As I come out of this depression, I have the brain space to look around and take better stock of what my future holds and where I've come from.
My crazy thinking and acting are diminishing. This is good. However, I'm finding I have some really tired days here and there because I'm changing so much. I'm having one of those today.
When I look back at what has happened, I realize I am shifting my entire life focus away from and healing from two major categories of negative impact: Fundamentalism and trauma.
My younger adult years were full of rich experiences and wonderful people. I also was marinated in an environment of fundamentalistic thinking while living with and being around traumatizing or traumatized people.
Apparently, I'm in good company. I started reading a book called Resilience by Drs. Steven Douthwick and Dennis Charney. They indicate that 90% of humans will experience at least one acute, traumatizing event in their lifetime (tragic death of a loved one, car accident, health event, rape, etc.). So basically, all of us.
Add on top of that systemic, chronic trauma caused by a fundamentalist belief system or religion, long-term abuse or neglect by a family system, discrimination due to race, migration, lack of resources, disabilities, incarceration and dozens of other types of systemic traumas, and there you have most of the human race experiencing pain that is altering how they go about daily living.
Suddenly, I feel like I'm not alone.
I've invested considerable time just to understand why I am why I am and why I might be unhappy with much of my life. I finally feel I'm on top of that mountain and have a pretty blue-sky understanding of how trauma affects someone's psyche and body. That alone has allowed me to breathe easier, feel more hopeful, more away from despair of this sense of Groundhog's Day happening every day. Rob Bell: "Despair is a spiritual condition. It is the belief that tomorrow will be just like today." YES. Yes. That is what I have lived and am actively changing.
So recreating a new life with new daily rhythms, patterns, ways of engaging myself, others and all of life all the while embracing and deepening into all that is true, beautiful and good already in my life.
Yeah, just that.
Seeking for better while embracing and retaining the good.
TIme for beer(s).