Showing Up for Myself - Day 83

I am having some trouble. I could identify it as another "experience of depression." So I guess I did not really stop anything.

I just feel... apathetic. Tired. In a lull. Lazy. I don't notice any thoughts in particular. I'm not beating myself up or being really negative. In fact I had some challenges to face today, and I faced them just fine -- better than I ever would have before.

So what gives?

I know that I feel lonely.

• I forgive myself that I have accepted and allowed myself to feel lonely. I forgive myself that I have not accepted or allowed myself to be here for myself. I forgive myself that I have accepted and allowed myself to identify voids within myself that I have believed must be filled by others, or if not others, substances (food, drink, drug), entertainment, products, and if none of this, then sleep. I forgive myself that I have not accepted or allowed myself to BE HERE for myself, to show up to support myself, to have the patience and integrity to see myself and to love myself unconditionally through self support. I forgive myself that I have accepted and allowed myself to distract myself from myself or from seeing myself through looking to outside sources of fulfillment or through believing that I am only worth whatever another person seems to treat me as being worth. I forgive myself that I have accepted and allowed myself to expect others to make me feel okay or good. I forgive myself that I have accepted and allowed myself to believe that this is not something I can provide for myself. 
• When and as I see myself feeling lonely, I stop and I breathe. I realize that within this I am looking for other people or other external forces to fulfill me. I realize that I am basically saying here that I cannot be okay until another person or thing makes me okay, and so within this I am giving myself an excuse/justification to just sit around and wait -- to not actually really be here for myself, to support myself, to find out how I can support myself or what the source is within myself that is creating this void and what source within myself can fulfill it. So when I see myself feeling lonely, I commit myself to looking for ways to build, foster, and grow a relationship with myself based in self support and unconditional love for myself as one as equal as life. I commit myself to show up for myself -- to not "blow myself off" or "flake" on myself like another person might do, but to be a consistent reliable source of support and stability for myself. 

I feel a little bit overwhelmed at the great amount of points there are in front of me, that I've opened up but still need to explore more. I feel like I don't know where to start. Which is a familiar feeling, like for example last week I had to write a monthly report for work and I put it off because in my mind it was like some big thing and I was looking at the whole wall like how the heck am I going to get over that? Or like I just didn't want to put forth the effort to hurdle the whole thing, identifying the end point as my next step rather than the next step as my next step. Rather than simply taking the first step necessary and looking at what exactly needs to be done, then doing it.

So within a feeling overwhelmingness it seems like a good plan/course of action to just start somewhere, and walk that first step with commitment and diligence.

• I forgive myself that I have accepted and allowed myself to participate within and as a sense of overwhelmingness to all of the points that I see in front of me that I have opened up but still need to explore further. I forgive myself that I have accepted and allowed myself to feel "disorganized" within this and like the organization of my writing and of myself is "chaotic" and like I am going to lose track of something, some point, and thus lose track of myself. I forgive myself that I have accepted and allowed myself to experience points as "piling up" so that they are like a big pile that I must pick through and find what I have already written that is of substance. I forgive myself that I have not accepted or allowed myself to support myself by writing a point to completion to the best of my ability. I forgive myself that I have accepted and allowed myself to feel disconnected between days such that I have not wanted to continue on points in consecutive days and that if I have begun drafting about a point on one day, when I try to pick it up another day I have not been as interested in it or I have felt like it doesn't matter anymore. I forgive myself that I have not accepted or allowed myself to actually really breathe through the process of writing myself out so that I can face this task with integrity and self honesty to actually look at myself and the points and write them out in a way that is self supportive and that actually assists me in creating change within myself. I forgive myself that I have accepted and allowed myself to become a writing automaton. 
• When and as I see myself becoming overwhelmed by the number of points I see before me to walk, I stop and I breathe. I realize that my writing process is here for me to support myself within self honesty and self responsibility -- integrity. I realize that there is no point in writing if it is not self supportive, so I realize that placing pressure on myself to write every day is not self supportive. I also realize that even if I am going to write every day, I have only expected myself to write one blog each day, so here I can support myself to direct myself to select one point, and walk it, and do so with integrity. I have already seen how this is more efficient/effective and self supportive than allowing myself to write multiple points and not complete any of them. So I commit myself to walk this process day by day, breath by breath, and point by point within self honesty and self responsibility, thus integrity. 

I also know that there are probably some points I do not particularly want to see. I'd like to think they're moot because they aren't right in front of me anymore; they've sort of "passed." But not really. They're still here. I'm just ignoring them, and they aren't yelling as loud. So this may well be one of the biggest contributing factors to my current state.

