Finding a way forward. When growth is crawling and reality unchanging. I am the only piece left untested. I have to be what shifts. Nothing around me is going to.
It is a strange thing. In a relationship sometimes the greatest way to fight for yourself is to stop fighting all together. It is not passive; it is a refocusing of energy. From – I need you to change to be ok. To – ok, I can’t make you change but I can figure out how to be ok.
I ask if there are any acceptable solutions lying around that I can piece to together. First looking between the relationship old fight and leaving. Anything there?
Maybe what I might find will have a host of lessons and gifts for me. I was the one to get myself here anyway. I’m not a victim, I just haven’t been clear eyed. At least in this story.
It is the classic story. Two people meet, lonely as they are, they’re pulled together. Truth and need mix.
It’s classic because I had the plan and he kept kind of choosing, kind of allowing it to move forward. What would our world look like if he had built it?
I guess that was never bound to happen. I needed clear expectations and he just was. Sometimes one way, sometimes another. Our clashing now weaves all the way back to then. I still want to set and follow through on a plan. He still doesn’t know what he wants except to not be planning.
Classic and common. At least from what I have seen. One person tends to carry it all, wake up with the to do’s and the worries. The other person is the opposite, dragged along. But if I look to a level deeper, what do I see. Him not really sure of what he wants. Nothing doing with me, just a person very unclear on how to identify and voice what is and isn’t for him.
And me. Under all the demanding, blaming, pushing. How did I get on a train marked us without him. Why is my most every moment wrapped up in our life. All the time I am working on our life, but I am alone. I can say with certainty he didn’t ask me to or trick me into being here. I went ahead without him.
Does that make us two people who don’t know what we really want. Because honestly I am far more interesting than my relationship. I am sure of it. Even though if he did hop on this train marked us, I would happily absorb myself in its journey.
I bet there is more to me though. So very much more.
I keep finding the dysfunction in this relationship prods me towards greater truth. So far, gifts keep awaiting me when I step back to show up and learn for myself, for us. So far, this relationship isn’t diminishing me, I am enhanced.
That is some magic. He doesn’t know who he is, yet the life in him can’t help but nourish me. I am codependent, yet my willingness to grow means I can bask in his light, in my own, in all of it.
Which leaves me with a couple truths. Growth is happening, I can see it, see him and me stretch, but it is slow. Or maybe it is fast but our road is long. I am also ready for a different dynamic. I can’t speed him up. But I can make different choices.
I can stop forcing the conversations. Constantly trying to figure out how we can show up for each other. I can identify my true needs and let go of the rest. A clean house – that is critical for my mental health. Having the house ready for our family these holidays – less critical. I want to release all I am carrying. I want to stop forcing us forward. I am lonely and tired. And I hate for him, that he can show up in more generous ways and still fall short. Because that sweet man is. He is loving and growing and caring. More each day. But it is slow or the road is long. And somehow, this all needs to be enough. Because in that enough-ness – I may find myself and he may find himself. And we may fall absolutely in love with who we are. One of the richest gift I bet this life and Earth has to offer.
–
When I prayed to the great Tree in my yard this morning, I asked only to show up to the lessons of today. I knew it would be uncomfortable.
It has always been uncomfortable. For as long as I can remember, I have fought loneliness. It is interesting how I can cry about work and this relationship taking up so much time and energy there is nothing left for me to be who I want to be. Yet in reality, when I don’t have something else to fixate on, I am sad and watch TV. Not always. Writing you tends to be a joy. Though today I don’t think joy will be a strong flavor.
I feel numb. I knew I would. Look how far back this battle goes. And I am not upset with the battle either. Humans evolved communally. It makes sense that I keep trying to throw myself into something more than myself. My methods and understanding haven’t been successful though.
I am less interested in my constructed human community right now. In this moment I would like community with my body and life around me.
Something exciting happened to me earlier this week. I saw people, even the ones I was struggling with, as little pieces of Earth. Like when talking with them, I was getting to know another expression of Earth.
That is magic and it brings a smile to my face on this hard and uncomfortable day. Thank you, profoundly thank you to those who keep indigenous love and wisdom alive and to those sharing it. It is healing to me and has allowed me to find home and self within Earth.
I have been praying to Tree all week now and each day I have found what I ask for. Today will be the same. I will find new strength. I will let go of carrying my partner and our shared life a little. I will invest in myself.
I asked for my partner’s patience. I am muted, not my normal engaged self. I really don’t want to explain it much beyond these pages and prayers to Tree.
I was right. Yesterday when I said he just is, sometimes one way, sometimes another. He asked we talk about the plan today. We did. He laid out a good plan. The first step would be some straightening up and sweeping before working on our project. His words, his plan. He promptly went into our study and has been there the past hour and half reorganizing his drawers.
Normally, I would have said something. Especially this mothing where everything on our list is important and has real deadlines. But he is happy and I choose not to carry our worry anymore. I am disappointed but I trust this is right. In the disappointment I get to be with myself, learn the lessons I asked for today and write to you. It is not so bad.
One day I will find new strength and life here. I will find myself and joy. I will know I am quite interesting and won’t pick up our problems as an occupation. Today and for a much while more, I will be uncomfortable doing work I have long avoided. My smile isn’t gone, it is just lessened today. I still choose this path and will thank Tree and myself tonight for a day of hard work and gifts.
–
This is day three of this story, a snippet of my life. Today I begin to return to myself, my life. A little dazed and overworked, I am unsure how all I have experienced and learned will join me.
But I trust it will.
Growth is never quite how I would like it but I can’t stop it either. I don’t get to choose how tomorrow will be impacted by yesterday. Not really. I can choose only to remember and let the lessons back in when they come. But what exactly will I remember and which parts of me will do the remembering. The beautiful, uneventful truth is these past days were not a revelation but a continuation. I have been on this journey. I get to a now absorb the intensity and wisdom of this leg so I can continue on. My body polarizing slightly more so it may attract what it wishes and yearns for.
This pain will greet me again to remind me of my work worth doing. My eyes will hope to resolve it knowing that will never be its gift to me. Just a little more growth, a little more forward. Just slightly. Just enough to weave me into a tapestry complex and evolving. Just like life loves to do.
I do hope I remember one lesson – the material goals of our relationship and shared life are hardly worth the focus I was taught to give them. The relational goals to be truly kind, supportive and wise to the both of us plus this growing baby, those are essential. To invest less in my list and more in me means I will have the resilience and clarity for them, my partner and this little boy soon and hopefully parting from me into this world.
-El An Gilman-