This has been a really important week for me.  I started the Artist’s Way this week, which is a kind of workbook/recovery book for people whose artist-selves have gotten thwarted along life’s way.  I’m pretty sure the author would say the book is for all of us.

With the help of some guided meditation questions, I’ve been identifying some really important stuff that’s kept me living small most of my life—living with a lot of fear, holding me back from thriving in all my glory (that sounds so pretentious, doesn’t it?—all my glory?  It does unless you think everyone has it.  Which I do.).  I’m feeling so hopeful and energized.  Something new is underway inside.  Something really good.

One thing I’ve noticed this week, and which only adds to my conviction that important things are happening, is this weird…Thing has woken up.  It happens nearly every time I have a break-through in inner-work-type stuff—every time I feel that zing of fear going away and the accompanying magic of knowing, even for a moment, what it’s like to confidently pursue my dreams.  Or to have dreams.  I’ll have a day or two, maybe three, of a natural sort of high, and then as that starts to level off, I’ll feel like I’m being watched.  Quite literally.  I’ll find myself looking to see if someone’s in the room.  No one is there, of course, but It is.  I’m pretty sure It is a projected persona from inside myself whose job it is to keep me from doing anything risky.  Anything at all.  When I start to imagine doing such things, it shows up.  A nebulous threat.  An Eye, making sure I know I’m being watched, sure I know I better not do anything great or fantastic or free, or I’ll be sorry.

My pattern has mostly been to try to ignore The Eye (think Tolkein’s depiction of it), to try to keep doing what I set out to do.  But would you believe that within a day or two of it being set on me, all the fears and insecurities and reasons to get depressed and deflated about life I’ve ever known have been set on me as well, and I have a minor melt down.  I recover from it, but as I do, it sets me gently back into the smallness of life I was originally so happy about leaving.  Mission accomplished.

Yuck.

So anyway, that whole cycle happened again this week.  But here’s what’s really great:  In the midst of my minor meltdown last night, my husband got mad.  He got mad.  Not in some stereotypical male way, but in the "I’m on your team and I hate this cycle right along with you" way.  He said he was tired of me coming up against freedom and then backing down.  He said I’ve got to fight.  I’ve got to face that demon, that Eye, and push through to the other side.  I need to do it.  He (my husband) needs me to do it.  Our son—our whole family system needs it.  “You’ve got to do something to stand up to it!” he said.

At first I was just annoyed.  I don’t like being told what to do.  And frankly, I don’t like having to stand up to this Thing.  It’s really scary.

But you know, I think my husband’s right.  And I sure as hell would rather be told what to do in this instance, by him, than be told to live small every day of my life.

So here’s what I’m aiming to do.  I’m going to make a collage.  I’m going to make a collage that depicts, somehow, me standing up to this Thing and proceeding to thrive.  Some signpost of what I want to do and what, with any kind of luck (read help from God/Spirit/Universe/husband/friends/inner muse), I will do.  I needed to write this post to make public this commitment.  I’ll show you what I come up with when it’s done.

This entry was posted on Tuesday, November 15th, 2005 at 9:41 pm and is filed under Books and Art, Healing, Psychology. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can skip to the end and leave a response. Pinging is currently not allowed.