beginning, slowly

My blog needs a break. Or rather, I need a break from it.

I've contemplated methods of accomplishing this: looking for guest bloggers, an extended silent absence, dropping the whole thing altogether. But I don't want to abandon this space, as difficult as I'm finding it to keep up. I began this blog when I feel that I began, when I started to awake to this new level of consciousness that I'm unfolding every day, now. This has become more than just a blog--it's become a facet of myself, an extension.

When I became too involved with what I should be writing about or who would be reading its words or whether or not I should share certain information, it became less of myself and more of a concern. And my life didn't, couldn't, wouldn't allow for any more concerns.

So I considered ditching it. And immediately I took it back and snatched it up and embraced it, guilty for abandoning it, if only in my thoughts. Since then, I've tried hard to make it for myself, a self-serving space I could use however I liked.

It's a weird thing, this blogging, no?


Nevertheless, I've still felt like I need a break from it. My energies are just in so many other places right now that my heart just hasn't been in my posts as much as I feel it should be.

As you might know, at the end of July I finished my service term with AmeriCorps. Not only was I facing looming unemployment, but I realized I was left with the extremely trying, difficult, intense task of processing this year on my own, at home. The after-school program and family resource center I had worked with had lost funding and was shut down after ten-plus years in service to the community, leaving my small team with the task of disengaging from the kids and families we had grown to love, not to mention layoffs of the only coworkers I had come to know. So, the last month and a half of my term I spent sitting at a desk in the nonprofit organization's corporate office, faking smiles for the CEO and trying to pretend like I enjoyed working in a cushy downtown office where everyone acted as if the less glamorous neighborhood I had relocated from didn't exist anymore (where I'd much rather have been). It was a difficult year.

Add to that my (slow) acclimation back to the real world after college and my recent major decision to turn down two amazing offers at UVM and UW, and I was in rough shape. And not many people around me understood this predicament I found myself in.

But you know what? Hmmm, how do I put this.........I'm better for it. In fact, I began to see that these were fantastic, good things for me.

You see, the past few months of my life have taken an entirely new direction, a 360 degree spin. I was sick and tired of surviving. My whole life I had been just surviving. I was mad. I was furious. I was sad that I had to be mad at all. I had had enough. Somewhere in there, I found enough courage and love for myself to reach a breaking point, and I let myself break. (Breaking is scary stuff.)

I decided that at some point, the cycle of abuse turns to yourself, and you can either choose to abuse yourself as well, or try practicing some self-care and step away. I tried just that. I left home and awoke to this whole new world that had existed the whole time, just under the surface, that I just hadn't been aware of through all the muck.

I don't care for abuse. I don't care for negative, draining, exhaustive energy. I don't care for lack of support. I don't care for direct crushing of morale. I don't care for any of it. At some point, I realized that my disdain for such things had reached a whole new level. I was waaay up here, and they were waaaay down there, and removing myself from these abusive situations has been my saving grace.

I'm still up here, and growing farther and farther higher to an entirely new level of consciousness, but they're still down there. In fact, that's been the hardest part about all this growing--realizing that you're growing away from so much that you've known.

Now, I'm still living at home. I've found ways to deal with that for now, though. I've been reading Rumi and Julia Child autobiographies and Sark and travel guides to Paris (you know, for dreaming up my someday-getaway). I've been writing in journals and recording every single truth I come to realize about my life. I've been listening to myself--really listening, and trying to be true to that voice. I'm forming new bonds and shying away gracefully from the old ones.

I'm unemployed, for now. To some unsupportive souls who know me, this is a horrible, terrible thing. But luckily for me, I can still afford to pay my student loan bills and I live with my parents and have no rent and I can embrace it. This might be my only chance to embrace it. In two weeks I'll be starting back up again with the old daycare I worked at in college (I know--I was ecstatic when I thought I was done there, but it really won't be so bad, I know it won't be, it's simply a step for now), and until then I'm practicing self-care and discovering new outlets and creating new truths. I'm trying to remind myself to have some compassion for me, and go with the flow. (In fact, just the other night this notion of self-love was solidified for me: I dreamt that I came face-to-face with a seven-year-old version of myself, and we hugged and cried and it was the weirdest, but most satisfying dream-experience.) I want to go to the movies by myself and sit in libraries and read my camera's user manual and eat good cheese and practice yoga and revel in alarm clocks set early.

I don't know where I want to live. I don't know what kind of job I want to look for, or where to look for it. I don't know what I want to go back to school for. I don't know when I'll want to go back to school. But I'm not jumping to a place of "OhmygodIdon'tknowwhattodo" anymore, I'm simply living. I'm learning that this isn't a terrible thing, living. In fact, I'm rather enjoying it. Slowly.

Perhaps it would have been easier to write about all these things as they happened and prevented myself from getting too overwhelmed, ending in this huge voluminous post (kudos to you if you're still reading), but hey, I did try.

Therefore, back to my main point (can I remember what it was when I started writing this?), I'll be taking an August break. Susannah's great idea, that I found through Alfie, spoke to me--I'll be trying to post every day with just a photo or two, maybe some words, maybe no words, maybe a lot of words. Maybe this will make me want to post more often and get back into the swing of things, but until September, this will be put on hold. I need time. Hopefully you can relate and will still check back in for daily tidbits.

Until then, I wish you the happiest of Augusts and send you peaceful thoughts of summery relaxation! Thanks for listening, truly. My readers mean just as much to me as my writing here.

xoxo