How might it feel to be a Jack-in-the Box, pushing everything down every emotion, stressful event, traumatic events, and memories, just to hide out for a while until it springs back up again?
If you have ever repressed your emotions, you may have a better understanding of what I am trying to say.
I’ve depended on this coping mechanism to help me through many storms, trials, difficult times and stressful moments. From a young child through most of my adulthood, I know I have experienced many things, which caused much pain. For me, mostly psychological and mental health, but it has impacted my physical health too.
I’ve pushed through the pain of fear, anxiety, and depression intermittently throughout all ages, never really knowing or having a name for what I was going through.
Having a greater awareness, appreciation and relationship with my body, my emotions, more recently, I am starting to wonder how much more needs to be processed and healed, things I have not yet become aware of.
Repression has been a coping mechanism, no doubt about that! What is meant for short-term to get me through, has been lifelong, something I immediately and naturally resort to.
How can I fully heal, have the freedom of being my authentically created self if I keep resorting to old habits and ways that hold me back rather than allow me the opportunity to grow and mature?
In time, I hope to cleanse my heart, my body, my mind, and my spirit. I want to be more like Christ throughout daily living. A life filled with unconditional love, an ease of forgiveness, peace, joy, happiness living my most abundantly filled life as possible. This is the driving force behind my desire to change.
I know there are so many improvements and modifications to be made. Most importantly is the awareness I have in knowing I am not where I used to be, but I am not yet where God needs me to be.
Creating new and healthier mindsets and patterns of behavior creates challenges, especially when the autopilot in me takes over and does things unconsciously, without even having to think about. It just does what it does because the brain is pattern seeking, and it knows the pattern and path of least resistance. Until I disrupt and create a new pathway, nothing will change. I need to initiate the process and take the necessary steps to move forward towards my goal.
If I hope to be the change, I wish to see in myself, then the time is now to start. For me to become who it is God created me to be then I need to have the courage to step out in faith and trust all which I am going through is for His higher purpose and good.
To break free from the cycle, the bondage repression has had on me for far too long, I need to stop pushing down my emotions, compacting them until everything gets so wound up inside of me that I pop, freaking out and scaring those around me (myself included too).
Once the emotions spring into action, the tension has been released and the person who helped release the emotions (whether intentional or not), may stop and wonder why, what have they done, taken everything personal or become reactive not knowing where all this energy came from. Little do they know, it’s a combination of things held onto for far too many years and repeated patterns of behavior that continue to trigger the emotions once again.
For a while, everything seems to settle down. A stirring and unsettled feeling begins again. Internal struggles continue as I work to process my feelings, emotions, memories, and a time that once was and is. Is what is happening a part of my past, a storyline that has been told so many times it seems real, believable, without a doubt it must be true (but it was really a lie/deception), or was what I was thinking and believing truth in my life?
The crank on the Jack-in-the-Box starts turning again. The music plays and I wait in anticipation, not knowing if I have yet attained the ability to demonstrate the self-control needed to respond differently rather than react. Sometimes I am more successful than others, keeping calming, expressing some of which my heart cries out to say. Other times there is more of a reaction, leading to bigger emotions and many tears.
What I need more than anything, while experiencing emotions big and small, is for someone to be present with me, meet me where I am at, listen to me speak (both verbally and non-verbally), hug, comfort, reassuring smile, laughter, and be reminded this too shall pass and I will make it through.
There is a physical pain, discomfort felt across my chest. My heart aches, feeling disappointment, discouraged, and let down when others seem to dismiss, the emotion I am going through as if it were nothing, to just let it go and move on. I know I need to process my emotions, take time to understand, accept what it is I am feeling before feeling satisfied and moving on. I need to know what was expressed and said is part of my process for healing, becoming a better person on so many levels.
Who is to blame? Nobody, really. Expectations lead us to disappointment. Also, the other person may be in a completely different time, and place spiritually, mentally, and psychologically on their journey. They may have lived a life where showing emotions was a weakness, crying would have consequences and maybe they had their own coping mechanisms which provided them with different tools to deal with and move forward from situations in a timeframe much different than my own.
We all have the power to change, create new neural pathways and connections. When one is able and ready, having the right mindset and doing good works, transformation can and will take place in its own timing. Until then, it’s important to remember we have no power or control over anybody or anything. It’s not our job to try to change anybody. We can influence, inspire, and plant seeds, but not control.
Only God knows His plans for me. I know His purpose in everything I am going through and experiencing are to bring about awareness and grow me spiritually, help me see life through a new lens and with a new perspective to more fully appreciate the journey.
Yes, there are times I get upset. Yes, some of the smallest, most seemingly insignificant things, can create a bit of chaos emotionally in my life, including things that annoy/irritate me, habits, mindsets, words, actions, offenses, and behaviors.
Every day, I am working on becoming more mindful that things may not always be as they appear or seem to be. We all come with our own skillset, toolbox, life experiences and so much more. I have had deep thoughts about what the other person may have gone through to be responding/reacting to me in the ways they do, including their words, tone, body language and actions.
Courage is my focus for 2023.
I know I am courageous!
I know I can do hard things!
I know I will overcome, persevere, and go through obstacles that appear throughout my life journey.
I know God has planted the most magnificent seed inside of me!
This is not the beginning, nor is the end.
Another chapter in my story.
Thank you for following along.
Magnificent Meraki 