Imagine waking to a cool, crisp dawn. You peek out the window and the sight makes you feel like a child on Christmas. As color begins to creep into the sky and its puffy clouds, the trees outside are dancing in the intermittent gusts of wind and the grass is glimmering with the morning dew. Caught up in the moment, you decide to dash outside to view the sunrise from the top of a grassy knoll. The dew drops are refreshingly cold against your bare-feet. Though the branches are still swaying mightily, the wind against your face feels like a gentle caress. When you reach the top of the knoll, you see that the whole sun is now floating orange above the horizon and its hue is added to everything; the leaves are a subtle orangey-green due to the rising sun and even the tree trunks seem to have a hint of blush. You close your eyes and feel the sun warm on your face and the invigorating wind. Imagine you're lifting your arms up as if hoping to fly. Imagine the sun's fire and the billowing wind are lending you healing energy. The wind is reminding you to view your hurdles and would be blockages to your greatest good as illusory and immaterial as the branches, for the wind never stops to consider that a branch, or tree, or house is in its way. The sunlight is reminding you of the light within and that if and when you let it, your inner light shines as a beacon of hope to others trapped in the darkness.
Wednesday, May 20, 2020
Friday, April 10, 2020
I See You, I Am You, and I Love You
If you spent much of your life yearning to feel seen, heard, and important,
I see you, I am you, and I love you.
If you struggled to get along with your peers and were often left out of group projects,
I see you, I am you, and I love you.
If you struggled on alone in school due to teachers who didn't know how to help you,
I see you, I am you, and I love you.
If you stumbled through reading passages while reading aloud in school,
I see you, I am you, and I love you.
If you spent too much of your time trying to prove your worth either through your grades or actions,
I see you, I am you, and I love you.
If you ever felt the need to tip-toe around people who disliked you because they made you feel inclined to apologize for your existence,
I see you, I am you, and I love you.
If you ever struggled on alone and in silence with a trigger word,
I see you, I am you, and I love you.
If you felt more comfortable reading during recess,
I see you, I am you, and I love you.
If you ever felt all alone in a dark and scary world,
I see you, I am you, and I love you.
If you've ever realized that you could give love freely yet couldn't send any to yourself,
I see you, I am you, and I love you.
If you ever doubted your reason for being here or ever believed you were here for no reason,
I see you, I am you, and I love you.
If you ever consciously stopped yourself from doing someone a favor because someone in your past showed you contempt for even offering,
I see you, I am you, and I love you.
I just want to assure you all on two fronts. Firstly, the trauma implied occurred pre-adoption so there is no memory of the event which allowed me to live in relatively comfortable denial by telling myself it was just a fear of a possible future event...until my biological mother told me about the event 10 years ago.
Secondly, don't assume the things in this poem have caused me to not feel blessed. The fact that I have experienced all of these things and am still capable of walking through the world as if nothing can touch me...there must be some form of magic coursing through my veins giving me courage.
Copyright 4/10/2020
I see you, I am you, and I love you.
If you struggled to get along with your peers and were often left out of group projects,
I see you, I am you, and I love you.
If you struggled on alone in school due to teachers who didn't know how to help you,
I see you, I am you, and I love you.
If you stumbled through reading passages while reading aloud in school,
I see you, I am you, and I love you.
If you spent too much of your time trying to prove your worth either through your grades or actions,
I see you, I am you, and I love you.
If you ever felt the need to tip-toe around people who disliked you because they made you feel inclined to apologize for your existence,
I see you, I am you, and I love you.
If you ever struggled on alone and in silence with a trigger word,
I see you, I am you, and I love you.
If you felt more comfortable reading during recess,
I see you, I am you, and I love you.
If you ever felt all alone in a dark and scary world,
I see you, I am you, and I love you.
If you've ever realized that you could give love freely yet couldn't send any to yourself,
I see you, I am you, and I love you.
If you ever doubted your reason for being here or ever believed you were here for no reason,
I see you, I am you, and I love you.
If you ever consciously stopped yourself from doing someone a favor because someone in your past showed you contempt for even offering,
I see you, I am you, and I love you.
I just want to assure you all on two fronts. Firstly, the trauma implied occurred pre-adoption so there is no memory of the event which allowed me to live in relatively comfortable denial by telling myself it was just a fear of a possible future event...until my biological mother told me about the event 10 years ago.
Secondly, don't assume the things in this poem have caused me to not feel blessed. The fact that I have experienced all of these things and am still capable of walking through the world as if nothing can touch me...there must be some form of magic coursing through my veins giving me courage.
