It's Hot

It's hot out — 102-plus this afternoon. I'm learning to be like the natives and stay inside during the hottest part of the day. I still haven't developed the habit of getting up and out early. It's the habit of the unemployed: stay up late and get up late.

I'm taking a trip back to the Oregon Coast in a couple of weeks, where it's still not hit 70 degrees even once this summer and sometimes doesn't get out of the 50s during the day. Unless the weather changes substantially, I will experience a drop of 40 to 50 degrees over the course of an air trip and a shuttle trip. In fact, I'll probably hit 90 degrees temps in Portland. I'm pulling out a pair of shorts and a couple of tees and the rest is jeans, a sweater and some long-sleeve shirts. Thank goodness for layering! And staying with someone who will have sweaters.

I wouldn't mind being a snowbird, because I love my temperature range to be between the 40s or 50s in the winter (I like sweaters) to the 80s or low 90s in the summer (I like shorts). But I'd need to be able to work anywhere I lived, either having a job that existed in two places or having two jobs or being able to telecommute. 

My friend Thea told me I need to live in San Diego. My BFF and a handful of other folks want me in Seattle. I have some people who think I'm in Houston forever. And I have a compulsion toward living on the Oregon Coast. 

I feel as if I were a kid wondering what I'm going to be when I grow up: I don't know what I want in specific. It's all just dreams right now, dreams of heat and cold, light and dark, here and there.

What climate do you prefer? Would you be a snowbird if you could? Where do you want to be?

Locusts of Control

There is a psychological term called "locus of control". It basically means where you perceive the control over your life coming from: inside of you or outside of you. According to my therapist, people with an internal locus of control tend to be more successful and happy than people with an external locus of control. 

Having an internal locus of control means that you perceive that you are in control of your life and that what you do determines what happens in your life, as much as possible. 

Having an external locus of control means that you think that something or someone else — your parents, God(s), luck, the Universe, your neighbor's dog — determines what happens in your life; you don't feel that you have much if any control over it.

There is even a simple test you can take (the site asks for a name, but just so the program can be friendly and refer to you by your name; give it a fake name if you like, or just a first name), that will give you a quick and dirty determination of where you fall on the scale between 100% internal vs. 100% external control. Thirteen is 100% external — I got a nine. My BFF said he was pleased at that because he would have been unsurprised if I'd gotten a 13.

Telling Stories

So, my therapist loved the two posts and all the comments and we talked about whether or not my perspective has changed ("not yet") because of telling my story from a stronger point of view. She also loved that Lora called me on using more passive verbs ("got through") rather than more active, stronger verbs. I'm working on that.

So this form of cognitive therapy seems right for me, because I am a story teller. Telling my stories with power and strength to overcome my feelings of powerlessness and weakness seems right up my alley.

My biggest problem is just that I am so anxious I don't think to do this. I don't think to do any of the other cognitive therapy I've learned. I don't think to do anything other than to hold onto myself so I don't fly apart into bits and hold onto the ground so I don't fly off into space. Because that is how I feel most of the time anymore.

The Story of My Life - Part 2

As I explained in Part 1, my therapist told me that there is another way to look at my life, rather than the powerless, victimized, trauma-ridden way. She talked about it as telling stories about our lives and how we can choose to emphasize different things. I've learned to emphasize the sad and fearful things, but my life has had so much more than that to it.

So here's another way to look at the story of my life. Beware: this is even longer than Part 1. If you want, you can scroll to the end and just read the conclusions.

It's true that I was molested, became afraid of the dark, and was bullied for many years. But I didn't live with my cousin (or my grandfather) and wasn't around either too often for the most part. And I didn't live near my school peers who bullied me. So I had the room to build a stronger self than it first seemed.

Although victimized early, and having parents who were kind of clueless about how to raise me and what was going on in my life, I did some powerful things. There was the time I taught myself to ride a two-wheel bicycle in a day so that my parents would buy me one. Because we didn't live near my school friends and there was seldom anyone for me to play with, I learned to keep myself entertained  --- I was bad at most sports so the boys in the neighborhood didn't usually want to play with me if they were playing football or baseball, and none of the girls were my age. I enjoyed skating around the cul de sac for long periods, I loved to read and write and draw, and I liked pretending to be a detective or something else that required me to sneak around the neighborhood. I didn't retaliate against my bullies, nor did I become cynical and bitter. When things got better for me in 10th grade, I simply enjoyed my good fortune and made more friends.

