Life

How to Therapy

I want to talk about therapy. As of 2018, I have collectively been in therapy for 13 years.

You’re welcome, Earth.

I have a history of severe depression, anxiety, and a delightful sprinkling of suicidal tendencies, a.k.a. MENTAL ILLNESS. (Insert dramatic music and crowds running away in black and white b-movie terror). When it first showed up so many years ago I was very blessed that I had friends in my life who insisted I wasn’t okay and pointed me in the direction of getting professional help. I send them little prayers every day.

To say there was a lot of stigma around “going to therapy” is sort of the understatement of a lifetime. My parents even tried to talk me out of it because they didn’t want me to get a reputation. They meant well. Thank God I did it anyway because I was suicidal and if I hadn’t I’d be dead now.

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New Year 2018

I’ve wanted to write this blog for about a year. I’ve been trying to come up with the right word. That’s what’s been slowing me down. After all that I went through from 2014-2017 (which I’m now coining “The Business”) I’ve been lacking the right…word…for what it is I’m doing with myself now after such extreme change.

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Purging The Shoulds

Should.

That fucking word. I swear to Christ.

It haunts us with things left undone. With potential. An endless stream of what-ifs, could-haves, and maybes that meld into a theatrical chorus of “You are not good enough as you are”.

I’m not talking about positive self-improvement. I’m talking about those twisted voices whose only purpose is to torment. We all have them.

“The Shoulds”.
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2016 – Portrait of the Artist

I have an annual tradition where toward the end of the year I deep clean my apartment and purge everything I don’t use. Year after year I slowly work myself toward being a minimalist.

If you come across an item you’re not sure about while you’re in the process of decluttering there is a three-question system you use:

Do you actively use it?
Do you need it?
Do you love it?

I’ve been doing this for a while, so most things need two or more yeses to stay.

This year what struck me as I started cleaning out my ever-dwindling cabinets is that they are not full of “things” anymore. They are full of the people I used to be, or people I wish I was.

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I’m Ready to Talk Now

Because I understand multiple points of view, it takes me a while to figure out how I feel about things. I’ve always seen this as a weakness because in debates I am not able to respond quickly. And I can’t just blurt out whatever comes to mind because I also come with this self-edit-function that won’t allow me to stand up for something unless I know it’s true to ME.

And I wanted to sit on this until I knew I was saying my truthiest truth.

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Reflections on “When God Closes a Door”

I turned on The Sound of Music today to keep my head occupied while I started reorganizing my living space (a fall tradition).

It’s one of my favorite movies. One of the things I really like about it is that every time I watch it, something else pops out at me. Today’s thing was Maria’s reoccurring line:

“When God closes a door, somewhere He opens a window”

I surprised myself by responding, “Yeah, I don’t think that’s always true.”

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Don’t Just Stand There

You are overwhelmed. You are scared. You are the adult and the decision is yours. Everyday the decisions are yours. All of them. No one is going to tell you what to do.

But you don’t know what to do. You don’t know which decision is the right one. Or the situation is so convoluted there are multiple options but none seems to truly be the right one. Or more than one could be correct, or maybe three. And then even what initially seemed to be the wrong answer starts looking like it might be the best way to go.

“Don’t just stand there,” your brain says. “You are scared. You are uncomfortable. DO SOMETHING. ”

I used to. I used to just do something. Just pick something at random and go with it so that the decision was made and the uncomfortable would stop.

Which had disastrous outcomes. (As you may have guessed)

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