Re: Blueberry's Next Steps: beneficial, constructive and mindful

Started by Blueberry, August 25, 2018, 03:20:30 AM

Previous topic - Next topic

sanmagic7

'zero waste' is an interesting concept.  when you first wrote about wasting time, i kind of felt my hackles raising a bit.  too many messages about making every minute count, always doing something constructive, 'there's time enough to sleep when i'm dead' kind of thing.

i saw my youngest d go thru something similar after i looked at life and 'doing' a bit differently.  she used to run herself into the ground, then get sick from overdoing things, and would come to a complete standstill.  it was ok to rest when you were sick, but otherwise it was wasting time.  i'd tell her that she needed to rest in order to recharge her system, to rest in order to heal all those cells that were getting worn out from work, but it took her a long time to see that healing is a 'something' we're doing, just that it's for ourselves.

i think it's important for us in recovery, growing and battling our way back to health and well-being, to take time out for ourselves, to rest regularly, to have quiet time and down time that is just for us.  i ran myself into this deep hole i may never get out of because too often when i'd take time for myself i was immediately labeled 'lazy'.

just saying, that the phrase 'wasting time' is a trigger for me.  i know there are others here who have a hard time taking and making time just for themselves to stop and be with themselves, take a nap, read a book for fun, watch a little tv that's basically junk food for the brain without feeling guilty or bad about themselves.  as far as spending time with people who aren't enriching and enhancing your life and self, well, i guess you answered that.  great realization.

enjoy carnival - i'm really glad you have a way to be part of it, but on your own terms.  that's very cool.   :hug:

Blueberry

oh yeah, san, 'wasting time' is likely to be a trigger for lots of people and depending how it's written or who says it for me too! i guess that's the good thing about this book - it makes much of the concept of what's important for you in your time. Those of us on here spending time healing and all that entails (including in my case spending time doing seemingly 'nothing') isn't a waste of time at all. We know that we need it.

The author even mentions that adults who don't take enough breaks and downtime tend to get sick so like you tell your daughter, it's not a waste at all to rest.

Blueberry

Quote from: Blueberry on March 03, 2019, 02:06:52 PM
Yesterday I was reading a book on zero waste, which wasn't all about plastic bags etc. No, also about wasting time versus using it for the people and activities which really matter to you. So it hit me afterwards once again - why on earth would I spend my time and energy in a FOO like mine when I feel so bad with them and afterwards??

Getting back to this zero waste stuff: it's part of an environmental movement. But the way I'm reading it atm it's about beneficial use of resources - be they time or natural resources or other stuff. This particular book focusses on 'beneficial for self' as well. Holier than thou attitudes don't help anybody.

BEing mindful is a help on the way to zero waste and that's something we all practise. Yay for us!

sanmagic7

thanks for the explanation, blueberry. 

i agree with the premise, and about mindfulness.  i think i've gotten away from that for a little while.  this is a great reminder.  love and hugs.

Jdog

Beneficial use of resources also means finding those little nuggets of gold inside of the smelly and unappealing aspects of our lives, right?  Resources are limited but creativity doesn't have to be, I think.  That's what I want to keep in mind today, anyhow....

Hope67

Quote from: Blueberry on March 03, 2019, 03:01:02 PM
Those of us on here spending time healing and all that entails (including in my case spending time doing seemingly 'nothing') isn't a waste of time at all. We know that we need it.

The author even mentions that adults who don't take enough breaks and downtime tend to get sick so like you tell your daughter, it's not a waste at all to rest.


This is such great advice - sounds really sensible and true.

:hug: to you Blueberry.
Hope  :)

Blueberry

Well, I'm back from my short yoga holiday, which included helping in the kitchen 3 hours a day (quite a bit cheaper than the normal and good for my problems in the working world). There I was day of arrival in the kitchen and some other worker was showing me how to work the dishwasher and Narc Woman from the January yoga place came round the corner gushing "Oh, hi Blueberry! :blahblahblah: :blahblahblah: :blahblahblah:" I greeted her with "Don't you dare treat me the way you did in January here!"

Needless to say we were in the same bedroom too. She repeated her welcome there and I got more specific "I'm going to put up with you but we're not friends." I know both times I was showing aggression and anger, but I had to to protect myself. 

