The Best Way to Heal (Blog #832)

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Earlier today I started a new 1,000-piece puzzle–a Van Gogh painting. I’m almost done with the border. While working on the puzzle, I listened to a lecture about healing trauma by a hypnotherapist (Isa Gucciardi) in California. One of her contentions was that our symptoms (addictions, relationship issues, and even some physical symptoms) are our teachers, that if listened to can lead us to the heart of our problems.

For example, one woman who couldn’t (and didn’t really want to) quit smoking knew that she used smoking as a form of escape. Her life was busy–she had a bunch of kids–and smoking gave her a break and acted as a boundary that kept others away. What she realized in hypnosis, however, was that her desire for both escape and boundaries began when she was molested as a child. One man realized in hypnosis that he used chewing tobacco as a way to “be quiet,” a message he’d gotten as a teenager from his mother. For both people, once their root issue was recognized with compassion, they were able to give up their addiction (or symptom).

Based on everything I’ve read and studied, compassion for every part of yourself is a huge component in healing. There’s an idea in shamanism that when we experience trauma (which we all do and can take the form of something dramatic and physical or seemingly ordinary and psychological), parts of our soul splinter off because they can’t take the stress. Like, Deuces! However, thankfully, the can be coaxed back into the fold–with compassion. By listening to their story of what they went through (what YOU went through) and assuring them that you’ll take care of them (of yourself) from now on, they’ll gladly integrate.

This was a point the hypnotherapist made, that there isn’t a part of your personality or soul that doesn’t want to integrate. According to Jung, wholeness is the goal. Not because anyone can truly put Humpty Dumpty (all your broken pieces) back together again, but because the deepest, most true part of you, your soul, isn’t capable of being broken in the first place. In other words, that’s a part of you that’s ALREADY WHOLE and that knows how to heal, that knows how to gather up all your scattered pieces and get them working together again.

This, it seems, is the journey of a lifetime. Also, like the putting together of a puzzle, it’s apparently something that can’t be rushed. Personally, I get really eager for projects (including myself if I can rightfully refer to myself as a project) to be completed. I think, Let’s heal–today! Let’s solve all our issues this afternoon. But my therapist says I or anyone else would go nuts if their subconscious unleashed all its secrets at once. “You’d crack up,” she says. And so it seems that the best way to heal is a little bit here, a little bit there. One piece at at time.

Quotes from CoCo (Marcus)

"It's never a minor thing to take better care of yourself."

My Right Brain Walks on Water (Blog #497)

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Ick. Gross. Crap.

Last night–in the middle of the night–I woke up shivering, absolutely freezing. In an absolute mental fog, I threw on an extra blanket and went back to sleep. Finally, I dragged my weak and weary ass out of bed this afternoon at two. The good news is that I didn’t (and don’t) have a fever. The bad news is that my energy level has been seriously in the red, and my stomach has been–once again–cramping. And one more terrible thing–I haven’t had a cup of coffee the entire day–not one single drop. (It hasn’t sounded good.)

That’s how I know things are serious.

Now it’s ten in the evening, and after spending most of the day in bed either reading or napping, I feel slightly better, a bit more energetic. (A bit.) Like, I can hold my head up without the support of three prayer candles and the Archangel Michael. That being said, I do have a good appetite and am keeping food down, so that’s something. Maybe–just maybe–I simply caught a twenty-four hour bug or ate something that disagreed with me. Maybe I’m not coming down with the flu for the third time this year–or dying.

That’d be really great–to not die just yet.

I guess we’ll see what happens tonight. Honestly, I think it’s a shit deal, the way a person can go to bed–exhausted, sure–but pretty much feeling finer than frog hair, and then the body can wake him (or her) up in the middle of a perfectly good dream by shivering, shaking, and twitching (or throwing up, or what have you). Talk about a rude awakening. Seriously, what the hell? From now on, I’m requesting that my body save all its complaints and dramatic activities for daylight hours.

Of course, I can imagine my body saying, “Hey turd, we TRY talking to you during the day, but YOU DON’T LISTEN.”

In which case I would have to respond–“Valid point.”

The book I’ve been reading today is called The Language of Change by Paul Watzlawick. The book was quoted several times in the hypnosis book I recently finished and is largely about the two sides of the brain (left and right) and how each side “thinks” and “speaks” differently than the other. In short, the left side thinks rationally and analytically, in words and “facts.” The right side, however, thinks creatively, in pictures and generalizations. As I understand it, a person’s world view, or their “this is the way things are,” is developed and held in their right brain first, AND THEN their left brain is used to justify it.

Think about THAT.

The book contends–and it makes sense to me–that since a person’s beliefs (and therefore their “reality”) is held in their right brain, it doesn’t make sense for them or their therapist to try to change or address their beliefs with left-brain language. Think about the number of times you’ve attempted to convince someone logically (that is, with your left brain) that they’re not bad-looking, or not a terrible dancer, or whatever. But if you were to speak the language in which that person’s beliefs were originally formed–well–then you might be getting somewhere. This is why metaphors and visualizations can work in changing beliefs and behaviors–because, like dreams, they are based on pictures, the language of the right brain. Likewise, this is why myths are important–because they use powerful images or symbols to communicate important ideas and ways of being–to your right brain. They’re not INTENDED to be taken as facts or even make sense to your left brain, that part of you that might (logically) ask, “Well, now, how COULD a person walk on water?!”

You can rise above.

