I have just impulsively started and finished two paintings tonight, and have two others, also begun this evening, on pause. One of these finished paintings, of which I'm especially proud, is called "I know not what I do". Oil. Black. Glossy. With blood-red splotches swimming helplessly towards an invisible vortex.
I cannot stop thinking about two people I used to be friends with, who no longer want to talk to me. I think about one of these two quite a bit more than the other, because I had been romantically involved with him, and truly believed myself to be in love with him. It is a testament to this belief that for the better part of a year since he had and I had started dating, and basically 9 months since I last heard from him, despite attempts on my part to speak, that he does not leave my mind, no matter how much I try to cancel him out, no matter how much I argue for his dismissal against my heart, and no matter how many different ways I try to mourn the loss of him, in order to just forget about him. I've prayed countless times; I've tried to tell myself he is deceased; I have written persuasive essays to myself as to why he's not worth one moment of my time...and guess the result.
It's a funny thing, how love and thought work. And, by funny, I mean, fucked up. What do we really have control over, if not our minds? And do not our feelings evolve from our minds, what we take in with our senses, what fits in like puzzle pieces to form a picture that says to us "yes, this is it, this works!"?
Moreover, in the grandest of schemes of things, what can it possibly mean, to care so much, so relentlessly, so devastatingly, for a person who doesn't even want to see your face?
I've spent much time lately taking stock of my life, of myself as a person, of my choices, my paths, and my actions, not to mention the root of it all: my thoughts.
I've arrived at this:
Change is nearly impossible, but it's not impossible.
If you desire change, you must get very, very comfortable with being incredibly, unbelievably uncomfortable, at every second of the day.
But if you are content with who you are, as well as the limits to your nature, then you accept certain outcomes for your life, and you also accept that you will not rise higher than these limits.
Now, this might make me sound like a negative nelly, so if anyone perceives that I missed a third, positive option, let me know, because I'm more than happy to be proved wrong.
So where does this leave me, a girl who, in some cases, doesn't have a clue as to what she might have done wrong? Or, in other cases, knows exactly what she did wrong, but won't be forgiven by someone? Or, is simply disliked, because of who she is?
I don't know the answers to this. It's also a lot harder to deal with people who explicitly refuse to make apologies for their behavior, even if their behavior is, on all rational counts, bogus. Because if you apologize to people like this, for errors you know you committed, this makes you weak. It's a no-win.
I've never had a relationship, in my entire life, that, if I so desired, could not be repaired.
This year, I've been blessed with four.
Now, I have not forgotten the new relationships, and new old relationships, that have begun this year. For those, I am exceptionally grateful. But, the wisest person once said, even if you've got 99 sheep, when one lamb wanders off, you're going to go after it.
So, what do you do with this? With people who don't want you?
You move on. You remember that life is, fundamentally, change. That everything, as the Buddhists say, is fleeting. You cannot form attachments because there is no actual form to which you can actually attach. I'm going to make a slogan tee: "Life makes a Buddhist of me."
But the hardest thing for me has always been the very crux of life: impermance. I like it when the things I love stick around. But it's not to be.
Did I mention I have a real hard time with this?
How do you get wholly involved with anything, if you know that it's going to go away? Maybe the answer is, you don't. Maybe you get economic about it, and you exploit it fully, and wring it dry before you send it packing, denying it the chance to do it to you.
Maybe I already do this, and I don't even realize it. I've spent a great deal of time thinking I'm a much better person than the outcomes in my life are revealing me to be.
Or maybe I've been spared a great deal. After all, the way certain of these relationships have ended, I wonder that these people were ever emotionally involved on the level I was, and still am, with them.
It's the easiest thing in the world: you meet someone, they are nice and chatty and outgoing and you have the same interests. You hang out, you hang out some more, and about this person, you can say, "man, so-and-so is sooooo cool, I'm so glad she and I are friends!". But then so-and-so does something that chafes you, and you bring it up to her, and low and behold, so-and-so blows her top and insults you when she is confronted. This is her nature. Sure, she's real sweet when it's sunshine and rainbows, but what is that worth? You could meet a murderer on the street and be the best of friends in T-3, but does that mean they're a great person? Does it mean you should be near them when it's a full moon? H-no.
