Focus

I'm listening to a YouTube video on "How to Double Your Brain Power!"

The premise is that we can gather inspiration from the collective mind. That pure knowledge can flow to us when we have a clear purpose in mind, a clear question.

I've felt that before, beautiful clarity of mind as I pour out my thoughts onto the page. I have also noticed that the only things that tend to get done are the things that I focus on. Makes sense. The weight of responsibility is incumbent upon us to focus on good things then.

I have noticed that the things that I put in mind as what I want in my life are what eventually show up.

I put excellent health at the top of my list and work towards that every day. I think I'm getting there.

A lot of times the things that we put in mind to get are things we desperately feel we need. The worry then is that if you focus on some specific need/want without balance to other needs/wants than the other things will get pushed to the side.

So, what is it that you truly need?

Nostalgia

Today's been really nice, sunny and warm outside, with a bit of a breeze. Dad and I went shopping yesterday for a new washer and dryer set for my house, my washer completely went out, the dryer door wont shut (I have to stick the handle of the mop in it to get it to close). SO my tax return is going to a new washer/dryer...

I love the spring though, nothing gets me down when it is nice and sunny outside.

We are watching Irish shows today since it's St. Patrick's day today. I love old fashioned shows, there is a lot to them that is missing from contemporary shows. For instance there is a sense of time and space. There are pauses that signify emotion and there are subtle humorous queues. I like the neighborly and friendly way people are with each other. Life has meaning, summer, winter, fall, and spring each season and time brings celebration. I don't know that I've seen such calm and friendly contemporary shows in fact.

Makes me feel nostalgic for how things used to be.

Reflections

Summer time, growing up that was the BEST time of year. My cousins would come from out of town, Deda and Susu from Saudi Arabia; Shany from Arizona

Local cousins would vie for their time. Shany and I were two peas in a pod, she would often stay with me. Deda and Susu would live with their mom in a rented apartment. I liked to go hang out with them because they had a pool :)

Somehow, summer seemed to be the only time I was alive, truly alive.

I have vivid and permanent images in mind of how everything was. The old red van parked in the same spot from year to year, broken down. The lilac bushes that were sometimes full, sometimes broken apart depending upon if they had been climbed on. The fence on the front porch, the random square bushes that we could fall into when they were full of leaves and over grown.

The thick, thick grass front and back. The textures of the grass and soil as I walked barefoot around the yard.

My broken window, my parents thought it was broken in the big storm that ripped through and tore a tree up by the roots which fell on the house... actually it was me, trying to practice throwing baseballs... I was throwing them at the pillows on my bed but missed.

The trampoline!! The neighbors, how they fascinated me...

Walking barefoot down center street, hanging out at the decrepit shops and just loving it. "The Blue Door" a store that we couldn't find a name on. It was a hippy wonder land in there, Grateful Dead paraphernalia, incense, random mood rings and rings with crystals.

Life was intense! I miss that freedom, that yearning... innocence

I embarked upon marriage with the intense hope of youth. Love grew and waned through the years and so did hope. I had big dreams about how life was going to be, about the kind of mom I was going to be. Never did I think I would end up divorcing the way that I did. I held on, and LOVED so intensely and hurt so deeply. I turned away and turned back. Always, always trying to be a better person.

Then it ended.

My identity vanished

My nights became a reminder of the absence of that constant companionship that had been mine. I REALLY missed my husband. I screamed out in frustration that I COULD NOT turn back, I couldn't take him back no matter what he said to me. No matter what. Because he had betrayed a trust so basic that it couldn't be repaired. Even though I have forgiven him, I can't forget and I know who he is and what he's done.

I was writing to try and regain my voice. Ajey heard me. That relationship was VERY hard. I was so intrigued by his intellectual reasoning, I loved his songs. There was a great deal of irrationality in the relationship as well though. We went back and forth between what was possible and what wasn't. I felt unsettled a lot of the time. I was frustrated.

LOVE oh love if only I could regain the intense beauty of it.

As the sigh of the sea, the scent in the wind, the glorious stars

Longing for wordless connections, no longer empty silence

Simple silence, a pause

a breath

Lilac scented summer, soft grass

Shivering together, lovers, clasped

Stars pass overhead

Time stands still




 







 

I need to write!

