deja vu or...

there aren't too many scenarios on this planet that someone else hasn't already or will experience.  it could be as crazy as being held at gunpoint, as funny as falling in a department store or as boring as using your crockpot three days in a row.  chances are someone has done nearly the exact same thing.

to me this is the best thing about sharing our personal experiences, we realize we are not alone in our endeavors.  talking about our set backs can ease the sting, consequently talking about our leaps forward can heighten the elation.  the trick is to be brave and share.  to own our lives in a way that is transparent.

this brings me to a text conversation i was having a bit ago:

sometimes i think i'm going to have to wait until my children are grown to be able to really find, develop and settle in to the relationship i desire, but that seems so far away.  i have to believe it is possible to achieve sooner.

finding a balance to satisfy my personal needs without compromising my duties as a mother is something that i have not been able to figure out.  i honestly don't think i am the only woman who feels this way.  i don't even think this is something single mother's deal with.  i think a large number of mother's struggle with how to find that perfect balance so you don't lose yourself to motherhood.

i've often wondered if fathers have the same struggles.  do they stress over balancing being the breadwinner, (yes, i am generalizing, but the majority of men bring home bigger paychecks than women do, check out the stats), being an engaged daddy, still being the macho guys guy and being an attentive husband?  hmmm?

interestingly this very conversation i was having with a friend, came up on a blog i frequently read.  the post was about the author, a man, who broke up with his girlfriend because his duties as a father required that he put all his attention there.  if you have the time follow the link and go read his post, he is a way better writer than i am and it's from man's perspective.

whoa!  how many times have you read an article, or clicked on someones facebook post, or seen an episode of a show, or hear a story on the radio and said, "hey that could've been me?"  this actually happens to me all the time, it is almost like having a deja vu moment.  when this does happen, i really tune in and compare the similarities and disparities.  sometimes i come away thinking, boy i'm glad my situation didn't end that way!, and other times i think, i should meet that human we would have a ton to talk about!. 

anyway, my point to all of this has nothing to do with finding balance, it is about the fact that we are united in the fact that we share experiences that are similar to others.  the others may be perfect strangers, a family member or a best friend, but our commonality is our experiences. 

love isn't a light switch...

how do you know when to break up with someone?  i know there are many, many different scenarios as to why someone would call it quits, we all have our thresholds, but how we come to that precipice is interesting to me.

i think it is a false presumption to think that we break up with people because we dislike them or stop loving them.  i know too many people, myself included, that decide for one reason or another that they must put some distance between themselves and their partner.  I know from my own personal experiences it isn't because i stopped caring.  i just don't think you can turn off the love switch that easily.

let's go way back to matt.  i broke things off with him, not because i didn't care about him anymore, but because what we were wanting, in terms of our relationship, were on different ends of the spectrum.  our last significant time together we went on a hike to pilchuck.  we talked about our future life together, what we were wanting from each other and possible solutions as to how we could make it happen.  i remember during our descent, he was walking in front of me and i was dissecting the whole conversation when i called his name.  he stopped on the trail, looked back at me with a skeptical smile.  i walked up to him, gave him a huge hug and kiss and said, "i love you." 

i meant it, i did love him, but love isn't everything.  i had realized on this hike that the compromises he was asking me to make were beyond the scope of what i could do.  i wanted to try them because i cared about him deeply, but i knew eventually i would be unhappy and possibly resentful for having made so many sacrifices to make "us" work.  why get started down a path with him, that included the livelihood of four children, just to uproot their lives and ours?  i couldn't bring myself to do it.

that hike was one of the last times we were in each others presence.  we met one other time, at his request, to try to talk it through but i had made up my mind on the mountainside.  the last time we were together ended in tears on both our parts.  although it was a hard decision i felt it was the best for my kids and i.  i have since learned he has married. 

let's jump ahead to something a little more recent.  lately (in the last couple of years), i have found myself in entanglements where i give more than what is being received.  maybe i jump in too quickly, or i have too high of expectations, or i don't even know what else, but whatever the case i feel like i am holding the short end of the stick.  not really the situation i want to be involved in, so i move on.

i move on because i want to be in a situation where both parties are giving and it's satisfying for everyone.  relationships cannot be one sided.  again, i don't decide to move on because i dislike them, maybe their actions, but not them.  it is usually a tough decision because i still really enjoy their company i just need more. i need something that either they are unwilling or can't give (to me).  sigh.