• I forgive myself that I have accepted and allowed myself to run an energetic experience through its course and then when it is "over" to believe that it is really over and that there are no residual consequences which are influencing who I am as what I have just accepted and allowed without stopping or seeing or investigating myself. I forgive myself that I have not accepted or allowed myself to write out points as they come up even if only privately for myself. I forgive myself that I have not accepted or allowed myself to see myself privately so that I can at least see myself in that way but have only allowed myself to support myself publicly -- which is great, but paramount here is self-support, and if I can do this with greater stability and integrity in private, then this seems very necessary. So I forgive myself that I have not accepted or allowed myself to write for myself in self support purely and absolutely, no matter the platform. I forgive myself that I have accepted and allowed myself to ignore certain points because I have not wanted to own them, I have not wanted to admit to myself or anyone else that they are mine, that they are points I have accepted and allowed myself to create and experience. I forgive myself that I have accepted and allowed myself to be ashamed of these points, not realizing that these points are only who I am if that is what I accept and allow, and that within facing/writing the points, I am no longer accepting or allowing them as me. So I forgive myself that I have accepted and allowed myself to self sabotage through my shame of various points such that not only do I not release myself from the points through writing, first owning them and then rejecting them, but I also am thus directing myself in such a way that I will have to face the points again, and that the consequences will still be experienced within me. 
• When and as I see myself avoiding facing or writing about certain points, I stop and I breathe. I realize that it is okay for me to write privately if this is helpful in actually writing -- many people do this and it makes perfect sense because the whole point of writing is to support myself, sharing is simply what is done for transparency and for sharing for the benefit of others. I realize that ignoring points and denying ownership is like tying myself to the points so that they are not only mine but are ME as who I am within accepting and allowing them to continue through my negligence and ignorance of them. I commit myself to supporting myself through energetic experiences and points to which I have an experience of shame through private excavation of myself, which will not only support myself within these points but also support myself within building self trust and feeling safe within and as myself to be a point of stability for myself, to provide myself with self support through writing, and to "show up" for myself. 

I also know that I have not been doing a good job keeping up with my commitment to read at least 3 blogs per day. I've barely made a dent in the BIG blogs. So I'm not supporting myself there. I'd rather sleep. Or play Candy Crush... which is why I resisted playing for so long, in part.

• I forgive myself that I have accepted and allowed myself to once again open up multiple pages of blogs that I "want" to read but to not actually read them. I forgive myself that I have accepted and allowed myself to scroll through a blog and see that it is long and basically wish that I already had it read and already had the information, rather than actually reading it and learning from it. I forgive myself that I have accepted and allowed myself to get distracted when I first start reading a blog, like thinking "I can do this later" where I believe that eventually it will get done but I never actually do it. I forgive myself that I have accepted and allowed myself to force myself to read blogs and then sort of zone out while doing so so that I do not even know what I am reading. I forgive myself that I have accepted and allowed myself to sometimes feel overwhelmed and intimidated when I read some blogs because they seem so clear and to the point and concise and I want to have written them or I want to have had those conclusions within myself, rather than realizing what an excellent resource this blog is and being grateful that it has been shared for me to read, and benefiting from it in this way. I forgive myself that I have not accepted or allowed myself to "show up" for myself, to be here for myself, within reading blogs, where I have all of these experiences listed above instead of simply focusing my attention on reading and understanding the blog and reflecting on myself within the blog to see what I can learn to support myself, where here it's like just by reading a title that seems pertinent and like it would benefit me, I believe I have supported myself. I forgive myself that I have accepted and allowed myself to read titles of blogs and think "oh that's an interesting topic, that seems beneficial" and then not bother to read it because I believe something like "it's already out there" and "someone already figured that out" so "now I don't have to" so that within this I become more apathetic about myself and my direction of myself within this process, where not only do I not read the blog to support myself but I also then believe that this is no longer a point I need to bother looking at within myself -- very very silly. I forgive myself that I have accepted and allowed myself to prefer to play a game on my phone or watch a tv show or sleep rather than read a blog or a book or do something which is self supportive like cleaning/organizing my environment. 
• When and as I see myself resisting reading a blog, I stop and I breathe. I realize that I have opened this blog up in this page because I have identified it as being something I "want" to read within a belief that it will be beneficial and self supportive to do so, and also because I am interested in what others are learning and what points they are walking and what all there is to discover about ourselves and our minds. I realize thus that it is only self supportive to actually follow through and actually read the blogs I identify within myself as wanting to read. I realize that when I open up so many pages it is easy to then feel overwhelmed at how many I have identified as wanting to read, so I recommit myself to reading blogs as I open them, one by one. I also commit myself to remembering that it really does not take that long to read a blog. I commit myself to directing my attention and focus onto the words on the screen and being here with myself and with those words, comprehending and integrating them within a reflection of myself and all as life. 

