This post has been a long time coming. Maybe not long long, but an inventory of the things in my head is overdue. Perfect timing.
The eclipse is imminent and today just felt like the day.
Full moons are for letting go of what we don’t want and a full moon eclipse is super ultra major purging and cleansing.
We have to know what to get rid of. And for that we need to go into the shadows and parts of ourselves that don’t often see the light and dig deep.
To exhume is to unearth something that was previously buried.
Get your shovels kids.
5 more sleeps.
I watched Warm Bodies the other night with Attica. She had never seen it and it was one of a handful (out of hundreds) of DVD’s I took to, then brought back, from the island. Dave burned 12 of them to his Plex server and now I have a tiny collection of my obscure favorites.
It’s the little things.
I am not going to go into a deep synopsis of the movie. It follows a typical teen romance trope. The end of the world can be undone by 2 plucky kids in love. One of them happens to be a zombie. I added a link at the end to a rather good analysis of the book by another blogger. Or you could just watch the movie. I’ll link the trailer too so you know what you are looking for.
There is a scene where the main character is healing for lack of a better word and asks another group of zombies for help.
R: Heeeeeeeelp exhuuuuuuuuume?
(Mumbling slightly less dead zombies)
Marcus: they said ‘fuck ya’
Its adorable.
And it got me thinking about my current dilemma.
I have had a reoccurring conversation about paranoia versus PTSD.
Paranoia, in small doses, is actually healthy. It’s a safety measure built into our brains. Assessing potential threats is a good thing. Thinking everything is a threat is exhausting at best.
Aaaaaand, just hear me out, PTSD can be useful.
Both things serve a purpose, you just can’t let them dictate your life.
But you can access old files and data to help make educated decisions moving forward.
Paranoia exists in the imagination, creating scenarios out of fear of the unknown. Our brain’s way of filling in gaps and trying to predict the future, but not in a fun crystal ball, tarot card kinda way.
It activates the fight, flight or freeze reptilian instinctual part of our brain and can be paralyzing.
PTSD is memory and recognition.
“Yes, this actually happened to me and I am scared it will happen again, because it fucking happened.”
This is why we only have to touch hot stoves once, or in my case a few times, I worked in kitchens, it happens.
As someone who has lived through some funky fucked up frightening shit, I really should have massive PTSD.
But I don’t.
What I do have is an intricate filing system for a brain that cross analyzes current situations with a pretty deep understanding of human behavior and patterns using all of the information I have ever collected on other people’s actions and reactions to similar events. Along with movie quotes, Jeopardy trivia, cross analysis of quantum physics and how it relates to the human experience, recipes and so many song lyrics.
Most of the time it serves me well. I think I am lucky.
If I am conversing with you, I am learning you. I can’t help it. I am listening to your stories to see how you reacted to different scenarios. If I know you well enough, I can fairly accurately predict your behavior. Not always, just mostly.
Sometimes people throw me a curveball and I end up questioning my entire existence, or I blatantly ignore what is actually happening because it doesn’t fit my narrative and then hindsight smacks me upside the head, but that is not what this is about. There are plenty of blog posts about that.
I also adamantly refuse to let people who have hurt or wronged me live rent free in my head and dictate my behavior and what I do with my life. They aren’t here, they can’t hurt me. But that is a choice I made a long time ago.
Living well is the best revenge, not that I am vengeful, I just stopped caring about those who do not care about me.
Same goes for people that I hurt who are no longer a part of my life. Of course I feel bad about it, but at the very least I learned a lesson about what not to do moving forward. Data analysis all the same. Changed behavior is the best apology. Dwelling helps no one once the lesson is learned.
The problem with PTSD and why it isn’t always a useful tool is that the connections in the brain will automatically see how certain people and situations are the same as a past traumatic event, as opposed to seeing how they were different.
PTSD equates all similarities as red flags and no white or green or chartreuse.
Red flags exist for a reason, I have long been colorblind, but I am getting better.
No situation is all or nothing. In actuality maybe, but not in the safe distance that is the contemplation of it.
Everything done can be undone. I am walking proof.
I have made some bizarre decisions on a whim and landed in some weird situations. I have been 3000 miles from home flying by the seat of my pants often in the last few years.
But I am still here, and those events, traumatic, euphoric or anything in between, are just stories I tell now.
We do also have to factor in Albert Einstein’s motto ‘Insanity is doing the same thing over and over while expecting different results.’
I will admit there have been times in my life where I was absolutely insane by this definition. 2005 to 2011 as an example. By rights I should be bitter and scared and vehemently monogamous or a full blown lesbian instead of bi.
Instead I came out of a very unfaithful marriage, constantly fighting to be the ‘only one’ and instead of being staunchly against polyamory, I embraced it. I can only assume this pisses him off. But he went about it all wrong. It wasn’t an agreement, there was no honesty, just force.
My conclusion, once all the data had been analyzed, was that I no longer expect monogamy from partners, nor will I ever be with him again.
Healthy reaction to PTSD and trauma. I learned something valuable, kept the lesson and threw the whole man out.
Like Sarah at the end of Labyrinth. “You have no power over me.”
No one does.
Don’t get me wrong. I still worry. I still hesitate and edit the words coming out of my mouth sometimes…lie detector determines that is a lie, I have no filter…but I will wait for better moments to bring things up. I read the room. And actually plan things by the moon and stars too. No point having a big emotional talk when I am 2 days from bleeding during a retrograde. I do have an inkling of self-preservation left and a blog I can vent on instead.
Do I think everyone should be like me and just do random shit while hoping for the best? No, of course not. Some people are only happy when they are safe, and that’s okay too. But to squander a chance at adventure because of what some dipshit did a decade ago doesn’t sound right to me either.
When does the art of self-preservation equate a lack of living?
When paranoia and PTSD take over would be the easy answer. But it isn’t that easy. How do you tell someone who has lived through unimaginable pain that it won’t happen again just because you said so. You can’t, to do so is dismissive. Time heals, patience, learning that person and what hurt them and definitely trying really hard not to do those things to them. That’s a start.
Or you could be me, running willy nilly into the next thing just in case it’s good.
And every time it rains
You’re here in my head
Like the sun coming out
Ooh, I just know that something good is going to happen
And I don’t know when
But just saying it could even make it happen
Kate Bush, Cloudbusting
Of all the times I wanted off this mortal coil, and there have been plenty, what kept me going was the idea that I haven’t seen everything there is to see yet. I haven’t lived, loved or been loved fully enough yet. And no matter how bad things got, I could remember the other bad times and I knew they ended eventually. And I am getting better at leaving.
I think I have always known something good was going to happen and staying somewhere safe and hidden was not the way to find it. But that is just me.
“Have enough courage to trust love one more time, and always one more time.” — Maya Angelou.
Yes Maya, I agree, Kate too.
But there is still a scared girl who sat on a bus with an army surplus rucksack full of half my worldly possessions and a baby in my belly escaping a ‘leap of faith’ move gone wrong. The 2 dozen times I fled the farm and rebuilt my life from an air mattress on the floor to a nice apartment, just to get sucked back in again. Until I left for good and rebuilt one more time. Then the island debacle, where I was almost free but did an 18 day turn around and stayed 18 more months in perdition.
And for that, we must exhume.
Not just to find the cause of death, but to see what worked and what can be thrown away.
Once it’s all out of the ground you are gonna find a lot of the baggage buried with your past was never yours to begin with.
http://empiresandmangers.blogspot.com/2013/03/warm-bodies-exhuming-humanity.html
cool blog book review of warm bodies.
I now need to buy the book.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=07s-cNFffDM