I've started, then given up, then re-started journals time and time again over the years. As I began each one, I'd become caught up in the need to cover the years I'd missed, the try to re-capture all the details I had let slip through my fingers & almost every time would go through a brief history of my childhood, then followed that with the birth of my first child and tried going on from there.
The problem with doing that? Every single time I'd become so overwhelmed with trying to re-capture history, that I'd give up before I ever really began. As each new day passed, un-recorded, neglected, and failing to be added to my journal as I attempted to catch up on years forgotten, I would fall into a guilt pattern, apologising in my writing repeatedly for time lost and days forgotten.
It has been approximtely ten months since I wrote last on this blog. What started out as a daily project, quickly fell by the wayside as I began saving drafts of posts I felt I needed to write, of things half remembered, half said, yet never finished and published. I had fallen into a new version of the same old trap from the past. This time however, I don't feel the need to apologise, nor to revisit what I missed. The fact that I obviously wasn't in a place, nor headspace to continue writing regularly is enough of a reason to have stopped.
The fact that it is currently 12.30am, and that 20mins ago I was falling asleep reading, yet once I put my book down, my head starting whirling with thoughts and I felt the need to write… is more than enough reason to have grabbed my laptop, and here I lie typing away in the dark. (Thank goodness for a backlit keyboard!)
Where am I headed with this post? I truly have no idea, except for the fact that I am realising just how often over the years I have apologised for my actions, for myself, for my very life. I would apologise for not being good enough, quiet enough (or in other cases loud enough), strong enough, understanding enough, loving enough. For being too strict, too uncaring, too judgemental, for caring too much, for being too open minded, for not following the rules, yet at the same time for being too willing to break those very same perceived rules. I truly could go on and on and on for pages for all the things I have apologised for in my life… and I can honestly say the vast majority I truly had no reason to be apologetic over, for what I was doing was apologising for being ME.
I am who I AM. Why, when the very people we are is who we NEED to be, do we feel this insane need to apologise and hide ourselves? To feed into societies dictatorial clone machine, to lose who we are and enable our individuality to be replaced by something so removed from ourselves that is purely a product of the fear of what others may think? It's time, no actually it is PAST time to let go of the opinions of others. To not just allow ourselves to be who we are, but to embrace that and love it in every way possible. To truly BE.
Yet at the same time as I write that, I can feel the insecurity & doubt that hides in the pit of my stomach, welling up ready to fight me to the death over taking that step forward. Do I need to feel that doubt? Nope. Absolutely not, yet it's a conditioning I have trained myself into over many years of avoiding seeing myself for who I am.
At the same time, I had worked tirelessly to raise 5 children, striving to teach them to accept *themselves* for who they are and not to allow anyone else to change them. For them to find their own strengths, desires, joys, paths, etc in this life. For Autism not to be a crutch or an excuse for them, but for it to simply be something they were told about, but that has absolutely no bearing whatsoever on the way they choose to live their lives.
Yes…. the irony of this is not lost on me either. That I am trying to teach my children something that I have not yet mastered myself. But you know what? I'm learning. Each day, I'm taking another step forward along the path I am travelling, and it is a GOOD path. The biggest problem right now, however is knowing where I want that path to take me. What are my goals in life? Where do I want to end up? What do I want to do with myself? The only real, true, solid goal I ever set for myself was to be a Mother. I achieved that goal five times over… and now, this year, the second of my children will reach adulthood. In a couple more years, two more of my children will also reach that milestone. I am realising how much I am floundering, lacking in direction because that goal has been achieved and I have no idea where to from here.
It is time to make new goals, to lay down the foundations to strengthen the path that I am on and give it formal direction, rather than allowing it to randomly meander wherever it may take me without thought nor planning. One of those goals, is to become a counsellor. What kind? I'
