words

On getting older (60 +)

Hair Loss: this happens but doesn’t bother me but I does bother some people leading to comb-overs. I still have hair but it is thining.

Skid Marks: This one I wasn’t expecting as I know that I wipe properly. By the end of the day and I am getting into something more comfortable, bang! There they are.

Older: ageism is real and happens here in Australia. Older people are not popular or seen as attractive. If you age retired, you are seen as not contributing to society. It doesn’t matter that you have been paying taxes for the last 40 years. Other societies and cultures hold value in their older persons and treat them with respect and love. I was once at a train stop only to have a teenager verbally attack me for being older. I was so shocked I couldn’t even reply.

Aches and Pains: This one is inevitable. Pain (both physical and emotional) is part of the aging process. For me it’s not about whining about aches and pains. But for some people it’s how they communicate.

food and sleep

I’ve some good some not so good news.

I’m doing really well in terms of living (currently) in a peaceful abode. But have been eating like I’m on death row. I have had an eating disorder since I was 17, so have had problems with ‘over-eating’ throughout my life. I’ve probably put on about 10 kilograms recently (the last two months). Yes. Very scary. So, I’ve bought a treadmill and are using it every day.

The other thing is I’m sleeping 12 hours a day almost every day. This is NOT good. I’m not depressed but am over-sleeping which is not good for me at all.

Still not sure how to tackle my over-sleep issue. If I set an alarm, it may trigger anxiety. So, I will need to try different things to see what works best. BTW: I’m not a morning person. G.

Quote

Quote

Lies are sweet in the beginning and Bitter in the end…

…and the Truth is Bitter in the beginning and Sweet in the end.

I recently saw a YouTube video on Gaslighting, and they said that telling lies was a form of gaslighting. This really caught my attention because I was lied to a lot as a child (but also as an adult), by my family.

If I remember these events, I feel very very angry, so need to be careful with what I think about and what I replay in my head.

For me I find this behavior VERY aggressive, particularly when it is done by a family member because it was done to me over and over and over.

The other one that triggers me a lot is passive aggressive behavior. There is someone I know who does this to perfection.

Yesterday I asked if we could make a time to catch up. She said: “if I’m awake, I will answer the call. If I’m asleep, I won’t answer.

She said nothing about what I actually asked for, which was a convenient time to catch up.

Funny enough I know this person really well and understand where the behavior comes from, so I understand why she does this.

What ends up happening is I end up blocking this person, so I don’t end up getting really angry, over and over.

I’m actually a very intelligent man……but because of my psychiatric disability I’m very isolated. Gavin.

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12 Passive Aggressive Tactics Covert Narcissists Love to Use

#1. General lifestyle non-cooperation.

#2. Expressing a desire to help, yet becoming sidetracked.

#3. Responding to confrontations with perplexion.

#4. Telling you what to do via questions.

#5. Playing the role of the victim.

#6. Running a smear campaign behind your back.

#7. Paying you a compliment while also complaining.

#8. Not including you in activities.

#9. Brazenly ignoring you, then feigning innocence.

#10. Holding onto a moral high ground, but passing judgment.

#11. The classic silent treatment.

#12. Appearing willing to please, yet holding grudges.

Don’t be an emotional reaction – be a person

This quote is one that has helped me throughout my life.

I didn’t have a good education, and I my family life was full on alcoholism, aggression (domestic violence), denial (lots of lies) and a lack of love and care for us kids.

My father was an emotional reaction – not a person. He would get very angry at the drop on a hat.

This had us all very fearful of him…and I was never really able to really feel safe.

Keep your intense reactions for the bigger issues of life
(which day-to-day living does not provide)

It wasn’t until 2003 when I got sober from sex drugs and alcohol that I started to really learn stuff and work on my emotional intelligence and also my interest in thigs other than sex drugs and rock and roll.

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When we constantly react to things, the habit becomes a habit.

The more we react the more we will feel the emotional sharpness.

DO YOU ABUSE YOUR EMOTIONAL SYSTEM?

• over-reacting in a wholesale fashion;

• living by misplaced importance;

• devaluing your emotional currency;

• destroying your inner peace;

• making life unreasonably hard for those close to you;

• alienating friendship.

I did this with anger. So the slightest upset, my anger would kick in hard and I would feel it sharply. Took me years to get out of this habit, as it had been in place since I was a child.

I currently have a neighbor that reacts to my TV when I have my front door open. The more he unconsciously reacts by slamming his door, the more he feels the emotion. By doing the slamming the emotion is reenforced, and more the sharp feelings are felt (Rinse and Repeat).