I'm not sure exactly what I am going to write, but I need to write.

The past few days have been beautiful outside, calling to me. I've been dealing with a broken washing machine, running up to my parents to do laundry, trying to get some work done, cleaning, running errands and paying my bills.

Today I'm dealing with an intense searching for reconciliation between my perceptions of what I should look like, the cultural stereo types that are in play, and what I really want to understand and think when I look in the mirror.

My face is a reflection of experience. My body the product of as much healthy food that I could buy, and the accumulation of hours sitting at the behest of a job.

At what point in life do we simply look into the mirror and realize the beauty we have gathered from living, rather than hate the signs of our experience?

When I was younger I used to love my Daddies laugh lines, I would play with them those beautiful wrinkles around his eyes, straightening them out and always feeling happy to see them. It's not so easy to see them on myself.

Today

My little kids are sleepy, daylight savings time is taking its toll on all of us.

I'm asking myself what love means.

Love, when I was married it meant sadness, it meant giving up myself to someone, giving kindness for affection. It meant forgiving and forgetting again and again.

I LEARNED a lot, I learned that little things didn't matter, socks on the floor or forgetting some small task.

I'm watching "Beyond Survival with Les Stroud." He travels to different parts of the world to understand and document indigenous cultures and their survival techniques.

The Zulu in Africa have some traditions that remind me of Tongan traditions, including giving blankets at weddings.

When I was married to Sam I felt that I was in the midst of a traditional people with many superstitions and traditions that have survived for many generations. I was fascinated by them, I wished to understand. I studied the language, I studied their written text and asked many questions. Somehow though I was just NOT a part of it all. An outsider looking in.

There were cultural influences that effected my relationship. His methods of raising children, through dominance, was frustrating to me. At times I felt so alone, especially at cultural celebrations. Men don't sit with their wives, they hang out together, cook and stay out of the way... unless they are older and of a certain status.

Each day I searched for a way to make life for my family better.

Loving has also meant sharing confidences, laughing at stupid jokes, talking for hours about nothing in particular and longing to be together.

Love has meant holding hands, cooking together, and knowing that your silence is understood and understanding someones silences.

Love was holding on despite impossibilities. Love was hopeful... and my heart was broken when I let go because it was hurting too much to hold on when hope was no longer enough.

SG

Late Night Frustrations

This is blogging while blind, frustrated by situational scenarios of the day that have me up far later than I want to be.

I was on track for getting to bed on time, then fate intervened. Sam called me up and wanted a picture of his drivers license from when he went by a different last name, which happened to be under a pile of carefully packed stuff in the trailer outside. I hate digging through piles of stuff in order to extract files of stuff for my ex. I wonder why I am still babysitting him? Then I had to figure out how to get a good picture of said license and send it to him. I ended up scanning it, emailing it to myself and then sending it to him.

Enough said.

So, my goal of getting up early and getting to the gym has gotten just that much harder.

I am fighting a battle here with my own insecurities and fears. Reality and wishes. I want a strong healthy body, for my own sake honestly but partially and irationally because I fear that comparison of me to them. My beauty to others beauty. How do I measure up? Shallow, shallow, shallow world right well I'm a player in it, of course I'm attracted to strong healthy guys. My ex husband was a polynisian god when we first got married. Naturally built. BUT he wasn't healthy emotionally, he wasn't independent. I had to baby him. There are guys out there who worship their bodies, spend inordinate time at the gym. Who can really stand being with these guys, seriously? What I really want is someone with a healthy attitude, who values good health and exercises to maintain that health.

So that's my plan anyway, develop a strong healthy body.

Dating... it's nice. I've mostly been dating John, but there are other guys interested in me. I really owe it to myself to date more than one guy. John's a terrific guy though. We shall see.

Well it is LATE so I'm going to go sleep.

~SG

Swimming Trip

Hi there blog.

Yesterday Roxie and I went swimming with John and his girls. We all had a lot of fun! :)

These girls are all adorable!!

So here I am trying to sort out the ins and outs of life

Sometimes I wonder what the greatest good I could do in life. I know what that is, to be a good mom.