Relationships are built on the easy but they live or die by the hard. What matters is not how well you can shop or laugh together; what matters is how someone conducts themselves in a disagreement. This is the only way you can really know someone: when the gloves are on. The good has to be good, but the bad has to be even better.
So, after several years of two relationships, and several months of two others, I can now say that I know four people, but I know them no longer.
I know I haven't granted forgiveness to certain people in my life. And I know there are certain people that I simply have no desire to be around. I know that this is the case for the people who refuse to speak to me. After all, if you wanted to speak to someone, and have them in your life, even if they had hurt you, wouldn't you? Truly, what would stop you? Yes, some people are like crack, but either you 12-step them and get restraining orders, or they're in your cell phone. There's no in between; the desire to see them, continually, is either there or it's not.
So, for those not in someone's cell phone any longer, you move on. You find replacements, knowing that, unlike what one of these people said to you, everyone is NOT replaceable. Every person is unique, and they, and only they, can bring certain things to your existence. If you view this any other way, you're not seeing the divinity in them. You are sorely missing the spark that makes them a unique gift, a brand-new song, a specifically radiant sort of light.
So you have to fill what these lights, now departed, left void. You have to find new music, different songs, and in your mind you may still be, all the while, humming old tunes.
Here's to new shows.
So, what do you do with this? With people who don't want you?
You move on. You remember that life is, fundamentally, change. That everything, as the Buddhists say, is fleeting. You cannot form attachments because there is no actual form to which you can actually attach. I'm going to make a slogan tee: "Life makes a Buddhist of me."
But the hardest thing for me has always been the very crux of life: impermance. I like it when the things I love stick around. But it's not to be.
Did I mention I have a real hard time with this?
How do you get wholly involved with anything, if you know that it's going to go away? Maybe the answer is, you don't. Maybe you get economic about it, and you exploit it fully, and wring it dry before you send it packing, denying it the chance to do it to you.
Maybe I already do this, and I don't even realize it. I've spent a great deal of time thinking I'm a much better person than the outcomes in my life are revealing me to be.
Or maybe I've been spared a great deal. After all, the way certain of these relationships have ended, I wonder that these people were ever emotionally involved on the level I was, and still am, with them.
It's the easiest thing in the world: you meet someone, they are nice and chatty and outgoing and you have the same interests. You hang out, you hang out some more, and about this person, you can say, "man, so-and-so is sooooo cool, I'm so glad she and I are friends!". But then so-and-so does something that chafes you, and you bring it up to her, and low and behold, so-and-so blows her top and insults you when she is confronted. This is her nature. Sure, she's real sweet when it's sunshine and rainbows, but what is that worth? You could meet a murderer on the street and be the best of friends in T-3, but does that mean they're a great person? Does it mean you should be near them when it's a full moon? H-no.
Relationships are built on the easy but they live or die by the hard. What matters is not how well you can shop or laugh together; what matters is how someone conducts themselves in a disagreement. This is the only way you can really know someone: when the gloves are on. The good has to be good, but the bad has to be even better.
So, after several years of two relationships, and several months of two others, I can now say that I know four people, but I know them no longer.
I know I haven't granted forgiveness to certain people in my life. And I know there are certain people that I simply have no desire to be around. I know that this is the case for the people who refuse to speak to me. After all, if you wanted to speak to someone, and have them in your life, even if they had hurt you, wouldn't you? Truly, what would stop you? Yes, some people are like crack, but either you 12-step them and get restraining orders, or they're in your cell phone. There's no in between; the desire to see them, continually, is either there or it's not.
So, for those not in someone's cell phone any longer, you move on. You find replacements, knowing that, unlike what one of these people said to you, everyone is NOT replaceable. Every person is unique, and they, and only they, can bring certain things to your existence. If you view this any other way, you're not seeing the divinity in them. You are sorely missing the spark that makes them a unique gift, a brand-new song, a specifically radiant sort of light.
So you have to fill what these lights, now departed, left void. You have to find new music, different songs, and in your mind you may still be, all the while, humming old tunes.
Here's to new shows.
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