Did my routine last night: I've been taking ketamine troches for the last year and lately I've been dancing as it kicks in, then smoking weed when it comes down. The ketamine helps me manage the effects of cannabis which can be intense. I dance and myself is revealed to myself. What I see is all the fear that comes up when I smoke because I'm afraid of losing control, but lately it's felt better and I'm even starting to enjoy myself when I smoke, and sometimes that makes me afraid and shame will come in because it's familiar and I don't know how to feel good.
Sometimes I see that shame is the thing that's governed my life: shame from my family system which was ruled by it, shame from the addiction and my behavior...sometimes I see it's guilt and sometimes fear. Sometimes I believe I'm not worthy of experiencing good things, which is shame. Sometimes I crumble because I know I'm a bad person, which is shame, and which is easier, I sometimes think, than the risk of loving myself, because with shame I can never get hurt. I'm always hurting but at least I know what to expect. But now I'm getting to the point where that doesn't feel good anymore. Feeling good feels good.
Ketamine helped me see that. Before ketamine I'd forgotten what good could feel like. I forgot it could feel good in my body, and now I remember. And cannabis reminds me of that too: how pleasurable it can be to lie in bed and feel the covers on my skin, or just listen to music. I'm reminded how pleasurable good can be, masturbation, my own body. Last night I saw how creative I am. I felt my creative power, which we all have, are, and felt how afraid of it I am, and how I use things like shame, guilt, fear to keep me from it, because to me it feels scary, vulnerable, like death somehow where all the things that are familiar: my judgements, my criticisms are gone and there's nothing to keep me safe. It's like I believe I can't protect myself, as if the heart doesn't know what it's doing.
As soon as I felt that creative power I judged it, judged myself as the greatest person for having it, as the most creative person in the whole world, and thought of all the things I could do with it, the money I'd make, conquests I'd have, in other words, the addict came in. I got a really good look at it and I judged him mercilessly. He was disgusting, but then I said it was ok, and he went away, and I went back to creativity. I judged myself for being afraid of it and wanted to go back, but I just kept dancing and it did. If I lost concentration I concentrated on the music, and the love I felt listening to it brought me back. I would just keep moving and I would find it again. Love and movement got me back on the path. Love is the guide through this.
I tried to dance but I would get self conscious about what I was doing, and when I judged myself, even if it was a "good" judgement, it took me out of the freedom and joy I was experiencing. I remember listening to a woman who had an alien who would talk to her, and the alien said "is this not good enough for you? Is love not enough?" And that stuck with me, because often I don't want the love or joy. I want the validation or praise that comes from it. I want to be recognized, which is fine and natural and necessary, but validation is beside the point. The point is the joy you feel in doing it, and, probably, in sharing it with others. And so, I believe we are all creativity, and things like addiction and shame and guilt and fear and anything else you can come up with that we think are so real (that the shame is real because we've done bad things) are all something we use to keep us from who we are because we're afraid of who we are because when we're sitting in our creative power we think, as we conceptualize it, that there's a total loss of control, and that's scary, it's scary because we forget, maybe, that loss of control feels good, or maybe we're worried about what other people will think about us, or whatever it is, and we forget, also, that we exist in that loss of control all the time, that creativity is who we are, and these things that cover it over are just things we use to make us think we're in control when we're not, even thought it feels like it does work, like brakes on a car, but the cost of that connection, and joy, and the harder we ride that brake the more miserable we make ourselves. I know because I've been pretty damn miserable.
But maybe we can just let go a little bit, and a little bit more and see how it feels. Ask a stranger how their day is going. Have that conversation we're afraid of having or take that class we've been putting off, and just see how it feels, and then go right back to the way things were if we don't like it. We value and honor ourselves by taking risks like this. We tell ourselves we're worth it, and we grow, our confidence grows, our love grows.
So that's what I was feeling last night and then today I was afraid to get up. It all seemed like too much and like I couldn't handle it and I wanted to lie in bed all day. This is what usually happens the day after. But I tell myself I can do it, I'm not alone and I have support. The fear brings in the addiction in the form of craving but I try not to judge myself too harshly. I feel like I'm totally and completely out of control but I take a look around and see that nothing's happening. People are acting the way they were a few seconds ago, the sun is still shining and the birds are still chirping. Trees are still treeing and the wind rustles in their leaves the way it did just a second ago. No one is out to get me, no is out to hurt me and if they do I can recognize it and protect myself.
The fear will come back often and so will the addiction and so will things like anger, impatience and resentment but returning to my breath helps. I know I can meditate later and it will help, but sometimes it doesn't, the difference now is that I believe help is out there. Help from God (whatever that might be), help from my friends in the program, a meeting I can go to. I know people have experienced dark times before too, and that I am not alone. I was feeling anxious on a walk today and I passed by a statue of St. Francis and I felt better. I know that man felt alone, and he must have been terrified at times, but he made it through, aid would come in some form, some bird that perches on his shoulder, some friend that says hello, some stranger that needs help, something...something that reminded him that there was love in the world, that he was loved, and that he could love in turn. Things have settled down since then, and I see now that no matter what I experience it passes, it does pass. I used to be afraid of my feelings and try to prevent them because I didn't believe that they passed. I can feel more nowadays and I'm grateful for that because the more pain I let myself feel the more joy I'll be able to feel also. I'm grateful I don't have to live the way I used to anymore if I don't want to and I'm grateful that good is starting to feel good, because it feels really good.
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