Things I did for the first time this weekend:
- see Blade Runner
- play Rock Band
- eat eggs from a chicken i’d met
- fire a potato gun
- misfire a potato gun
- set my hand on fire, but only sorta
- eat Thin Mint ice cream (miraculous, thanks for asking.)
and more! This weekend was really fun.
I’ve been feeling lately like my blog entries are getting kind of stale and repetitive, which makes me think that I’ve been stagnating a bit. And I’m ok with that, independent of the blog—i don’t feel like my grieving needs to happen on any particular timeline—but I know that people I love check in on me here from time to time and I hate to fill these pages with the same old whining.
That’s one reason why I’m happy to report that I think i made a sort of big breakthrough this weekend.
Here’s what I’ve been thinking about: Since I’ve been old enough to be capable of any meaningful introspection, I’ve always thought that I was incredibly good at managing my emotional resources. I generally think I know myself really well, and historically, I’ve been very cautious about personal investment. I will chase intimacy only when I feel I can afford to. I give everything I think I can to my family and friends, and I rarely fight it or feel bad if I feel like i don’t have any more to give.
This is one regard in which I’ve always thought I had my shit completely together. I could be independent, I could be a warrior because I was never going to give anybody anything that I couldn’t bear to lose. I’ve been aware and even fond of this established modus operandi, and three months ago I could have given you all sorts of reasons why i felt it was a very clean and productive way to go about one’s business. I’d have defended it until I was blue in the face, actually, equating being a loving person with being stable and available and self-sufficient.
In retrospect, though, I’m realizing that you miss out on a lot when you only love as much as you’re ready to lose.
This whole thing came about pretty organically. I remember thinking when my dad died that I would need to be mindful of how much energy I put into taking care of other people, to make sure I was keeping myself together first. Pretty much everyone in my life echoed this sentiment, and it was pretty good advice at the beginning, when I experienced volatile shifts between feeling available to comfort others and needing to retreat into myself. I expected that it would be a long time before I would have emotional energy for more than the basics with any sort of consistency.
I have been very surprised to observe how little thought i give self-preservation lately. I am very consciously, in almost every moment, aware that I am still grieving. If there were ever a time I’d expect myself to retreat socially, this is it. And somehow in spite of that, i don’t feel guarded in the ways I generally do. Maybe it took losing my dad to accept the fact that ultimately, i’m not going to decide when terrible things happen. That being afraid of something won’t keep you from losing it as much as it’ll keep you from having it. That stoicism only takes you so far. That when I die, hopefully a really long time from now, the people I love would probably think it was a huge shame if the only emotions I ever showed were those I’ve shown in the past—hyperprocessed, sanitized distillations of what I felt privately.
This would not be half the breakthrough I think it is if it was just a theory on something in myself I might work on. But I’m reaching all these conclusions retroactively in the gradual realization that my inclinations are to connect more, to take bigger emotional gambles. And although I still have the mechanism that tells me I should be, I’m not really afraid of what could happen.
I think this is actually, when adjusted for time, the biggest leap in personal development that I’ve ever made, and i’m really happy about it.