Love is a Choice

Your task is not to seek for love,

But to merely seek and find

All the barriers within yourself

That you have built against it.

- Rumi

There is a clash of ideas out there. One that says that love just happens, that we “fall” in love, that we are pulled by an unseen force, stronger than ourselves into an abyss of love and loving, the state of being in love. So if we do not feel it, if love does not magically appear, then there is no hope for it to ever be there. Love either is or is not. You either love someone or you don’t. That is my summary of how some people view love.

 

I have a different opinion that has come to me through experience. Love is a choice. Love is a challenge for some people. Take me for example. In my early life I did not sense love from my family and I had no friends. I was solitary. Love was a concept that our family, victimized and disseminated by incest and secrecy could not grasp. If we felt anything like love it was for and from God – an immaterial juxtaposition of superstition and hope. My soul was so fractured,  that up to the age of 15 I never connected on an emotional level with another human being.

 

The most I could understand about caring for another creature was in my relationships with my cats. I cared for them. I maybe even loved them. Perhaps it was because they came to me when I was in pain. They never asked for anything, and their love was unconditional. It would be years before I would learn, through trial and error, to love a person.

 

My experience showed me that love does not simply appear. I had to want it. I had to desire it wholly. This was not an easy thing to do, being so wounded and jaded in my formative years. I spent years looking for love in all the wrong places. I didn’t find it. I felt like a failure. Not until my heart was broken by “falling in love” and being rejected, did I begin to understand that love is linked to power and that power is linked to choice. I needed to heal, to find my strength, to find myself, to love myself. This groundwork was a necessary precursor to loving someone else.

 

Why is it so hard to love another person? I think it is because we are perfectly imperfect. To accept, even cherish, the flaws of another is an act of will. We must first be in a position of power in our own lives. Only then is it possible to use that power to create love in the world, and to give that love to another. But we must desire to have love, and make the choice to cultivate it. First we seek to understand why we do not love, then we work through to the point of empowerment. Through power we heal and begin to love ourselves. Then we move that love forward into the world.

 

To be in love with a person requires the ability to create love of self, and with power to move that love into the world. We choose who to love. We choose who we want to be with. Romantic love and feelings of lust may be fleeting but compassion, adoration, compatibility, acceptance and powerful soul love are long lasting. We may give, we may withhold, we may take them away. This is part of human nature and human power.

 

So we do not seek love. We choose to love by understanding what it is within ourselves that prevents us from creating love. The universe sends all manner of opportunity to those who face challenges in this area. People, circumstance, experience, challenges – they come into our lives to teach us. We must not waste the opportunity to realize our potential to love ourselves and love each other.

 

 Dedicated to Matt, in whose potential to love I believe with every fiber of my being.

Reconciliation

My Dear,

This is the letter I cannot send, but write to more fully reconcile the ending of our relationship.

 

Our time together was… perfect. I felt more myself with you than with any man I have ever known.  We just fit together, physically, intellectually, in all the little ways that are important. I adored you, and was happy to be a part of your life, and for you to be a part of mine.

I am sad and full of regret for pushing you, rather than accepting you. I asked for acceptance and received it with tender understanding. I am an impulsive person, often seeking adventure and danger. Female drama is all it is. That is why I demanded more than I knew you were ready to give. It was not that I needed you to say, “I love you”. It is more a problem of my own, that I have so much self-doubt, that I push people too hard. I don’t want to be like that, especially with you. I know now that I forced the issue because of my own destructive tendencies. At the time I sent that letter, I was thinking only of myself and angry that you were asking me to give you the space you needed to heal. I fooled myself into believing I had a higher motivation. I am so flawed. I am sorry. That is not that person I want to be.

 

In truth, I think your pace in our relationship was steady, true and healthy. It was exactly the right thing. Even now, my remorse grows, knowing that the kind of connection I seek is not an extreme emotional burst, but true companionship. From you I have learned so much already, and believe you have learned from me too. I sense that if I had not sabotaged our relationship, that we would have continued to learn from each other, and become better for it.

 

I dont’ know if that is what you want, but I know it is what I want. The more fully I understand that I am better for having known you, the more deeply I regret pushing you away. I only hope that someday we may reconcile. You have been more honest than I. You are an example to me of the value of restraint and introspection. These are attributes I find lacking in myself, but so desire to cultivate.

 

Right now I am doing a lot of soul searching, and focusing on growing through losing you. I am taking care of my body by working out and eating right. I am taking care of my soul by being honest about my own flaws. I am growing by being more compassionate toward myself and others in all ways. We all make mistakes, none of us are perfect, but we all need love in our lives.

