PERMISSION TO BE SILENT...
So, I am absolutely exhausted, but I have been sooo behind in my blogs and have been feeling very very very inspired to blog on a daily basis... I have been putting pen to paper writing in my personal journal since I haven't been able to access the internet conveniently or have enough time to post a blog.
I am forcing myself to blog right now because I feel very much compelled to do so. The time is now 12:30A on Wed., 3/14/07. I just got done working a 13 hour workday!!! I started at 8:30A and didn't leave work until about 10:30P!!! The Director, Field Services Manager, my Training Manager and myself pulled an extra long shift in order to get this 1 million dollar grant request application for the training program together for submission in less than 24 hours. It is such a darn shame that an action plan was not followed and resulted in having to work these late hours and feel frantic in pulling the application together at the 11th hour!!!
Alas, I am just a line staff... The thing is I better be careful what I wish/ask for. Being line staff and getting paid hourly, I get paid overtime by 5 hours just from my work this past evening!!! Yayee!!! I put it out to the universe and ask for more money because for the next couple months, I will be living pretty modestly in order to maintain enough savings to pay my family's loan in support of my filing for chapter 7. The file is now open and in progress... I don't have enough money to pay for the mandatory credit counseling and education course in order to complete the chapter 7 process. I will have just enough upon getting paid this Friday... The positive outcome is that I will have a fresh start on my financial life in about 3 - 4 months. The challenge is that I will be pretty much a homebody and cooking for the next few months... No trip or extravagant trips or purchases of any kinds thank you very much.
I continue to trust the process... I stay sober, continue working the 9th step to the best of my ability. I won't be able to make the financial amends to others until I get this bankruptcy squared away and get financially grounded again.
So, what do you ask does the title of my blog stand for? I meant to write about this on this past Thursday night/Friday... I just joined a new AA meeting. It is an 11th step AA yoga meeting. Cool aye?!?! A yoga class that is followed by an AA meeting!!! How ingenius!!! I went this past Thursday... The whole experience is about 2 hours and very very taxing to someone as new as myself (being not so limber and not so fit from lack of exercise). The yoga instructor was amazing.
Here are some of the highlights that I would like to point out that made the experience exhiliarating.
- "ohm"ing in and out with the rest of the group
- getting to face the challenge of feeling my aches while engaging in the yoga poses, but challenged to listen and focus on my breath and breathing
- being asked whenever I was in the offering pose to offer to the Universe/God whatever came to mind and the instructor gave me permission to offer... I started offering my pain, my negativity, my intolerance, my defects, my aches, pains, insecurities for God to receive and take away from me... By the end of the hour, I was offering love, appreciation, hope, gratitude, and serenity to my Higher Power and those around me in giving thanks for the gift of sobriety
- a huge thing that felt oh sooo nice was being asked to lay down in fetal pose and relax and breathe... While in that position, the yoga instructor serenaded us. I felt like a baby being serenaded to sleep while in my crib. It was an amazingly wonderful feeling. I felt loved, safe, at peace, and warm.
This was perfect as I grappled with letting go of my judgements of a man that I would like to date sharing with me that he wants me for sex and for dating and hanging out and getting to know one another in other intimate ways, that we "could talk about it later." I interpreted that as his lack of desire to be with me in any other way than just physical. Sigh... What I got out of the yoga was to feel appreciation for his honesty and prompt honesty; for his ability to be true to himself and share that with me; for my appreciation that he probably is giving all he can give with the resources he has; also the ability for me to honor my own feelings of what is important to me.
Ok... I am physically and mentally spent... I am gonna take a shower, brush my teeth and go over to my friends place to house sit and dog sit for one more night before relinquishing care of the dogs over to another house/dog sitter. I need these moments to myself so that I may care for myself the way I have been caring for the dogs... Waking up in the morning to go on a walk and wake my body up and let the mind follow... Be up early enough to feel the cool air before it gets too warm...
By the way, the temperature was 93 degrees yesterday!!! Today, it was about 85!!! We are due to cool down... The coolest it will get by the end of this week is about 70. Not bad for spring in March... Apparently we are in desparate need of rain!!!
G'nite.... I am pooped!!!