Personally, I intend to start paying more attention to both my body’s signals (like, to get more rest) and my right brain’s pictures and dreams. Because, like Sergeant Friday on Dragnet, I’ve got the left-brain thing down. (Just the facts, Ma’am.) I can rationalize and analyze all day long. I can give you a hundred reasons why something won’t happen, shouldn’t happen. And yet there’s this other part of me–half of my brain!–that knows anything is possible, that firmly believes no matter how badly the storms in my life may rage around me, they don’t have the power to bring me down. This is the part of me that says, “You can rise above anything,” the part that says, “You can walk on water.”

[When I originally posted this blog–last night–I got the right and left brains switched up, stating that the left brain thinks in pictures and dreams. It’s fixed now. It’s the right brain that does that.]

Quotes from CoCo (Marcus)

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All emotions are useful.

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Driving to a New House (Blog #485)

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It’s nine in the morning, and I’m in San Francisco. I drove here yesterday, and it took four hours. Along the way I saw vineyards, orange and lemon tree groves, and more trucks filled with tomatoes that I could count. The rolling hills of California, under the hot sun, appeared to me to be pure gold. But don’t get excited and start heading west–they’re really just made of dead grass.

The lesson here is that good lighting can do wonders.

I’m staying with a new friend of mine who’s attending the same dance workshop I am–The Switch. The event’s purpose is to foster the culture of ambi-dancing, or dancing your non-primary or non-gender-specific role. In other words, people who are normally leaders (typically men) have a chance to follow, and people who are normally followers (typically females) have a chance to lead. Anyway, finding my host’s apartment wasn’t a problem, but finding parking was. I circled the block for over an hour. (Street parking is free here but hard to come by, especially on a Friday evening.) FINALLY a someone pulled out two blocks (and up a steep hill) away, and I snagged their spot. (Having packed like Rose on the Titanic, I had to consolidate bags before huffing it down the hill.)

And because I don’t want to go through all that again, I’m not using my car the rest of the weekend. What would be the use? Parking is difficult EVERYWHERE here.

Here’s a picture of the Oakland Bay Bridge, which I drove in on.

After getting dinner at a local Mexican restaurant and checking out a neighborhood bookstore, my host and I went to last night’s dance together–on his scooter. (Don’t worry, Mom, I wore a helmet.) I can only imagine we were quite the site, a small Asian up front, and this large Caucasian behind (with a large Caucasian behind), holding on for dear life, zooming through the crowded, steep-hilled streets of San Francisco. But we made it to the dance in tact and easily found a parking spot–scooters can fit anywhere. Along the we drove through The Castro–the local Gayborhood–or as my host called it, “Queer Central.” Y’all, there were more homos and multi-colored flags than I’ve ever seen in my life. Even the crosswalks were rainbows. Plus there was a bar named Moby Dick, a grocery store named Bi Right (clever, huh?), and a coin laundry named Sit and Spin (think about it).

Fabulous.

The dance itself was lovely. Honestly, I haven’t seen a room full of such happy, smiling people in a while. The “rules” for the event are that if you ask someone to dance, you ask what role they would like to dance–lead, follow, or switch (as in, switch roles throughout the dance). So the place was full of not only the traditional setup–girls leading girls, but also guys leading guys, girls leading girls, and even girls leading boys. You know, just people dancing, having fun.

Being in a new city and not knowing anyone (except a few people I’ve met at other events), it took a while for me to get up the courage to ask others to dance. I mean, I did just have a rough experience asking guys (and girls) to dance at a gay bar in Dallas, and some of those feelings of rejection popped back up. Plus, I did that thing I always do the first night of dance events–compared myself to everyone else in the room and found myself wanting. But I told myself, These feelings ALWAYS show up and try to ruin your good time, Marcus. Just let them be–and ask someone to freaking dance. So that’s what I did. Actually, I asked quite a few people to dance–and a few people asked me to dance. And I had some delightful conversations. And it was fun.

And no one died.

The scooter ride back from the dance went well, but it was freezing. Having come through 120-degree desert heat on the way here, this is something I was unprepared for. I guess it’s because San Francisco is covered in fog (you can’t see the moon, or the stars, or anything at night), but it was sixty degrees when I got here, and God-knows-what when my host and I rode home last night. Thankfully, my host let me borrow a jacket (he’s very kind) so I could layer-up, and I’m looking at the cold weather as an “adventure.”

I can do anything for a weekend.

Currently I’m sipping coffee and thinking about getting ready for classes, which start in two hours. I need to take a shower and round-up a light breakfast. Mostly I’m contemplating a book on hypnosis, which I read a couple chapters in last night before I went to bed. From what I understand so far, the book suggests that 1) hypnosis is both a state of mind and a form of learning and 2) all of us are technically “hypnotized” far more often than we realize. In fact, according to the book, it’s possible (and likely) that my feelings of rejection and better-than/less-than came up at the dance last night because the environment (new city, new people, dance hall, music) reminded my subconscious of dozens of similar situations in the past in which I had responded the same way (feeling insecure). Sort of like when you change jobs or move houses but crawl in your car and suddenly find yourself driving to the old location and not the new one. We’re talking about “learned behavior” here (crawl in the car, go to location X), and this action/response mechanism can apparently apply to emotional responses as well (go to new dance event, feel insecure).

If you can learn to lead, you can learn to follow.

This theory makes a lot of sense to me. I’ve talked before about how I often react to present situations with past emotions–when dealing with finances, for example–and having this context about learning and behaving helps me better understand what’s going on here (in my life). Now–what to do about it–I don’t know. I’m only three chapters into the book. Stay tuned. But I trust that if a human can learn to respond to a situation one way, they can learn to respond to a situation another way. If you can learn to lead, you an learn to follow. You don’t keep driving to your old house forever.

Quotes from CoCo (Marcus)

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Stop buying your own bullshit.

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