Copyright 4/10/2020
Tuesday, April 7, 2020
Brief Uplifting Insight
After a powerful healing experience last night the following realization came to me:
I no longer resent the fact that my smallness has led me to feel unsafe and I don't resent the fact that I have so often felt all alone in the world for these feelings of powerlessness led me to pursue experiences of travel and to test my endurance on the Appalachian Trail. I was seeking to reclaim my power and therefore my deepest wounds became the catalyst for my greatest adventures. As I believe I have mentioned before: if it wasn't for other people's moments of weakness, I would not have sought my inner strength.
I no longer resent the fact that my smallness has led me to feel unsafe and I don't resent the fact that I have so often felt all alone in the world for these feelings of powerlessness led me to pursue experiences of travel and to test my endurance on the Appalachian Trail. I was seeking to reclaim my power and therefore my deepest wounds became the catalyst for my greatest adventures. As I believe I have mentioned before: if it wasn't for other people's moments of weakness, I would not have sought my inner strength.
Saturday, April 4, 2020
Meditative Imagery
Imagine walking through a dense forest and that the path you are on has a thick layer of leaf-litter allowing you to amble barefoot between the massive trees. Imagine thick, luscious moss blanketing the roots, trunks, and branches of the trees as you might expect from a temperate rain-forest. See if you can hear a light, pattering rain on the bright green leaves above you. Now as you walk gently down the path, picture yourself surrounded by an ethereal light. It surrounds your aura. Now invite the healing light into your energy field by placing your hands over your heart center. While doing this, actively send your grief out through the soles of your feet as you allow the healing energy to flow into your heart chakra. If you feel inclined, send the light to any and all chakras that have been imbalanced due to the grief that has been brought to the surface these last few weeks. And remember to breathe. With each inhale the light pours in, with every exhale, the grief moves out through the soles of your feet to be transmuted by the earth. Imagine the spring green that surrounds you is also filling, healing, and replenishing your heart chakra. Mother Nature is on your side, she is here to heal us if we let her. Breathe in the aroma of the spring rain and notice how the refreshing breeze caresses your face. Can you feel her love for you? Do you hear her say “I Love You” whenever you see a breathtaking view? For whenever she shares her beauty with you, you may hear, through the level of your soul, a silent yet unmistakable, “I Love You”.
Friday, April 3, 2020
Autism Awareness Post
As someone who has been diagnosed with Asperger's Syndrome I want to share my experiences of what it is like to be on the spectrum.
Our biggest challenge isn't that we lack social skills, our biggest challenge is that people rarely take the time to teach us these skills and instead mock and ostracize us for not innately knowing the rules of social interaction, thereby enforcing a continuation of our problematic ignorance. So we remain ignorant of what everyone else perceives to be common-sense etiquette. Not only this but then we sometimes make even more errors. And some for berate ourselves endlessly over these errors.
Let me explain. There have been times in my life where I refrained from doing someone a favor because there had been a time in my past when people seemed to get upset by the idea of accepting help from the likes of me. The way my peers had treated me made me afraid to do the right thing as well as the wrong thing. When someone with Autism acts selfish, it's often because he/she has been taught (through mistreatment by their peers) that they are an island unto him/herself. And when one has so often felt alone, the propensity to mistakenly act selfish increases.
I, to this day, struggle with being part of a group because in most cases during my time at school, I was made to do all of the work or none of the work. They made it clear that I was only in their group because the teacher placed me there but in all other ways, I was just extra. In fourth grade, I had studied endlessly this list of factoids about a specific county in Maryland and had successfully memorized all of them in order to prepare for a Maryland themed Jeopardy game. My team refused to pick my category throughout the whole game and the nail in the coffin was that the last question fell under my county and they still refused to allow me to provide the answer. I had done everything right, but since I hadn't yet been able to prove my intellect, they dismissed me for the umpteenth time and I was devastated.
Now earlier on, I still had a pretty good connection to this part of me that said, "Don't worry. Your worth can't be diminished by others' actions. You're smart, you're worthy of love and you're extraordinary." Now I don't mean this in an egoic manner, I simply mean that I felt I had grit, determination, and resilience that outsiders couldn't see and that as sensitive as I am, I've been strong in my own way and in my own right. But after years of mediocre, chilly, and sometimes outright cruel treatment from others, these words of comfort were no longer comforting for they began to sound like lies. How can these positive things be true when almost no one else is capable of seeing it? How can these comforting words hold any truth when it feels as though 90% of the people I meet dismiss me, underestimate me, allow me to struggle on alone? One of the only positive beliefs that I was able to hold onto was that I was smart whether or not I could find a way to prove it. My issues with dyslexia and ADD caused me to make mistakes when reading single spaced directions and to stumble through text when reading aloud. That said, my parents knew I was smart which might be one of the reasons I never let anyone else convince me otherwise.