 

Yours truly,

Your Sweetheart

In His Own Words

Well, I could sort of sense that the last couple of weeks were going to present a challenge for our relationship. I know that you have wanted more from me and I have wanted to be able to offer more. However, I don’t think I am capable of it. I wonder if there is something wrong with me because I enjoy your company, and think you are pretty and smart too. But I can’t fake it and say that I love you. I don’t have much experience to refer to in this area so I don’t know what is considered normal but I cannot manufacture deep emotional feelings and am not the type of person to try to lie about that. I hate to have to tell you this but at this point I cannot see continuing to stay with you. We are not working as a couple and I feel terrible about not being able to give you the love that you deserve. I have enjoyed our time together but we have to end it here.

I hope you understand.

Sex Among Friends

Breaking up is a grieving process. Even though we weren’t right for each other, it still hurts to say goodbye to love. It’s helpful  to have friends (or at least acquaintances) on hand in moments of distress.

 

So the story goes that the day after my break-up I found myself calling on a new friend, one I met at work. He is friends with my boss and comes in regularly as a customer. I would say I see him at least once a week. This guy is someone I would classify as an odd character. While I’m sure he’s nearly twice my age, he acts like a hyper teenage boy. He has crazy hair, a strange face, and an awkward physique. These things coupled with a rancid and inappropriate attitude would not normally be attractive, but his cavalier demeanor make it nearly irresistible.

 

While happily living in coupledom with my perfect boyfriend, I thought of him as little more than an acquaintance. He would come into work and blatanly say that he liked me and wanted to go out. He would bring up sex and watch for a response. Being a professional I could handle his behavior without creating drama. Perhaps this is because it was also done in such a way that I could laugh it off and move on without any awkwardness. Well, having my heart broken, I began to think that perhaps I should call him on his shit.

 

The day after my break-up I went into work and hoped he would come in. He didn’t. So I tracked down his cell number and sent a text message. Within 20 minutes of leaving work we met at a bar. I don’t drink, but made an exception in this case. That night I took him home and made him cuddle me all night. I might have had sex with him but my energy level was low and he was being kind of mean. He kept accusing me of setting him up for some kind of elaborate prank. Thought I was in cahoots with my bosses. (As if I would want them to know what I was up to!)

 

He did come into my work for many hours the next day. He was in a foul mood, which I attribute to lack of sleep, sports injuries, personal insecurity and perhaps angst over the lack of fucking from the night before. But he didn’t let on to anyone that anything had happened. Naughty secrets thrill me through and through. I think that if he shapes up his attitude and can actually be nice to me like before, that I would enjoy having sex with my new friend. He is certainly not relationship material, but it would be highly taboo and that alone is a turn on.

 

I believe it is a pleasure and a gift to have friends that will strip me down and screw me to a pulp. As long as there is respect and discretion, I think that sex among friends can definitely help numb the pain of a break-up.

Rare conversions

Finishing the glass of wine in the bathroom overlooking Helsinki

My eyes glassy and kind, intent drawn up introspectively

I take a final look at the broad expanse of city just south of nature’s great polar cap

There is nothing further north of here but ice, I consider the thought

It rolls through me like a shudder, a dread

Too many minutes have passed for decency to remain in the rectangular room

The large window, right by the pot – an exhibitionist’s dream

But I, being neither exhibitionist nor dreamer feel wary

A certain thrill, tangible and allowable with thanks to strongly mixed drinks

Accompanies me to the business of lifting my heavy wool skirt, slipping down my multicolord winter tights and delicate undies

Then with a rush of letting go, the tinkle and the view

 

Letter to my future X

It’s about time that I share the letter that caused the end of it all. Seven months of exclusively seeing each other, and half as many months on my end, feeling like I needed more. So, here you go, this is the actual letter I wrote, knowing it would most likely be the end of our relationship.

Dear Lover,

There is so much on my mind right now and I can’t stand to have it weigh on me. Maybe it would be wise to allow all these thoughts to sit, to marinate, to unravel and to perhaps wind down. It seems an eternity with my mind a factory constantly creating, churning and spewing out product… while no one is buying. The supply far exceeds the demand.

While your actual appearance in my reality has become a dim flicker, in my consciousness I have fashioned a demigod. (I mean to say I have been thinking about you a lot.) I have come to understand on a clear and concise level what it is that I want that I am not getting from our relationship. Now, I feel guilty, selfish and undeserving for even desiring these things. Yet, I go on desiring. Until recently the hope of a future where the seeds of my longing come to fruition has been enough.

I am so sad. I cannot even calculate my sadness. There is a lot of hurt here. I wish I could show you that I am a person of passion as well as substance, of logic along side impulse. Perhaps that is evident now. There are two things, but I will address now only the crux of the matter.

Why do I have to write these words, when I should speak them?

I love you.