I'm working on that goal.

I need to wake up earlier, get going in the morning. Thankfully I think I'm almost to the point where I've got the energy and clarity of mind that I've been working so hard for.

I'm going to be rocking strong and healthy :)

I believe that once I'm healthy and strong all the effort living my life will be easier.

I also need to PLAN better, get more sleep...

So I've got an episode of ONCE to finish (Zombies in this episode, cool beans), then a good guy to talk to... and then my bed calls to me

Speaking of which, a nice hot bath would be good... I shall add that to my list

SG

New Relationships

I like this

Good friends that I have movie nights with. A job I enjoy. Kids who brighten up my day with the amusing things they do.

This time in my life is nice

My fears at this time revolve around what will happen with my next relationship. Will something in my past come back and haunt me? Will I be able to be loved for my genuine self? Do I accept and love my genuine self?

A new relationship means letting go of the frustrations of my past. Opening myself up to new ideas/possibilities. It means reevaluating what I thought was the most important thing to me, in some ways circling around to what I most valued in the past but gave up when holding on meant causing strife between me and my significant other.

Letting go is difficult. Especially since I am a compassionate person and hate when those I love are sad and in pain.

Holding on

I wish I could heal all the suffering and pain

All the loneliness

But I can't, it only frustrates and hurts me when I try

Because holding on means staying in a mode of indecision, especially where the decision to stay or go has already been made and I can't change the reasons for making the decision.

I fear, deception. Falling so deeply in love with someone only to find out that you're not really as important as you hoped you were to them. Something else was. You can't fight against that. Especially addictions and/or pornography.

It's hard to progress towards a beautiful relationship, while holding on to fears... so hopefully I can let go enough to be genuine and happy (and hopefully not get hurt).

Frame of Mind

I'm in a strange place in my life right now. Since my diet has changed, the levels of my emotions have changed. I don't feel mind numbing depression, which is good, but I don't know how to explain this unfulfilled sadness that I now have. Today it's been terrible, mostly because I stayed up late last night half working half trying to feel out the dating websites I joined. I say feel that out because it seems like I'm a non-entity on these sites. Guys will send me smiles, flirts, messages that they wouldn't mind an email from me. BUT then I respond and nothing... no response or 1 message and then .........

That's frustrating.

I don't know what to change/if there is any point in changing what I have put on the profile, I'm not sure that it will make any difference.

I am THIS person. Does it help to try harder?

In other ways it's strange because I am at this place of equilibrium and dating/getting involved with someone would change that. SO I'm not sure I really want to go there anyway... I'm OK being who I am, I've come to terms with a lot of things in my life that have been really hard. In some ways I just don't want to try to have to explain that to someone else. I sort of get the feeling that these guys are looking for someone without children, without emotional baggage... they don't want to put themselves out there for someone. Then there is a problem with the TYPE of guys on these sites, I have the extremely emotionally damaged types, the I'm too good for anyone look at my Pecs (how great am I?) type, the OK guys who don't really want to get involved with a family. WHAT am I wasting my time for on these sites? There was 1 guy, who sort of seemed he wanted to get involved with me. Except he was giving me signals that what he really wanted was to talk about sexual fantasies. So I told him I didn't want to be played. He assumed it was because of some emotional baggage but mostly it was because I felt unsure of who he was. I didn't know him. He sort of tried again a couple of times trying to be "intimate" but I would get nervous afterwords and text him about that. That wasn't cool for him, I tried to explain that it takes time to get to know someone. That trust is not automatically given away, that is foolish. That intimacy should come after trust is developed. That ended that.

In a way I was really proud of myself for feeling out the issues and standing firm. In another way it left me feeling frustrated and questioning myself about what I had lost? My sexual instincts, my understanding of what guys need, how I should approach them... and what about LDS standards anyway? I need to hold the line here... but what if there isn't anyone out there that is going to accept that I am trying to hold this line and yet I have failed so many times to hold that line in the past.... doesn't that look hypocritical... so am I ineligible for celestial companionship now? I've got kids, I have baggage.


Anyway that's where I'm coming from. I should go to bed to hopefully get enough sleep to be in a better frame of mind tomorrow.