My over-reaction to various events in my life were often due to the fact that I saw ill will and bad intent behind the actions and seemingly harmless words. If the people in my group were to tell me that I could get the ingredients for the science experiment and they would do all the rest of the work I heard, "We don't trust you to do anything but gather the ingredients for us." When someone in middle school asked me if I had IM, I responded "What's that?" and then she immediately said, "Well then you don't have it" and dropped the conversation and what I heard was "I wasn't invested in this attempt to connect anyway."
And the reason I over-reacted to receiving a C on anything is because I truly felt that I had yet again failed to prove to people that I could be above average. I went from failing a math quiz in 4th grade to going up a math level part way through 5th grade. I even got a math award at the end of Middle School. I went from struggling elementary student to a high school member of the National Honors Society. I aced high school chemistry, got a full scholarship to Montgomery College, succeeded in college level physics. I've gotten 2 poems and a short story published. Now imagine, innately knowing that you had great intellectual potential but being the only person in the classroom who knew that. Wouldn't you find a C to be surprisingly discouraging?
Our biggest challenge isn't that we lack social skills, our biggest challenge is that people rarely take the time to teach us these skills and instead mock and ostracize us for not innately knowing the rules of social interaction, thereby enforcing a continuation of our problematic ignorance. So we remain ignorant of what everyone else perceives to be common-sense etiquette. Not only this but then we sometimes make even more errors. And some for berate ourselves endlessly over these errors.
Let me explain. There have been times in my life where I refrained from doing someone a favor because there had been a time in my past when people seemed to get upset by the idea of accepting help from the likes of me. The way my peers had treated me made me afraid to do the right thing as well as the wrong thing. When someone with Autism acts selfish, it's often because he/she has been taught (through mistreatment by their peers) that they are an island unto him/herself. And when one has so often felt alone, the propensity to mistakenly act selfish increases.
I, to this day, struggle with being part of a group because in most cases during my time at school, I was made to do all of the work or none of the work. They made it clear that I was only in their group because the teacher placed me there but in all other ways, I was just extra. In fourth grade, I had studied endlessly this list of factoids about a specific county in Maryland and had successfully memorized all of them in order to prepare for a Maryland themed Jeopardy game. My team refused to pick my category throughout the whole game and the nail in the coffin was that the last question fell under my county and they still refused to allow me to provide the answer. I had done everything right, but since I hadn't yet been able to prove my intellect, they dismissed me for the umpteenth time and I was devastated.
Now earlier on, I still had a pretty good connection to this part of me that said, "Don't worry. Your worth can't be diminished by others' actions. You're smart, you're worthy of love and you're extraordinary." Now I don't mean this in an egoic manner, I simply mean that I felt I had grit, determination, and resilience that outsiders couldn't see and that as sensitive as I am, I've been strong in my own way and in my own right. But after years of mediocre, chilly, and sometimes outright cruel treatment from others, these words of comfort were no longer comforting for they began to sound like lies. How can these positive things be true when almost no one else is capable of seeing it? How can these comforting words hold any truth when it feels as though 90% of the people I meet dismiss me, underestimate me, allow me to struggle on alone? One of the only positive beliefs that I was able to hold onto was that I was smart whether or not I could find a way to prove it. My issues with dyslexia and ADD caused me to make mistakes when reading single spaced directions and to stumble through text when reading aloud. That said, my parents knew I was smart which might be one of the reasons I never let anyone else convince me otherwise.
My over-reaction to various events in my life were often due to the fact that I saw ill will and bad intent behind the actions and seemingly harmless words. If the people in my group were to tell me that I could get the ingredients for the science experiment and they would do all the rest of the work I heard, "We don't trust you to do anything but gather the ingredients for us." When someone in middle school asked me if I had IM, I responded "What's that?" and then she immediately said, "Well then you don't have it" and dropped the conversation and what I heard was "I wasn't invested in this attempt to connect anyway."
And the reason I over-reacted to receiving a C on anything is because I truly felt that I had yet again failed to prove to people that I could be above average. I went from failing a math quiz in 4th grade to going up a math level part way through 5th grade. I even got a math award at the end of Middle School. I went from struggling elementary student to a high school member of the National Honors Society. I aced high school chemistry, got a full scholarship to Montgomery College, succeeded in college level physics. I've gotten 2 poems and a short story published. Now imagine, innately knowing that you had great intellectual potential but being the only person in the classroom who knew that. Wouldn't you find a C to be surprisingly discouraging?
Monday, April 22, 2019
More From My Internal Monologue
Even when my mind starts coming up with encouraging thoughts, it can create an elaborate monologue that is capable of keeping me wide awake. My mind keeps dwelling on not simply the BS that I went through, but how I pulled through despite the BS.
