I always thought myself as a bit awkward. Someone that is just a bit socially awkward. The one that will cancel plans last-minute because she wasn’t brave enough to tell you no the first time. The one that doesn’t want to be around people because it gets her anxious and all she can think of is her imperfections. The one who will also suffer silently. The one who will dwell in deep depression and believe that is where she is meant to be for the rest of her life. Yes, she might be able to temporarily get out of that deep hole she has been digging herself into but ultimately she will gladly jump back in. Why? because that’s how I am. That’s my brain. My brain was designed to live in depression, melancholy, solitude and unhappiness. Right?
But you know what? That is not true. I am not designed if that is the correct word to use, to be an unhappy, bitter, depressive, and melancholic human being. I don’t know why I decided I was going to be like this for the rest of my life. I have no idea what caused me to make that determination about myself. I don’t have time to dwell in the past and try to dig into what caused me to get to that point in my journey.
Do you know what I do have time for? Now. This present moment. I have time for this precise moment only. There is no way for me to change what I have done, what I have thought, or said. I don’t have time to think about the future. I can make plans and work hard towards my future but ultimately anything I do, I do now. I do in the present moment. I am learning everyday to live in this moment and this moment only.
I have plagued my life with this disease on concentrating on the past. On holding on to the worse moments of my life and not letting go. Then bringing them up at any moment to remind myself how miserable I am and how unhappy the present moment is just because that thing happened to me 5 yrs 3 months 7 days ago….or whatever it is. I have lived my life this way. I am 33 years old and I have lived like this all my adult life. Do you realize what that means? It means I have wasted all this years in despair. For absolutely no reason. If there is a reason I still have yet to find out the purpose of this. I want to bang my head in a wall in anger. But then it dawns on me if I continue to do that, dwell on my past actions I will definitely never get of this hole and seal it forever.
I have no idea when I will write exactly about my experience with my Ayahuasca ceremony. I took the medicine and she’s working me. She’s still in me and working her way through me. My first week after doing Ayahuasca was a rollercoaster of emotions. I would wake up with this pain in my stomach. I would bend over the toilet seat trying to throw up on an empty stomach because all I could feel was this huge heaviness in my soul, in my body, in my stomach and violently needed to leave my body. The first 2 days I spent shaking. Literally shaking, even when I talked I felt my lip trembling. I couldn’t control it.
My mind was losing it’s power and it didn’t like it. My mind wants to be in control at all times. She wants to take the wheel. She has taken the wheel for most my life. Who am I to take that power away from her now? Well…she was fighting back with all her might. I still don’t believe I have defeated her. One day, I felt this peace, this stillness in me. And I realized I got it. This is me. This stillness is who I am meant to be. I am in control. I am happy, peaceful and calm. The next morning while showering, my black, heavy feeling came back. I knelt in the shower throwing up stomach acid and sobbing. No, it’s not over yet. It’s not that easy. My mind is not easy. What makes you think a week will heal you? It was like I hit a brick wall.
I still have a lot of work to do. I realize now. This journey isn’t over. But I am almost on my 3rd week of doing drinking the medicine. I’ve cried so much. I’ve screamed on the way to work. I’ve had diarrhea, nausea, vomit, and dizziness. Yet even with all those symptoms I feel this cleansing power in me. I feel my body is healing of years of trauma that I have caused myself. My relationship with my husband went through hell these last few weeks, yet I feel closer to him. I feel we are both at the same level and are working to heal each other before we can heal our relationship. It is the most precious thing. Being able to heal yourself. When you heal, everything is easier. I accept myself, I am loving myself now. I haven’t felt this way about myself in years.
Believe that you can change if you really want to. Believe that this darkness isn’t who you are. It may be what you experiencing now and have been for a while but it’s not who you are really. You are, you just are. You are not your mind. You are not the stories you tell yourself everyday. You are not those emotions that suddenly creep up on you and cause turmoil in your head and body. Take a deep breath, close you eyes, acknowledge the thoughts and feelings that come to you when you do this. But as soon as you acknowledge them as a feeling or thoughts let them go. And focus on your breathing, that’s you. THAT is you. Don’t let that tool, that amazing and intelligent too we have and call mind take over you. Your mind doesn’t control you, you control your mind. It is your tool to use when YOU need it. Don’t give it the power it doesn’t have.
Free yourself. I am freeing myself. Do the same.
Diary of a Mom Learning Self Love 