I just do and I want you to love me too. But you just don’t. Or if you do, you don’t show it. You don’t want to say it. Am I aiming to get something out of you? I don’t know anymore. I’m just tired of striving so hard. I wanted to wait until you were ready. Now I think you will never be ready. Not for me. Maybe that’s the problem. I am blind and do not realize that you are not for me, but for someone else.

You amaze me. I feel comfortable with you and can imagine so much more with us together. But I need you to open up to me on an emotional level. If it is not there, then it’s not there. It hurts me to think that. For your sake and mine. It pains me to think that you might have nothing to say, that all this pouring out of me is simply the catalyst for a cataclysmic reaction. I don’t want to stop being with you, but for how long can I hang on to an impossible dream?

I hope you receive this with compassion because I am terrified of what I have done in writing this letter.

With much sincerity, 
Your Darling

Living Coma

Candidiasis – the symptoms of this perplexing overgrowth have kept me in a state closer to a living coma than to a real life. Former diagnoses of my symtpoms have included (in chronological order):

1- Depression: I was treated for depression for two years with SSRIs, mainly Prozac. Far from improving my symptoms they worsened until treatment was discontinued. During this time I also engaged in psychotherapy, which had somewhat better results. My belief is that talk therapy helped me to better engage with my body, which was the first step towards discovering my true illness.

2- Bipolar Disorder: For anyone not familiar with this diagnosis, it is a burden to carry. My x-husband would tell me I was “being crazy” or “being bipolar” whenever I would get angry with him (anger which was warrented, if not helpful). Granted, I was often irrational and would experience extreme highs and lows. I exhibited many of the symptoms associated with this disorder, especially in relation to mood and self-medicating behavior.

3- Gluten intolerance/wheat allergy: As a result of red, flaky skin on my face I went to an aesthetician. She said it looked like a food allergy. She was right because my doctor diagnosed me with an allergy to wheat and I started cutting it and all gluten containing items from my diet. The flaky red skin went away almost immediately, but it returned almost six months later, despite strict adherence to the new diet.

So… three wrong diagnoses and over ten years of living with mood swings, depression, anxiety, chronic constipation, yeast infections, fungus and later skin rashes and no treatment is 100% successful.

Finally, four weeks ago I got yet another diagnosis: Candidiasis aka Candida albicans. This is usually seen in immunocompromised individuals, or people with very poor diets or obesity. So why me? I’m basically “healthy”, not obese and have a good if not excellent diet.

While thinking it over for 3 weeks of total deprivation (no sugar, no carbs, no fruit etc.) I began to vividly remember the diet of my childhood. I hated food. I hated the highly refined, boxed dinners that fed our poor family of six. Our food was lots of starch (potatos and rice), vegetables came in cans and meat was on sale and probably full of antibiotics. Our parents fed us juice instead of real fruit. We always had desert. Candy at grandma’s every weekend came from Costco and we ate til we were sick. There was no sense of nutrition. Whole foods were and still are not a thing my parents understand.

Thus, the beginning of my battle with mental illness, digestive and skin problems can be traced back to poor diet in childhood.

Now, as a 27 year old adult woman I am left to take responsibility for my body. I must purge myself of my past. For three weeks I followed a strict cleansing regimin and the Candida diet. I lost 8 pounds! I felt great, invigorated, healthy and alive. I felt that I had awakened from my living  coma. The main point is that all my previous diagnoses were really SYMPTOMS themselves of a deeper underlying problem. Western medicine sucks ass by not understanding this premise, and by not understanding the culture and habits of the people it seeks to treat.

Well, today proved that there is still more work to be done. I ate some sugary candies in celebration of my success and immediately began to feel the life draining from my body. I felt sick and tired. Luckily, tomorrow is a new day! Even though I ate bad foods today, I can start fresh tomorrow and continue on my path towards cleansing the Candida from my body and regaining my life. Hooray for health!

Tongue in Cheek

My tongue is soft and flaccid against my cheek

Soft, idealistic worm rises to give form to dream images, narrowly conceived notions

From bed of flesh to consciousness the creep rises

I am in love with a man who does not like the word, so my tongue is still

I do not love a man who covets the word, and so I oblige with wagging

My heart is a cheater, mind drifts in the fog of choices

Yet the craving of my tongue is for one man – the stoic, the scholar

 

American Senryu for Him

Hard to see the past
Sewn up in new lover’s tales
Do my eyes show fear?

Lots of drugs you say?
His habit told in the nude
Five years clean, sober

AA helped so much
After twenty years of dope
Junkie turned thinker

Forty years old now
I hold you warm and alive
Don’t go back there please

Poetreearborist’s Weblog

Poetreearborist’s Weblog

Poetry created by a life of chaos and a mind set on clearing out the cob webs. Bizarre, deranged, spiritual and progressive – for the most part.