I moved passed a phase of passive suicidalism and years of PMDD. For years, I've felt small and insignificant among my peers since they didn't want to have anything to do with me and claimed that they could say and do whatever they want to me since "life isn't fair". Due to early childhood trauma, I occasionally acted out in class or would cry over a "C" because I felt thwarted in my efforts to prove myself as smart, and therefore as someone with worth. Despite what teachers thought of me then, I ended up in the National Honor Society in high school and got myself a full scholarship to Montgomery College. I even managed a semester of straight A's in college when I stopped procrastinating on every assignment.
In my last year of middle school, during a major school trip no less, my peers walked away from the table when I sat down to join them at dinner only to come back when I left. Granted, one peer who hadn't seen this occurrence, invited me back during dessert. This repeated experience drilled into my psyche that I didn't matter; that I was worth less than others. Not to say that I didn't have friends, but as I remember it, it feels like I had one good friend at a time. (One of whom I reconnected with and discovered she remembers me!)
There was a time when, despite waking at 2 AM from severe abdominal pain that caused me to "upchuck" until I got to dry heaves, I couldn't dream of waking my mother up to ask her to take me to the hospital. It wasn't because of anything she had ever said or done to me, it was what I had started to believe about myself that made me pause. "This pain is terrible, but they deserve to sleep; I'll wait til 6." I literally watched 4 hours of some show wondering if it was appendicitis.
Just 3 weeks or so ago, I finally internalized the idea that I have permission to be myself, as stated in my previous post, I believe. But the point still stands that I discovered my inner strength due to these hurdles. It's what got me onto and through the Appalachian Trail; it's what allowed me to save again for an 8 month trek around Europe and the UK.
As I stated once in a blog post long, long ago: "The sunrise/sunset is beautiful because of both the clouds and the sun" and so it seems is life. If I hadn't struggled so much, I wouldn't have accomplished these things. I hiked the Appalachian Trail because of a major setback. The best things come to me after a heavy storm.
I moved passed a phase of passive suicidalism and years of PMDD. For years, I've felt small and insignificant among my peers since they didn't want to have anything to do with me and claimed that they could say and do whatever they want to me since "life isn't fair". Due to early childhood trauma, I occasionally acted out in class or would cry over a "C" because I felt thwarted in my efforts to prove myself as smart, and therefore as someone with worth. Despite what teachers thought of me then, I ended up in the National Honor Society in high school and got myself a full scholarship to Montgomery College. I even managed a semester of straight A's in college when I stopped procrastinating on every assignment.
In my last year of middle school, during a major school trip no less, my peers walked away from the table when I sat down to join them at dinner only to come back when I left. Granted, one peer who hadn't seen this occurrence, invited me back during dessert. This repeated experience drilled into my psyche that I didn't matter; that I was worth less than others. Not to say that I didn't have friends, but as I remember it, it feels like I had one good friend at a time. (One of whom I reconnected with and discovered she remembers me!)
There was a time when, despite waking at 2 AM from severe abdominal pain that caused me to "upchuck" until I got to dry heaves, I couldn't dream of waking my mother up to ask her to take me to the hospital. It wasn't because of anything she had ever said or done to me, it was what I had started to believe about myself that made me pause. "This pain is terrible, but they deserve to sleep; I'll wait til 6." I literally watched 4 hours of some show wondering if it was appendicitis.
Just 3 weeks or so ago, I finally internalized the idea that I have permission to be myself, as stated in my previous post, I believe. But the point still stands that I discovered my inner strength due to these hurdles. It's what got me onto and through the Appalachian Trail; it's what allowed me to save again for an 8 month trek around Europe and the UK.
As I stated once in a blog post long, long ago: "The sunrise/sunset is beautiful because of both the clouds and the sun" and so it seems is life. If I hadn't struggled so much, I wouldn't have accomplished these things. I hiked the Appalachian Trail because of a major setback. The best things come to me after a heavy storm.
Wednesday, April 3, 2019
Affirmations
Recently, during a walking outdoor meditation, I received a message that I wish I could have heard more often in my life. Even though I have always been un-apologetically me, the fact that most of my peers and some of my teachers wished I would act differently affected me and caused me to believe that these differences made me less deserving of love and care. This affirmation came with two phrasings: "I have permission to be myself" and "I am allowed to be me".
After so many years of being surrounded by naysayers it took a few years of being surrounded by "yaysayers" for me to receive and internalize this message. People at my chapel have provided a space for me to unlearn much of the negative internal monologue that has had power over me.
After so many years of being surrounded by naysayers it took a few years of being surrounded by "yaysayers" for me to receive and internalize this message. People at my chapel have provided a space for me to unlearn much of the negative internal monologue that has had power over me.
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