In the kitchen I spoke to a couple of the bosses and said there was no way I could work with her in the kitchen. They were really pretty accommodating. Narc Woman (N.W.) and I were both working 3 hours only so they put her on mornings and me afternoons. I never really quite trusted it to continue that way. I knew from January that N.W. is pretty good at getting her own way. The problem in January was that she wouldn't leave me alone. This time around I did allow her quite a lot of headspace. Sometimes I'd remind myself not to give her any. It wasn't easy. I wrote quite a lot about my progress with and around N.W. in my paper Journal.

One thing I didn't manage to write was a reaction today in my final hatha yoga session (hatha yoga = physical exercises, as opposed to meditation or philosophy of yoga etc etc). I tried to write it in the train on the way home, but blocked. So for whatever reason there was a space beside me in the yoga room and nowhere else. N.W. turned up late and so she took that spot :aaauuugh: But OK. I didn't want to leave yoga just because of her, so I stayed and had a good session.

In Savasana (the relaxation pose at the end) I didn't manage to go into any relaxed state (though I usually can) and then violent images went through my mind. I haven't had these images for a while. Things happen to me that never actually took place irl; I know this because I wouldn't have survived them. No one would. I tried moving my feet and hands to see if that would help. It didn't. So I rolled onto my side and then sat up and opened my eyes. N.W. was lying on her side half way off her mat, pretty close to me :aaauuugh: :aaauuugh: At the time I had a pretty strong feeling that her presence was triggering these violent images. I'm not going to feel back into it now.

N.W. is no good with other people's boundaries. She just rides over them and probably I sensed that when she was so close to me. There had been other occasions during the yoga session where everybody was briefly in Savasana including me and I was quite relaxed, no violent images.

Anyway that's enough for this evening. I want to unpack and need to prepare for 3 students tomorrow.

Hope67

Welcome back Blueberry.  I admire your ability to deal with this situation and how you handled things.   :cheer:
Hope  :)

Blueberry

Thank you Hope :) :hug:

This morning I'm even managing to feel a tiny bit grateful to N.W. in a wry way. Because contact with her is showing me more and more aspects of my deranged and damaging FOO.


Wattlebird

Ow that women must have been a shock to run into again, I think you dealt with the situation admiringly.
:applause:

Blueberry

Thank you. Yes, it was a shock.

I did do well but now (as usual) I'm getting EF-y. Just want to go to bed and hide. Though actually that could be due to other things too.  e.g. the usual hopeful request from enF for a bit of contact and info from me, other than the purely financial info that we exchange. This morning I was thinking I would so like to be able to write a brief synopsis of what's up: "I'm making slow but steady progress. I'm actually happy, it's just that I'm often exhausted. I've just been on a yoga holiday. ...", knowing I can't write any of it. All or any of it could be used as ammunition against me, in their heads or on paper. Or just in my head wondering if they're insinuating against me. That probably sounds paranoid but I do know the things they tend to think and say.

Talking about ammunition, that is what N.W. at the yoga place is good at gathering. She did from me in January. She didn't from me last week but she was busily gathering from other people. N.W. buttered people up to gain information which she could then use against them if she wanted. I realised yesterday this "buttering people up" is "grooming" by another name.

I feel ashamed and embarrassed that I allowed it to happen to me in January. These feelings have prevented me even writing about it up till now. I know the feelings are connected in part to M haranguing me in my childhood about how "gullible" I was, believing everything anybody told me especially anything M didn't want me exposed to like the view from paternal GrM that B1 was favoured over me and that I was actually an OK person. These feelings of shame and embarrassment are also connected to being constantly told by M and B1 how stupid I was and not told anything to the contrary by enF. So I feel stupid for allowing my self to be groomed though N.W. was very adept at grooming. She managed to wrap the majority of people in both yoga places round her little finger. Once there, she could manipulate them. Woe betide anybody like me who realised what was going on and unwrapped themselves.

So the ammunition I gave her - she was fishing around for what problems I have and kept talking about burnout. Well, my burnout aka complete collapse is years ago now and it's too simple a word for a much more complex problem. So I said that if I'm pushed too far, I actually go kind of crazy and start screaming hysterically :doh: :doh: :doh: :doh: I'm pretty sure she was trying to push me into that with her behaviour in the first yoga place. She didn't manage :cheer: She got my middle finger and then she got a very rude remark when she came up all two-faced to say goodbye and wish me luck when I was leaving. Neutral words plain failed me. Yeah so she didn't manage to push me back to my old behaviour when stuck in a really bad EF and having no clue what to do, having no tools to use to express the pain I wasn't even feeling. In both yoga places she got push-back from me. She didn't manage to push me over the edge.  :cheer: for me. But she did manage to make my stay very difficult, very uncomfortable and even push me into fear and anxiety.