~SG

Trying to be more open...

Good thought:

"So today, when I have a natural instinct to keep something a secret, I think to myself, “Why? Why don't I want people to know?” Because if I am living an honest life, and my eyes are open, and I'm trying my hardest to be good and kind, then anything I'm doing is fine to tell people." From the blog of Penelope Trunk

I have many, MANY, blog posts that I have written and hidden, or never posted. Most of the time they have to do with situations where I have let myself down. Where I haven't lived up to my potential as a person. AND a lot of times they have to do with situations/acts that I have been a part of that I fear will hurt someone else.

I suppose that is a part of living, making mistakes, seeking love, trying to learn from mistakes to do the right thing next time.

It seems to me that most of my big mistakes have been made when trying to find someone to love me. Sometimes I think that it would be better to lay it all out on the line, to not keep secrets. BUT something prevents me from doing that.

I kind of wish sometimes that I didn't have to go through the process of revealing myself to someone else. Of digging the bones out of my closet and letting them see the mistakes I've made. I don't know if I could ever reveal the intentions behind my actions without them sounding like justifications. For the most part all I want others to see is that what I've done isn't a one sided story.

There have been times when I have done serious things out of selfish motives. My short stint as a thief for instance. I got caught, thank goodness. That stopped me from continuing, made me wake up.

Another reason in regards to dating in particular that I don't want to reveal my mistakes is that it could stop a relationship from progressing. AND/OR it could give someone who really has no business into my life the "upper-hand." I'm tired of guys and their egos. I've spent too much time trying to preserve those egos for stupid, ignorant guys.

My present confusion revolves around a few simple facts. That I have several guys in my life that love me.  I love them too.

In the first case my ex-husband. Who is working REALLY hard to try to look good to me. ALL of the things he knows that bothered me in the past he is trying to make it SEEM are no longer an issue with him and he's trying really hard to get back with me. He is blessing our lives by paying child support and giving us extra money as well. But I feel in a lot of ways that it comes with an obligation to keep him happy and he's driving me crazy by calling all the time, holding me up on the phone and holding my phone up (by asking the kids to use it to talk to him). He asks me questions about the time I spend with other people. He asks me questions about my plans, life, etc. and I'm getting quite fed up with him.

Second. Z
We care for and help each other out. We have lots of similar likes. BUT I am trying to maintain a testimony of the Gospel of Jesus Christ and that while having questions about it because I've made serious mistakes and have not put almost ANY time into study of it. So I know that my faltering testimony could tilt this way or that and I don't want to become involved with someone who has decided definitively that they don't believe and won't believe. AND I don't want to try convincing them otherwise if I don't even know what I think anymore.

Third. A
He was supposed to be the missing piece in the puzzle. We spent so much time building up a nice vision of the future. When I was with him it was like I was my true self again, the person I thought lost forever when I became pregnant at 16. I really liked who we were together. We complemented each other in many ways AND he had a way of turning my self destructive behaviors around, making me face them. Then all of our complications turned into reality and we called off being together. BUT he's asking me to stay close, out of a hope that we might still have a relationship some day.

Otherwise I have no real prospects at the moment. The guy from work turned out to NOT be a guy to be with. Online dating sites have produced so far, random old guys (over 45), divorced guys with kids (and I have the same reservations getting into a relationship with them that they probably do getting into a relationship with me. IE they've got kids, and who knows how things would work out), a couple of guys that have "liked" my pictures but don't have good enough English to carry on a conversation, some I was sort of interested in but who never returned my messages, one guy who thought that discussing every point on my profile was a good idea (so tell me, in what ways do you feel like a poet? haha)... UGH I hate this sort of thing.

I've just about made up my mind that I need to join the local Cross-Fit gym or hang out a lot at Real Foods in order to meet someone who has a similar mindset to my own. But then I've no guarantee that they are going to be interested/members in the church.

So, geez.

We've been watching so much "Cake Boss" lately that I feel like a part of the Valestro family. I don't do much with my own family and in fact have an opportunity to hang out with them on Saturday but feel like going to do something else at the local Yoga studio. I don't know why but I just don't jive with my family.

Anyhow... time for bed....

SG