Then I survived a move away from everything and everyone I'd ever known. I survived the death of my father from a heart attack. And I survived going away to college and even thrived there. I was wary enough and strong enough to take myself out of an uncomfortable situation and move out of my aunt and uncle's house and into on-campus housing. And I did begin the steps toward adulthood, something I didn't realize until I casually brought up the following story to my therapist. 

The Story of My Life - Part 1

There is a type of therapy called Narrative Therapy where you rewrite portions or all of your life highlighting different aspects than the ones you currently highlight. For example, these days I describe my life mainly by highlighting all the things that have happened to me where I was powerless and bad things happened. Wonder why I'm depressed and anxious?

But talking with my therapist this week, we discovered that I have other aspects that I could use to describe my life. For example, remember when I talked about not being self-differentiated from my mother, aka still having the uncut umbilical cord between us? Well, in another conversation, we discovered other stories where I had differentiated and done things that carry you on into independent adulthood.

By talking about how differently I can describe aspects of my life by what I choose to highlight, we got on the subject of how I could write a different version of my life and remind myself of all the good and powerful aspects I've shown in my past. It hasn't all been bad choices and powerless tragedies. So I'm going to do that. But first, here is the way I currently tell the story of my life, to myself and to others (well, some of it I only tell to others I am close enough to trust).

Connection

Humans are born hard-wired for connection, which is why being thrown out of a group, being ostracized, or simply having no community is so devastating. Even the non-conformists have to find other non-conformists to hang out with!

In my e-class on shame, love, and worthiness, one of the things Ms. Brown talked about was the need for a connection network: people in your life whom you can go to when you need support, when something that felt shaming to you occurs, when you need a reality check, and just for that being part of a group of people who love and accept you.

I have a very small connection network of people I know in person, and most of them live elsewhere. But I've discovered that I've got a lot of online friends who I've never met in my connection network. These are the people who cheer me along during my difficult times and my good times and who help me recognize good things amidst the rubble of my current life or who suggest good things that are not too difficult to do to make things better. These are the people who don't seem to mind that my blog has so much angst and depression to it. They see beyond the depression and anxiety to me, which boggles my mind.

As I slowly learn to accept that online friends count just as much as friends I've met, I slowly start to feel better. I feel as if I've met many of these friends and I find I want to give to them as much as they give to me. This is my community. This is my neighborhood. We drop off virtual casseroles on bad days and we share virtual margaritas on good ones. If I had the money, I would fly out to meet every single one of these people, give them a hug, and take them out to dinner (this was how we showed appreciation in my family).

So to all of you who are my virtual friends and family, and to those who may become such, thank you for making me feel more connected and less alone. It's taken me awhile to appreciate this kind of connection, but I have appreciated your kindness and thoughtfulness for as long as you've been providing them.

Love and blessings to you all!

Sitting on the Couch

I've got anxiety pretty bad these days. I feel anxious about looking for work, about signing up with a freelancers association that could lead me to more work, and about not finding work and going broke.

I feel anxious about leaving my apartment. It's hot outside and I can't be spending money on things I don't need, so I don't need to go out, except for therapy, grocery shopping (which I do on the same day), and getting the mail, which I often let pile up in the box.

My anxiety makes me want to just wrap my arms around myself, around and around until I'm unable to move and I am calm. So I sit on my couch, day after day, and I don't really do much. My comfort zone has become excruciatingly small.

I even try not to think: I go online and see what blogs have new postings, but even blogs with new content run out. So I have to think some. I get bored with blogs and with playing solitaire or sudoku on some electronic device.

And I think I've very nearly hit bottom. There's not a lot of room between me and the bottom of whatever it is, be it the barrel or the Abyss, so most of the space for movement is up. It would help if up were easier or I had help. But for some reason, my life has required that I do most things alone, with no help from others. I think this is quite mean of life.