Quoc
FILING FOR CHAPTER 7 - BANKRUPTCY
So, as a part of my 9th step amends, I get to file for bankruptcy and start my financial life over fresh and new! I went into the attorney's office that my sponsor recommended for me... The price is $2,000 to file. Ouch! I have to scrounge up some way to find this much money just to file... This will set me back living very modestly and paycheck to paycheck again through June!!! I feel ok knowing that the alternative is not filing and having to constantly face possible wage garnishment and them coming after me... I won't be able to save up enough to pay the full amount to the attorney until the 2nd week of May... I face the risk of the law offices on behalf of the creditors that have filed liens against me of possibly seeking me out and end up garnishing my wages. That really will set me back as I am already living pretty modestly...
So, I gotta hunker down and cook a lot and not take any trips or even go on dates because I can't afford these luxuries right now. I would like to make more money to accommodate for filing for bankruptcy without interrupting my enjoying the amazingly fun life I have been born into as a result of working on the 9th step...
Just this past weekend, I enjoyed a mini-vacation with a couple sober friends driving up to San Francisco. We treated ourselves to the wonderfully warm and sunny weather and visited the non-touristy parts of San Francisco like walking around the neighborhood homes around the Castro area including a 5 mile all day trek we did walking through all of Haight & Ashbury. It was an amazing time... I don't recall feeling this kind of relaxation since my trip to Catalina many many years ago with my Parks & Recreation crew. I remember that moment when I was laying in bed with my friends and just laughing and sharing stories... It felt sooo liberating.
I have been experiencing an amazing liberation from bondage of self and the ties that I feel compel me to walk with my head down or my head in the sand like an ostrich.... I no longer have to run from the shameful behaviors of my past from myself or anyone else. I am empowered and motivated to try not to repeat the behaviors that have created the current list of people, places and institutions that I will be making amends to. It all started with that wonderful 1st amends that I did with my sponsor... The one to myself...
I have been able to start dropping a lot of the things I do to myself out of obligation or conditioned belief and direction by people in my past... Just this past weekend, I gave myself permission to not finish a meal and stop when I am full... I also gave myself permission to not be so practical and enjoy treating myself to some fun!!! I need not just buy the things I need... For now, I am limited by my finances, but when I do have money, I will work on giving myself permission to treating self to nice things and be ok with that!!! I am deserving of receiving the best quality of everything that life brings, so long as I do it responsibly.
Lastly, I have been dealing with feelings and defects that come up in response to people I have been meeting and looking at the possibilities of intimacy.... I want dating, snuggling, and spending quality time together beyond just the physical act of "bumping uglies!" I no longer have to settle for that because that is what I am used to. I can redesign and create the very nature of relationships that I want in my life. In doing so, I am facing the fears and feelings of rejection from my being HIV positive. I am also facing consequences of my not being honest about my HIV with others because I am afraid that I am going to be automatically dismissed and discounted.
It sounds all good and fine by many of whom have supported me in sharing that if "they dismiss me and reject me on the basis of just me being HIV" then it is really their loss of getting to have an amazing relationship with me... The Truth and my current experience is that I am so sensitive to these few new relationships that I am courageous enough to even gather enough balls to just talk to them and then tell them my status and IMMEDIATELY GET REJECTED. It hurts; it scares me; it disappoints me; it makes me feel like there is something wrong with me; something hideously undesirable about me.... As a matter of fact, I think it is difficult for me to accept because I feel there is something hideously wrong with me and unacceptable of me being HIV positive... Clearly I have not come to terms with my HIV status.
I am not strong enough to accept all the projected rejections by the people I will be approaching for expanding the relationship beyond platonic... But I also am not strong enough to just put things on hold and not have relationships with others beyong just the platonic... I am stuck between a rock and a hard place... I am already making mistakes that are raising red "character defect" flags... I am already creating some more wreckage from mistakes...
Telling myself "practice makes progress" here is not ok... I am working very hard on growing smart a lot faster than the pace that I am moving at... I will continue to ask for God's help... Continue to affirm to do the right thing... Continue to redirect my energies and desires for intimacy to exercise and other healthy activities that build strong friendships and sets a foundation for intimacy. I will act on what the big books suggests, when matters of sex become an issue, I get to throw myself harder into helping another alcoholic and be of service. Lastly, I do get to give myself permission to not outgrow human and give myself permission to take chances, face rejection and trust God and the process and know that somewhere beyond the scope of my limited projections of being all alone and rejected by everyone will be deep intimacy, friendship and love beyond what I can ever imagine.... I need only trust the process and others that are examples and role models for me...
Wish me luck.... Thanks all for your continued support... Anyone have any idea how to make $2,000 fast cash legitimately?! :-)
Hugs,
Quoc
