Connection...

Some minutes ago, I powered up my laptop to compose some thoughts on life before the internet, before cell phones, before cordless phones, before central air. 

"Party lines" existed; one could listen in on their neighbor's phone calls. 

Folks opened windows for airflow through their homes; they could listen in on outside conversations and, Lord forbid, on inside talks if folks hollered loud enough and their windows too were open, or not.

We didn't lock the doors of our houses; anyone could walk right in. 

Anyway, when I powered up my laptop I discovered something I wrote a couple weeks ago about isolation and connection -- two subjects that tie right in with communication, now and past. 

I think folks were less isolated pastly than nowly. 

Life-past was lived mostly 3D, which of itself brings more connection; more senses are involved. 

~*~

June 15, 2020, thoughts...

Isolation

The marine vet

Raven Rock Overlook, 2019

He asked how I dealt with doing so much solo

How to live with a feeling of isolation

At the time I didn't have any concrete answers

Seems I may have said something about finding connection

Which I had found with nature

But now, I think I have a more concrete answer

Though part of it is embarrassing, but then not

Because I think it is probably an innate human response

Think Wilson in the movie Cast Away

Some may say,

"Carol, you haven't experienced isolation

You have a husband

You go out biking and meet people on your journeys"

These things are true

And I am thankful for them

I am married; I do not live alone

I often ride my bike and sometimes meet people

My isolation?

Around 2015 I had to, for the most part, drop our of social life

Fatigue was overwhelming

Due to my health adversities

Energy had to go into surviving another day

My isolation?

I've never met anyone, in 10 years, who has my medical condition

Which is a major factor in feeling isolated 

The closet have been folks with MS

But I don't have MS

And then, how many folks with MS ride a bicycle?

I've met one person  online

And he gets 'it' more than others, I think

'It''...how a person with atrophied muscles from inhibited nerve function

Can ride a bike

I used to feel I had to explain 'it' to everyone I met on the trail

And sometimes I did, if I had the cognitive function to do so

If not, I'd still try to have that conversation in my head

Probably more for explaining 'it' to myself

Processing

My isolation?

I left a cult in 2005

To which I'd been loyal for 28 years

To which I'd committed my money, time, soul, beliefs

Left behind those connections

But I found connections in the ex-and-anti-cult community

Some of those were reconnections with old friends

But then I left that community after I got falsely accused 

What a mess

I'd defended a guy on the anticult forum 

Who was falsely (or at least mistakenly) accused

I knew he was, because I was his supposed target for his supposed lies

Which weren't lies

Hubby and I even met 3D with the guy, multiple times

I later met 3D with the third party he had supposedly posed as in 2D

Which he hadn't 

Messy, messy

Later folks on a couple anticult forums were told I'd given the falsely-accused guy 

Access to the anticult's secret women's forum

And that I'd shared the women's secrets with him

I didn't do either of those things

I was guilty of telling the falsely-accused dude that a secret women's forum existed

Which I wasn't supposed to reveal

That was part of the agreement when a woman joined the forum

And I had hesitantly joined some months earlier

So I probably shouldn't have told the dude

But I did

I did tell someone on the forum I had done so

And asked their opinion if I should tell the forum administrator

They thought 'no'

And I agreed

So I didn't say anything

In hindsight

I wish I had

I also told the falsely-accused guy

That the guy who had falsely (or at least mistakenly) accused him

Had launched the secret forum for the women 

And that the launcher-accuser was the only male who had access

So the falsely-accused guy interpreted that as perverted

But I didn't think the launcher looked at the forum

Unless there was technical difficulty

I'm getting way off track here

Explaining back story

Which I'm not explaining well at all

It was messy and complicated

Soap opera style

Suffice it to say

I was kicked out of the secret women's forum 

And left the anti-cult forum

Outcast

From the cult

And now its anti-counterpart

Isolation 

Then I got involved in broader "cult-recovery"

With my then-mental health therapist

He called me an "activist"

I'd never considered myself an "activist" for anything

After two years

And still his client

He accused me of things

That I had no idea I had done 

Because I had not done them

But he was my mental health therapist

And I doubted my own perceptions

Could I actually be guilty of what he said?