NTS: Don't give anybody this kind of ammunition. I can write about it on here and my T could know it too. Some Ts in the past knew it. In fact hearing that that was the reaction I feared in myself because I had occasionally felt myself go crazy inside and start screaming hysterically was what indicated to two Ts that I desperately needed trauma-informed therapy. So obviously it was good to tell them. But just any old people? No. Or worse, any old people who are pretending to be knowledgeable about mental health? No way.

I don't need to justify my existence. I don't need to justify things like my inability to work quickly or to work a full-day. I don't need to try and explain it with dire examples so that people understand. They most likely can't understand. They just need to accept. Or maybe not even that. In the case of N.W. in the first yoga place, it wasn't her business! Yes, she was working alongside me some of the time, but nobody said to her that she had to do more work to make up for me doing less. She ran around doing far more work than she had to, she kept trying to find more and more work. That was her issue. But the trap I fell into was her being all friendly and understanding :aaauuugh:

Some other very burnt out looking woman in the second yoga place had confided so much to N.W. that she mentioned her 'black soul' and I was sitting there thinking "Don't give that kind of ammunition to N.W.!!" Btw I don't think she meant black as in evil, I imagine she meant black as in damaged, depressed.

No wonder I'm feeling a bit Ef-y with these sorts of realisations going on. I have a T appointment tomorrow. I can then also address the fact that I feel somewhat jealous of N.W. the way I do of SIL2 as well. Another thing to feel embarrassed about, but I'm not going to write any more about it rn. Need to do some more professional work.



Anjulie

I think you've been very brave to stand up against her verbally.
Be kind to yourself. :hug:

Blueberry

I'm feeling low. Unmotivated. Rather go back to bed and hide and that is what I've done most of the day.

Yesterday my T suggested what I need to do is explore my physical and maybe even emotional feelings when I achieve things. There were lots of achievements in the yoga centre! I spent some of my time in T appointment feeling.

But here on my own at home, I don't like feeling!! I don't want to feel!  :blowup:  :pissed: :pissed: :pissed:

I don't suppose I've really got that out of my system. Probably I need to go and dance wildly to music, or maybe do EFT or even Screen Processing.

This Brexit stuff is getting on my nerves. I'm somewhat affected by it. Partly I feel the Brits who actually live in the UK need to go this path they're on and maybe, hopefully, they'll sort out what they want. otoh for all those affected by it with their lives on hold, well, not so nice. My life isn't actually 'on hold' but I did get a form today to fill out to explain why I should get to remain in the country I presently live in. Although a lawyer told me a good while ago there's no way I could get 'thrown out' after this length of time in the country, still I find filling in forms very stressful. And now getting this form in black and white - makes it more real. I have till the end of June but earlier would be better of course.

What I did achieve today: 1) I asked a colleague if she could take on part of a contract for me and she has tentatively agreed   2) I tried out a 2nd hand bicycle and have decided to take it. It's in good condition but also super-cheap.   3) I finally sent a bank transfer I should have sent a week ago    4) Supported a friend who was spitting with rage over someone's treatment of her   5) Oh, yeah, I got out of bed eventually too, before all the rest of the stuff

I'm not finding communication of any kind easy today so it's really good that I managed 1), 2) and 4). There is more communication to do - chiefly emails to write. Maybe tomorrow. There are also posts on here I could reply to but somehow I'm feeling too "turned inwards". At least I'm feeling that now. That's part of my therapy homework.

Not Alone

"I feel ashamed and embarrassed that I allowed it to happen to me in January. "

It seems to me that you were dealing with someone who was VERY SKILLED in manipulation. At some point you did see what she was doing and you stood up to her. To the degree that you were "tricked" by her, you did nothing wrong.

"I don't need to justify my existence. I don't need to justify things like my inability to work quickly or to work a full-day. I don't need to try and explain it with dire examples so that people understand. They most likely can't understand. They just need to accept. Or maybe not even that. In the case of N.W. in the first yoga place, it wasn't her business! Yes, she was working alongside me some of the time, but nobody said to her that she had to do more work to make up for me doing less. She ran around doing far more work than she had to, she kept trying to find more and more work. That was her issue. "
Absolutely!!!!