I also know that, related to the above point, I feel a bit stagnant, like I want to continue learning/consuming more before moving myself forward, like I feel that desire/need for guidance or some kind of direction to know that I am doing a good job and going the right way. I have remembered the support I received on the forums which was fantastic, but I have fallen out of practice in posting my blog there or reading anything at all on the forums. "I don't have time," but I waste so much time, and go to bed so early.

• I forgive myself that I have accepted and allowed myself to doubt myself and my ability to direct myself within self honesty and self responsibility as what is best for all. I forgive myself that I have not accepted or allowed myself to direct myself to investigating topics that interest me or seeking out assistance/support through reading other blogs or reading the forums or listening to interviews. I forgive myself that I have accepted and allowed myself to basically just wait and hope either for myself to "believe in" myself again as my abilities here, or just wait/hope for this feeling to pass, or wait/hope for someone to come along and say something encouraging so that I have that positive charge again of feeling like I am "on track." I forgive myself that I have accepted and allowed myself to identify that I "want" to post my blog on the forum again because I got great support there, but to not actually do it. I forgive myself that I have accepted and allowed myself to resist involvement in the forum because it's like "one more thing" to add to my to do list where within this every task that is not sleeping or eating or watching tv is some kind of chore, and yet I waste so much time doing those things and other things, not supporting myself, not using time to support myself. 
• When and as I see myself feeling like I would benefit from some kind of outside direction, I stop and I breathe. I realize that there are a great many resources at my fingertips that I can access whenever and wherever I want. I realize that I can guide myself through this process and that there are others who are walking with me who can also serve as guides through the reading of their words. I commit myself to take this self identified need for guidance into my own hands, to guide myself toward increased awareness of direction and increased realizations of awareness. I commit myself to using my time to support myself and to realizing that I waste a lot of time fruitlessly so taking some time to do self supportive activities is really not difficult from a practical standpoint. 

I know that there is plenty to see, but I don't feel like seeing it, so I look the other way, and say "there's really not that much to look at here."

• I forgive myself that I have accepted and allowed myself to blatantly and deliberately ignore and deny what there is to see in myself, what points there are to walk, when it's like this is my reaction when I see that there are a great many points to walk, so I feel overwhelmed and then react within a belief that there's really not that much so why bother? Complacency. I forgive myself that I have accepted and allowed myself to be complacent within and as myself, complacent with myself as who I am, believing it is "not that bad" or it "doesn't matter" if I ever face myself again, or that I can face myself tomorrow, but today I sleep. 
• When and as I see myself making excuses for not having to face myself and see whatever is there, I stop and I breathe. I realize there is a lot there. I realize that is why I feel overwhelmed and want to shut down. So I commit myself to looking at myself in self honesty, to not breaking that stare, and to seeing myself as who I am -- it really isn't scary, I'm just me afterall, and I'll be here still whether I look at myself or not. I commit myself to seeing myself and then walking through what points I see, point by point, day by day, breath by breath. 

I also know that there are points which I do not wish to change, and that there are ways I am actively not supporting myself which I could easily write about but have not because I have not wanted to make commitments to myself to change. For example, eating very unhealthy foods in the absence of anything healthy or nutritious (which obviously is going to contribute to this problem of tiredness and lethargy).

• I forgive myself that I have not accepted or allowed myself to face myself within certain points and write out certain points because I already know that I do not want to change them, because I want to continue to indulge in these self abusive behaviors and continue to avoid responsibility for myself. I forgive myself that I have not accepted or allowed myself to realize the benefit of supporting myself through self change, through taking responsibility for myself. I forgive myself that I have accepted and allowed myself to continue to self sabotage because "I like it" or "it's fun" or even within an awareness of punishment where I know that this behavior will push me further into negative experiences that will cloud and stifle my ability to direct myself within self honesty and self responsibility. 
• When and as I see myself avoiding walking a point out of a fear of having to change that point, or a resistance to changing that point right now/yet, I stop and I breathe. I realize that even if I do not change the point right away, I can support myself in seeing who I am within that behavior, how it does or does not benefit me, how it is or is not what is best for all, how it does or does not serve to support myself in self responsibility. Within facing and seeing and writing out the point I can see why I should change and thus support myself to actually change. So I commit myself to seeing myself always in self honesty and self responsibility, to writing out who I am in various behaviors/points, and to making practical commitments to myself that I can keep, building on commitments so that I do in fact change.