxiety has been here all along, the toughest challenge now I have no relenting need for acceptance, attention or even love as I give to myself nourishment required for such an arduous endeavour. Trauma comes and goes as I sway back and forth away from people who would trigger stress in me with their passive-aggressive defensive attacks, and forth in facing communication needed for a smoother path until exhausted, realized either connection will or will not happen once I am sure I have given my habitual all as I peel away my own layers of protection strong in the knowledge I have my own back. Reaching acceptance of my needs and understanding theirs although not justifying projected uncertainty left in their wake of doom and disaster muddled with unreasonable deservedness to deny how I feel or their lack of respect and consideration shown. Boundaries redrawn, permeable to the ebb and flow of energy every cell craves to survive. We can't expect to absorb the joys of life when we bury deep our sorrow and stress. Life was never going to be easy and is made far more complicated in pursuit of such. Simplicity comes with a price but one I'd happily pay after too many years with bankruptcy of self in extension of another's terrorised transference. Liberation is responsible existence.

Aspiration for illusion.

Jacqueline du Pré, considered the greatest cellist of all time, short her 'career' and life taken over by multiple sclerosis, a celebrated inspirational woman who captivated audiences with emotionally charged performances, but what of her personal internal life? A woman unable to say "no" to demands or expectations of both her parents and husband, to her audiences. Multiple sclerosis becoming a relief of sorts, something she 'foresaw' as a young girl, an acceptable and legitimate way of ceasing to be the puppet, the extension of another's need for approval and praise.

Are we a people of aspiration to the illusion, in awe of the fantasy where reality is overlooked, denied or taken with a pinch of pity or admiration but separated from a naive childlike dream to be adored, celebrated, envied, but ultimately, accepted and loved even if love is merely conditional, set to disappoint as condition is no love but simply more expectation, more extension of another's need for approval and praise? A perpetual unfulfilled and unfulfilling pursuit. Source; When the Body Says No: The Cost of Hidden Stress by Gabor Maté.

Healing from within.

Mandy Murphy was her name, I forget her face but her hair I recall vividly was golden locks lightly tussled about her shoulders and down her back a way. The sweetest delicate girl in her informative years during junior school that I felt so much envy toward in my shy unassuming need to have such attention as her when she merely scratched her knee. I with messy dark unfurled ribboned long hair, inky fingers and second hand clothes foraged in jumble sales could never understand what it took to be cared for so readily. When I hurt I hurt alone, suffering the bruises in silence as I cried in some corner where I could not be found. I see Mandy Murphy in every woman who seeks attention so sweetly that men, some women but mostly men swoon to their side with offers of affection. She is a 'good girl' in their eyes. Often doing well in life, a well enough paid job or clean and tidy dwelling, conforming neatly into standards set by man. She the cause of many a falling out between lovers, she the incent, the wife the scorned jealous affronted victim and persecutor in one. With all my efforts to be free from expectation, other people's rules of how we should be, I still feel eluded as to how I am excluded from such circles of drama but know now it is that Bermuda triangle I have sought so long to escape. To them, I am an outsider as I refuse to play my part. Neither victim nor persecutor, rescuer or pity giver I feel something else for the Mandy Murphy's these days. No more envy although the child within sheds a saddened tear for being overlooked, uncherished as an individual but for her, I feel compassion.

For me, for my mother's daughter lost and lonely as she was, I am almost home, I'm at the door unlocking my heart to her with the greatest of ease. I see that messy brown hair, fingers which love to write, hold books as they provided a safe place of understanding, answers to question not yet asked, a scented feel of comfort, hand me down garments and envy her youth. I have become her again only this time she is loved, adored. So sweet and delicate yet robust and bruised from play, unassumingly taken care of at last soon to be free to leap with the abandoned joy she's craved for too many a year. Her name was Julie, mine it's rightful owner, Julia, the given name never used after registration until an assertive in her own right eleven year old declared possession again. A rebirth perhaps but liberation for certain. I have taken you with me on this journey and thank you. Without the support and understanding I have received I might not have arrived so soon...so soon at fifty-six is late enough but never too late to reconnect to oneself. A painful, confusing homecoming where entanglement takes place creating a whole completed puzzle. Anyone want to come play...you are all very welcome in my playhouse?

Not all is as it seems.

Stability doesn't derive from the practice of unyielding rigid tradition but its paradox embodied in flexibility, the fluidity of learning, growth in deeper understanding. Maturity of humankind, mastering of emotion. not the quashing of that which connects all.

Empathy unites life, separation of body and mind, emotion and thought is a stiff upper lipped scourge plaguing the planet creating death in its wake. Avoidance of feeling takes its toll on us all. Fear only the life we lose in loss of connection, our emotions serve us well when the source is felt and understood as a developed parent to child. Only then can we truly master the state of being stable. There's only one way forward, through. All else is stuckness and confusion.

Lost in sight found inside.

'What's on your mind, Julia?' digitally enquires facebook....well I shall tell you, says I as I appear to the outside world a dreamer whilst stilling my mind enough to hear my heart and it's calling. To be at ease with myself is to be at ease with encompassing dis-ease, not happy, too sad for that forced emotion to make better those who run uncomfortable with sadness, anger, anxiety, anything but the illusion of joyous success even if true the laughter, fleeting only ever in reality as we walk true the path.

Distraction is the objective, sickness the symptom, introspection and acceptance the cure. To the townsfolk I'm a dreamer, to me I'm wakened, eyes wide open to see all is missed as if living in adjacent dimension. Slow and steadied becomes my world easy as the rest rush by in dizzied circles getting nowhere in repetitive compliance with falsehood duped into buying.

Alain de Botton on Emotional Education

Gabor Mate on the Myth of "Normal"