He harmfully cut me off

Slash

After much deliberation and mental torment

And learning his behavior was a pattern

He'd done similar ten years prior

Before he had his counseling license

I filed a professional complaint

With his state licensing board

A year later

Therapist tried to smear my character online

Using outright fables based on my past

Which he knew well

Some people, many perhaps, believed him

Outcast

From the cult

From cult's anti-counterpart

And now the broader cult-recovery field

Isolation

But then 

Connection

One of Therapist's past clients contacted me

Therapist had harmed them in worse ways than I

They thanked me for filing the complaint

And following through

The ex-client was able to reconcile with a close relative

Whom the client had cut off

Due to Therapist's twisted analysis

And that made it all worth it

"It" being the complaint 

And the attempted smear

And all its repercussions

Internally and externally

But by the time "worth-it" had landed

Therapist's character smear of me

Had already done its damage

In the public arena

Fourteen months later I was a witness for the state  

At Therapist's state licensing board hearing

To which he didn't show

Another fourteen months later

Therapist's license was revoked

The ex-client again thanked me

Along with a few other folks

Who were privy to the situation

And who had experienced harm

At the therapist's emotional-lashings

And that was that

So, yeah 

I've had to live with isolation

At least the internal kind

And some external 

What helps me?

Let me list some ways...

Music and singing and dance

Connecting with the awe of nature

Befriending trees and wildlife

Talking life over with my self

Finding purpose in the smallest of things...

Like laying my parrot-print throw on the foot of our bed so that the parrots are flying out the window

Naming and talking with inanimate objects...

Adult Groot Art-o-mat block

Bicycles, Olivia and Blue

1999 Ford Explorer, Sir Edward

Rolling walker, The Phoenix

And (the most embarrassing) the bath back-brush

I haven't given the bath-brush a name. 

That feels I'm taking it a bit too far.

But who knows?

Whatever helps.

Almost daily, if not every day, I talk with

The magnificent creation of nature 

In which the circle of life happens

Expressing my deepest gratitude

Discovering connection is key...

Joy, Gratitude, & HeARTfelt Tokens

A coupleish weeks ago, I read the words, "How do you find joy?"

However, a week later I ran across the  question again and realized my brain had mis-remembered the question. I had turned "How do you find joy?" into "What brings you joy?"

When I realized my mind had made the switch from "how" to "what," I thought,

Those are two different questions. In one I'm looking/searching for joy. The other is more passive, for lack of a better word; something brings me joy even though I may not be looking for it. If I'm aware in that moment, I'll recognize it and my heart will be uplifted.

I think at the top of my list for "how" is:

• Bringing to my mind's eye scenes from my good memory bank and feeling the scene in my heart. I often tell my self, "I did that,'" or "That really happened."

The "how," (which is also the "what") also brought to mind Victor Frankl's book, Man's Search for Meaning, and part of how he survived the camps. If I recall correctly, three of the things he engaged were good memories from his life before the camps, doing pick-up theatre and singing with his fellow prisoners in their quarters as long as mean guards weren't around, and watching sunsets and/or sunrises.

All this pondering got me to thinking of how joy feels. 

How does one describe joy?

Gratitude always seems a part of joy.

Other feelings that came to mind regarding joy are awe, wonder, largeness of life, freedom to be and to give and to receive. I may be expanding it too far, but it's fun to think about.

Some of my whats are:

• Riding my bike through woods and meadows and fields.
• Nature. Wildlife. Trees. Creeks and rivers and rocks of all sizes. Sky and clouds and the heavens.
• Hearing from my adult children. Sharing conversation & memories. Roasting marshmallows around a campfire.
• Music. Dancing with the rhythms. Singing along. Making up songs. Playing my drum or tapping out beats with my fingers and feet. 
• Peoples' stories. From serendipitous meetings with "strangers." From friends and family and history of all sorts. Every day life stories and stories of survival and endurance in the face of overwhelming hardships.
• Good memories. Not just thinking about them, but feeling them. Going back into the scene. Savoring them. Sometimes they prompt me to action. "Get up and go ride your bike Carol. Or call Son or Daughter. Or just go be with nature. You'll feel better for it."

As serendipity would have it, about an hour after I wrote the above on May 18th, 2021, I read the paragraph below, written by Rachel Naomi Remen, M.D. It's an excerpt from the Foreward of the book The Fear Cure by Lissa Rankin, M.D. 