so, how do you know when to call it quits?  for me i think it is when you are having to change who you are to accommodate your partner.  when we do this, we build up resentment because the relationship isn't satisfying our needs we are just pleasing someone else.  the right relationship should nourish, celebrate and embrace each parties wants, needs and goals.

a side note:  i don't think you should jump to the quitting selection.  there are a lot of opportunities to improve a relationship if both parties are willing and open to compromise.

recurring dream...

dreams are something of an enigma to me.  i am not one who generally remembers their dreams, however lately i seem to remember the racy ones.  anyway, i can't remember the last time i had a nice dream, a nightmare, and i've never had a recurring dream.  with that said, i have a high school friend who appears a couple of times a year in unrelated dreams.  he just walks through the picture, i call it a cameo.  when this happens i usually shoot him a message just to say hey. 
 

are you someone who remembers their dreams?  i have another friend who claims that they can control their dreams.  crazy, right?  but this friend swears to it.  all they have to do is think about what they want to dream about before falling asleep and somehow that is what this friend dreams about.  when this friend tells me they had a dream about me, i just reply, "you planned it."  a planned dream kind of loses its impact as opposed to an unplanned dream.

 

the other night as i was reading and getting ready to crash for the night, i got a text.  this human doesn't normally text me at this hour seeing as how this human lives on the east coast and should be sleeping.  the text simply said, "are you busy?"  being this is an unusual thing for this human i replied, "nope. what's up?"  the next line kind of surprised me, "i had a nightmare and just want to run it by you."  now there was a whole slew of texts that transpired with a ton of details that i'm not going to include, but this is what you need to know, for the past several years this human has had the same nightmare about someone close to them.  here is the gist of the nightmare:
 

i get the vision of her being trapped in a burning house and by the time i get to her it's too late and i see her burning alive.

 

what would you do if you kept having this same nightmare?  i had a couple ideas of what i would do.

• dream journal.  write the nightmare down as soon as i woke up, with as many details as possible.  my thinking is that although it may be a recurring dream there might be slight changes that you don't recall 2 hours or even 10 minutes after you wake up.  list everything i did and consumed that day.  much like a food journal, you might find patterns of consumption that trigger the dream.  write down anything strange that happened that day.  there may be no correlation to the events of the day prior to the dream other than something out of the ordinary occurs, that maybe when you look at the history will prove to be extraordinary. 
  
• talk to the subject of the dream.  when i suggested this to my friend the idea was quickly shot down.  however, i think it might be helpful.  i get that conversation would be strange and most likely extremely uncomfortable, but maybe the subject has some insight to either make sense of the dream or stop them.

 

those are really the only ideas i have and i would most likely do both of them, that is if i was intent on understanding and possibly stopping them.  do you have any suggestions?

duped...

why is it, we say we want to hear the truth, but when the truth doesn't quite fit into our expectations we unzip our nice guy costume and unleash the beast from within?  i know that i am guilty of this.  i sometimes pout or get really angry or plead my case until i am blue in the face because my feelings are hurt, but is this really a reasonable reaction?

the other day i was faced with a human who said, "i duped them."  they claim that i falsely led them to believe one thing when my intentions were something different.  obviously i beg to differ, but that is always the case when two people are on opposite sides of an issue.

i think the problem lies in the fact that humans rely on how a situation or an interaction affects them emotionally.  we place stock in factors that are out of our control.  we have expectations of how others should treat us.  we have preconceived ideas of how our lives should go.  when one or all of those things don't happen we feel "duped".

tonight i will be walking into a situation with many unknowns.  seeing as how there are so many unknowns i have no idea what to expect.  i am sure there will be things that i don't agree with, that will hurt my feelings and that will inspire me, but above all else i am hoping for the stripped down truth. 

i have been preparing myself mentally so that i don't unleash the beast.  i am praying that i can be completely vulnerable without a iron wall to protect me.  i am hoping that i can shelve my ego and really hear what is being said, not just hear with my ears but hear with my heart.  i seek the courage to express myself in a manner that isn't accusatory and reflects my sincerity.  i am expecting clarity to a chain of pain so that i (we) can put it behind us.

if all goes well, i (we) will be on our way to mending a relationship that has been dragged through barbed wire lined trenches.  a relationship that has meant so much to me.  even if it doesn't go as well i hope, the truth, my truth and their truth, will be on the table and the unknowns will be gone.