Violence/thinking aloud (8)

Thinking aloud series starts here

Copy of my email to helpful friend following yesterday's discussion:

"Thank you for walking with me through the mire, dissolving my high horse en route. Perhaps there's a new niche there for you -  "I can help you get off your high horse"?

I haven't tried to rewrite anything [yet?] I'm just letting our conversation work on me, feeling I may not have to write anything at all …   It might be enough to just inhabit my own truth, writing it was not quite enough ['though that did help move things along].  It was essential to have you witness/participate/enquire with me to move it on again. I deeply appreciate that.

Two things stand out - you asked what did I want to achieve with the email.   I said that I had no interest in salvaging the relationship, just wanted to lob a grenade into [their] complacency, wake ‘em up, shake ‘em up.  But the part that held some sort of paydirt was that I wanted [them] to see the error of [their] ways, apologise, acknowledge their failings, the damage [they] had done sort of thing.  And that I thought the chances of that happening, whatever I wrote, were about the same as me winning the lottery (and I only buy a ticket once a year, if that).  That's pure parental/early childhood stuff.  Wanting my parents to be more conscious than they were/could be.  A child's hope of truth and reconciliation,  It makes me weep great fat tears for that forlorn childhood dream, hopeless.  I was wanting [them] to rerun and repair that ancient hurt.  BIG ask.

Secondly the stuff about all the reservations/judgments/unease I already had about the situation before this upset. Wondering how it was that I had not reconsidered my participation sooner despite having such mixed feelings.  So in this latest drama the things that were already making me uneasy were writ large by life/events just in case I wasn't getting it clearly enough before and acting on my own [and likely everyone's] best interests and myself opting out earlier.

A bit like the dream of [their] regret and reconciliation, there's probably something about holding onto the dream of what could have been, the unrealized potential of that situation.  What it is not and cannot be at this time.  Another unrealistic hope.  I'm surprised, now that I'm out of the fixation, at the strength of my desire to lob a grenade in [their] direction, as if that would achieve anything.  Such anger/violence, such fighting with reality.  Such holding onto something that was at best unsatisfactory, at worst damaging and dangerous.

Then there’s Amanda's stuff about the simplicity of standing, literally, physically in the truth of our being - then no power is required to make ourselves heard [or, in this case, to hear/listen to my own knowing].  I couldn't discern how much I was caught up in bluster before we talked.  Now I see - A LOT! 

I'm wondering why it was so hard to see/allow that, despite the good things, on balance it just didn’t feel good to be there, and to act on that knowing by stopping going.  I'm not even sure if there's any need to send another email, to seek any clarification from [them].  What purpose would that serve if I'm not just ambivalent about being there but feel its wrongness/lack of fit?  I have the feeling that no matter what [they] said it wouldn't make any difference.  I’ve already gone over threshold and won’t have anything to do with them in future.

So I think I'm very close to letting it all go, with or without any more correspondence, maybe even with a “Thank you, I wish you well” email!  Giving up any temptation to attempt to give feedback/raise [their] awareness.

I'll keep you posted on how it unfolds.  For now I am deeply grateful for your friendship and for your help in saving me from myself."

I posted this blip

To be continued …

#am writing