...The opposite of fear is joy. I had thought that joy was the same as happiness, but joy is far more durable than happiness. The capacity for joy seems to come from an unconditional relationship to life, a willingness to show up and meet with whatever is there. It is an openness that takes us beyond the wish to control life to the capacity to celebrate life. It moves us from an adversarial relationship toward life to the experience of mystery and wonder which is at the heart of life. Ultimately it can heal us... 

~Rachel Naomi Remen, M.D. 

~*~*

Around my home and in my car, I keep heartful tokens -- small inanimates, which aren't small to my heart -- to help me along my journey of life. Reminders. 

This morning (5/20/21) as I performed my balance and strengthening stretches, I was again reminded of joy. On my wall is my focal point when doing certain stretches.

It's a combo of two different art pieces hanging on the same wall-nail:

1. A wood-burning & macrame that I made some 40+ years ago
2. A "Mosaic WHIMSEY" by Art-o-mat artist Janie Reavis-Cox

And while doing my stretches this morning accompanied by music from one of my Pandora stations, this song came on.  My joy and my gratitude merged quite nicely. :) 

Ten Years

In 2018, I read most of a book titled Mind Over Medicine by Lissa Rankin, MD. I forget what exactly prompted me to buy the hardcover book, but it must have been my preview reading of it on Amazon. 

Used to be, in more brick-and-mortar bookstore days, I'd frequent Borders and peruse the bookshelf. When a book called or whispered to me, I'd sit on the floor cross-legged, open the book and scan it and decide whether or not it was worth a deeper read. If it was, I'd pick out a comfy, upholstered chair and read sections of the book, and then buy it...or not. If I had to rein in my desire to start underlining or writing in the margins, it was a definite buy, depending on cost. 

I still prefer hardcopy to screens. I like inking up a book. Underlining sentences. Marking up paragraphs. Writing notes in margins. And turning pages. And bookmarks; I like bookmarks. 

I put away Dr. Rankin's book when I got to the part of the exercise at the end of the book about writing my prescription when it asked if I believed I could get well, or something like that. I couldn't go any further. I hit a wall.

I think part of the hit was my Way conditioning, about their "law of believing." 

Sure, I want to believe I can get well. But how would what I believe make any difference on the outcome? I have to let go of the outcome, which is something I've been learning for years now. And it brings me peace. 

Dad was rendered a quadriplegic the last 12-1/2 years of his life. A C-4 sever from a head-on automobile collision. I'm sure he wanted his body back; he even underwent experimental surgery to help that possibility. Does that not indicate that he was "believing?" To say he wasn't able to "believe big enough" (something Way doctrine promulgates, in part or whole) makes my stomach turn. But yet, could it be possible for the body to regrow severed nerves if the right physiological chemistry prompted such? Or, if a person could live long enough for regrowth to happen?

Regardless, Dad did "believe big." Way terms; ugh. I'd rather say he "meaningfully endured." His attitude to continue on astounds me now. I mean, it astounded me then. But now that I'm the age-range of when much of his bodily & limb functions stopped working and after living ten years with polyradiculitis, it astounds me more. Mom too, in her care of him. It really is something, heroic even.

So, back to me. In 2018, I just couldn't get past that belief question. 

But in mid-2020, I looked into Dr. Rankin's work more deeply. Again, I can't recall what prompted that. I learned she doesn't teach the "law of believing." I think I'm accurate in saying that she teaches there is something to believing, but to say it is a law (like the "law of attraction") can be harmful. I agree with that. 

Through the past year or so, I've wondered... 

Is my body set up on a pattern where it says "It's six weeks now; you need another injection of steroids." Could it be a neural pathway that is psychological, but causes physiological changes and symptoms? If so, can I break from that pathway? Can I help my body make a new path? 

The heavy metal ions in my blood are down, though there may still be some in my tissues that are dumping. After getting my mercury levels down in 2000, it took until 2005 before I was "well." But I did do low-heat saunas then to sweat out any mercury that might be stored in my tissues. It's not been five years yet since getting the cobalt and chromium down. I can't do saunas now because of Covid. The terbinafine is completely out of my system; I don't think it was the main culprit anyway. But I was younger then too, and that could be a factor.  

And now it's 2021. April marked my 10-year anniversary from the onset of polyradiculitis. That hit me pretty hard in March and April. 

In March I started attending one of Dr. Rankin's Zoom courses, Healing with the Muse, that meets two-to-three times a month. I love them. I like being able to attend them live because of the interaction and community. But if I can't attend, there is a playback.

(More to come...eventually...maybe)