Still Recovering

I'm still adjusting to the shift that I experienced in early July. It's only been a little over a month but it feels like much longer than that...like I just woke up from a long dream and am trying to account for lost time. The main feeling I am struggling with is a familiar one. I don't know who I am nor do I know what I want to be. It's not an amnesia feeling. No, not a physical memory loss. I have my memory. This feeling is more along the lines of identity confusion. I know who I've been and the experiences I've had in playing all of my past roles. I also know what worked for me and what didn't. But the person I am now, the person I suddenly woke up realizing I was, doesn't know who she is anymore. She's a blank slate. Essentially the feeling comes down to feeling like I've started all over again.

I'm not comfortable with all the empty expanse of space in front of me. The blank canvas that is my life stares me down daring me to paint the first strokes of what will eventually be this new chapter in my life. Why is it always so difficult to start something? To put brush to canvas or to write that first sentence of a story? Why is it so hard to let go of past experiences, especially failures and losses, and see the future as bright and full of possibilities? And why do I have to have so many mini-lifetimes, so many new chapters, crammed into this one lifetime?

Sure, there are things in my life that haven't changed. I am still a mother and a wife. I am still in my 40's, still have the same body and features, still have the same mom and siblings and family members...so much is still the same. Despite all this sameness I feel different and there is a push coming from within to make a move, to just put paint on the canvas without having any idea of what the end result will be.

I know I have entered into a time where the spiritually profound is in the back seat. It is on hiatus. For how long? At least a year, maybe longer. This doesn't mean the spiritual goes away entirely, just that I will not be having spiritually profound experiences with the intensity that I did from 2014-2016. Though I am not directly communicating with my guidance right now, I understand why I need this break. When I look back at the past year it is clear to me that I need to rest, recover and slowly rebuild. I felt...still feel...that I was decimated from the inside out. Slowly I am recovering but despite feeling better, despite finally feeling like I will not die from it all, I am extremely tired and depressed. I am haunted by the question of why. I still don't know who won the battle that was fought or if it was even won.

I've been mulling over ideas about how to start again continually it seems because right now it is all the option I have. Start again. Move forward. Yet the past is always there whispering to me all the failures I've had. Everything I consider seems either hollow in comparison to what was or seems pointless because I've already done it. It feels inevitable that all my hard work will come to nothing in the end. Start, stop, start, stop. I'm just tired of the cycle.

I can see the booby traps my mind sets up as I consider idea after idea. Part of me says, "Just try something. It doesn't matter what as long as you enjoy it." True that is but then I want the path I choose to have the ending I want. All the paths I've traveled thus far have ended in disappointment. What I thought they would be turned out to be far less that I had hoped.

I've looked at continuing my education by taking the last few classes I need for my LPC. The classes will keep me occupied and then the internship following will as well. But then I recognize how I am. I pursue a career and become bored or disillusioned by it so very quickly. Why bother with all that work to end up right back where I am now? I've thought of returning to teaching, or taking a teaching assistant job just to occupy my time but then I would have to put my youngest in childcare and I know I would hate being back in the education system. I've thought of getting a personal trainer certification because I've been into exercise and good nutrition since the age of 19. Problem is that it involves sales and I don't like sales and the pay is poor. I've considered watching other kids in my home alongside my own to make extra money but am really not motivated to advertise for it or to deal with other people's kids or other people. I've thought of homeschooling but....

Well, the "but" says it all. There is always a "but".

There have been many, many education related jobs online that I know if I applied to them I would get. But I always hesitate because I see the same ending as before. Been there, done that, don't want another T-shirt. Plus, there is no joy left in that path for me. I know that this time I need to do something I enjoy, something that lights up my heart. This next step needs to be heart-led. Period.

My heart is not ready, though. I'm still healing and recuperating. It is bothersome to feel it is time to pave a new path but at the same time know I'm not quite ready. Like my guides told me a while back, "Enjoy this time." There is no rush, there is no need, there is no push except from my own restless avoidance of too much time.

I am still so very angry that I have been so completely decimated inside that there is no quick recovery to be found. It SUCKS. WTF universe! WHY? And I am so very, very sad at the same time. Exhausted, too. I have always thought of myself as tough; a Warrior. Nothing - no one - could beat me down. Yet this time I lost. Totally. The loss has just been too much. I don't know how to rebuild, where to start or if it can even be done. I can see possibility ahead but don't have the strength left in me to reach for it. Actually, I don't want to anymore. The voice inside says, "Why bother?" Yeah, why?

Somehow I have to get from total destruction back to wanting to try again. I can see progress being made in teeny tiny increments but it is painfully slow going. There are good days and bad. Mostly the good days happen when I keep myself physically active and occupied with things to do. Downtime is destructive.

As I write I can see where I want to be. It isn't a physical place or a job but a state of being. I can see that the reason for my sadness is because I am stuck in the past most of the time. That is why being physically or mentally occupied chases away the sad. If I could just stay in the present moment it would be a great relief.