Back at it...and feeling WONDERFUL!

Sometimes, we just need to "feel" what we need to feel and I have to admit I went through a time of "feeling" but I am the better for it. I worked through all the "stuff" around RBJ and I think I've got it figures out. At least enough that I am feeling good again and back to painting, sketching, studying, gardening, and HAVING FUN! Every day is a gift and I unwrap it slowly and savor it, starting my morning with my spiritual work.

I'm facilitating an "Artist's Way" workshop at in my studio and we are on Week 2 in the book although we're meeting for the 3rd time. The first week was about how the workshop would run, what's expected, and a basic introduction to the plan. The second week, we covered the first chapter in the book "Recovering a Sense of Safety" and did a fun exercise together. This week, we'll cover "Recovering a Sense of Identity." I am excited about the next 10 weeks and my journey with these wonderful ladies who have joined me in this voyage inwards to discover, recover and explore our creative selves from a place of spirituality and trust. "As you teach, so you will learn" rolls around in my mind and I am learning so much, not only about my fellow travelers but about my own self. I'm liking my own, too.

I think the month I took off was about learning to love my own self again. I let myself go into "victim" mode. I needed to experience that and then, one day, it was like waking up from a dream. Maybe delving back in to the Course in Miracles shook my soul enough for me to see that I was choosing to play the victim role. It was a choice and I was choosing to be miserable. So, I wallowed in it for a while. I wallowed in self-pity and self-abuse long enough to KNOW that I was making the wrong choices for the way I want to live my life. I forgave myself. I forgave RBJ. I forgave everyone who I perceived had ever "hurt" me because I really don't think anyone I have or have had in my life sat down and thought..."hmmmmm, what can I do to really f-up Sabra?" Nope, I don't believe that was the case but I was just wallowing around in the deep hole I'd fallen in to and bathing in the self-pity, martydom until I looked up and saw the sunlight at the top of the hole and noticed the rope and I pulled myself up out of the mire. I like the sunlight much better than the scary hole but as I climbed the rope out of the hole, I got stronger with each movement to get up the rope. I got stronger and stronger and it became clearer and brighter and when I got to the top of the hole, I looked down and gave thanks for my time there because I was sure a better person as a result of having been there. I make the conscious choice to be all that God wants me to be and to enjoy every single moment, to the best of my ability, for the rest of my life.

I've been on the South Beach diet for about a month and my clothes are starting to be more comfortable. I want to be physically healthy so I can enjoy all the opportunities available to me. I want to ride my bike and feel the freedom of movement and the wind in my hair and the sun on my head. I want to walk, swing my arms and feel the fresh air entering my lungs as I breathe deeply. I want to find love again. Yes, this was a biggie for me but I do want to have someone to share my life with and I know, when the time is perfect, he will appear in my life. I'm not looking but I just know it will happen. I know everything I DON'T want in a companion so that must mean I know what I DO want...I want someone who will read poetry to me, bring me flowers and do thoughtful things for me just to see me smile. In return, I'll go to baseball games and do the same thoughtful things for him. I want someone independent who doesn't NEED me but wants to be with me just because I'm fun to be around. So, to make that happen, I NEED to be fun to be around and the Sabra that was in that hole was NOT fun to be around and that's why I "went away" for a while. I needed to get things sorted out.

That having been said, I am also aware that perhaps a companion is not a part of my destiny and I have things that I am meant to accomplish. So, that could be a possibility and if it is becomes a reality, I'm okay with that, too because I won't live my life "waiting." I will LIVE my life, every day, in the way I want to live it. I will do what I want to do and be who I want to be and I can do it with or without someone at my side.

I found a handwritten note in one of my books that RBJ has written when we first got back together. It had a list of things "we" wanted. A home, a garden, a picket fence, etc. Guess what...I brought every single thing on the list into my reality. I did it and I have all of the things "we" wanted. I made it happen and I guess I pushed him out of my, too because his words didn't match his actions. In many scenarios, his actions didn't match his words and I finally realized it. It was an epiphany and something I had resisted for too many years. I didn't want to believe that he was NOT who I thought he was and finally, I did. I believe it. That's when I started seeing the light. I first had to forgive my own self for seeing only what I wanted to see instead of seeing the whole, true picture. It doesn't mean he's a bad person, at all. In fact, he's a very good person. He's just not the right person for ME and I accept that now and I believe it and I am ready, at last (after over 40 years) to move beyond trying to hold on to something that was never there.

You'd think I'd have gotten to that place many, many years ago. I would never have dreamed that I wouldn't have it all "figured" out by this age. But "this age" is just more of any other day that came before. I'm still a newborn, but more. I'm still a toddler, but more. I'm still a teenager, but more. I'm still 30, but more. We're still EVERYTHING we ever were, but MORE and yet sometimes, we get stuck in a place and time