It’s a bit like being stuck on a hamster wheel.

Awareness is the key to making changes for a better life.

Gavin.

touch wood

Hi All.

Doing well at the moment hence the ‘touch wood’ thing because I hope I don’t jinx it.

All the other sayings like: ‘be careful what you wish for’ and all that stuff has meaning because when things get better old habits can return and some of those things and behaviors can be not so good.

I’m a FULL-BLOWN addict. I’ve had addiction behaviors since I was about seven years old, and they just got worse and worse as I got older. What I notice is that when things are going bad my addiction stuff is suppressed. All the negative energy overrides the addictions.

It’s only been about three weeks since things have improved but my thinking has recently changed, so much so that some of my addictive stuff has returned. Nothing serious, but enough to really notice the change.

One of the many things that has been so good is…I’ve gotten so much done at home. Some stuff I’d been putting off for four years. So, my home is looking amazing. Still more to do, but I’m so grateful all that I’ve achieved in the last three weeks. G.

What about you? Is change something you are wherry of?

Quote: when you see the elephant’s tail…

When you see the elephant’s tail…

..you know the worst of things have passed,

and you are through to the good again.

I heard this quote in a TV series called: Friends and Neighbors (on Apple TV). It appealed to me due to the other quotes about elephants i.e. How do you eat an elephant? One bite at a time.

They say an elephant never forgets…and the proverbial elephant in the room.

For me ‘seeing the elephant’s tail’ means there is probably another elephant coming behind the first elephant 😀

Winter is coming…

Winter in Australia is pretty mild compared to other countries, but for me Winter is a problem because I suffer from hyperhidrosis. This means I sweat a lot all the time, and when the weather is cold I’m wet and cold. Doesn’t matter what I’m wearing. I just sweat all the time.

I wouldn’t have issue with Winter except for this condition.

I walk to the library and when I get there the back of my head is dripping wet.

I recently went out taking photos at night time, and when I got home all my clothes were wet including my jacket.

Everything had to go into the washing machine.

I have to wear two kinds of deodorant. One on the skin (under arms), and another on the clothes (under arms). If I don’t do this I smell like a polecat. It’s due to the fact I’m always wet.

The only time I don’t sweat is when I’m asleep.

Gavin.

Finally back to studying

I stopped attending Grow quite a while ago and was aware that at some point I will need to get back to studying for my mental health.

First, I stopped drinking (for the 600th time) over Easter and now are back to studying Eckhart Tolle and A Course in Miracles. Also, back to the healthy diet too.

I know I have to do this as there is a lot of unconsciousness still in me. Also, plenty of resistance and avoidance of the Now…

Although I love studying The Power of Now, I still have some resistance to it because I have a very strong pain body. (past trauma). So, when I listen to the book, my pain body gets triggered and I stop listening and wander off in my negative thoughts.

You are walking along a path at night, surrounded by a thick fog. But you have a powerful flashlight that cuts through the fog and creates a narrow, clear space in front of you. The fog is your life situation, which includes past and future; the flashlight is your conscious presence; the clear space is the Now.

Eckhart Tolle

ACIM is very different to Eckart in that it is non-duality teaching…specifically i.e. Buddhism.

I listen to the Course every night before I go to sleep. If I don’t do that, I feel completely wrong and can’t get to sleep.

I am not a victim of the world I see.

acim

Childhood Abandonment and Family

I’ve been thinking quite a bit about families and how helpful they can be, especially Spanish speaking families and the strong bonds of love and support they have.

‘Family is everything’ they often say.

The love is very real, and both physical and emotional support of love is very self-evident in these families.

But for me ‘Family is Nothing’. No emotional support. No love. Nothing.

I was born into a family where my father didn’t just ‘not like me’ but had constant seething contempt for me. This was permanent and was there until his death.

My Mother was obsessed with my father, so no support from my mother.

Both my sisters were supporting each other, so once again no support there.

When I turned nine my middle sister suddenly stopped liking me and also started having seething contempt for me (just like me father). This continues to this day.

When I left home my father would write me these letters asking me to come home. My mother wanted me to come home apparently, and my father kept writing letters asking me to come home. I didn’t want to come home because my father hated me.

My parents would visit me when they would come to Adelaide, but these visits were approximately 10 to 20 minutes because my father could not bear to be around me. So it was a cup of coffee and they would get up and leave.

For me family is very unpleasant and unsupportive, so at some point I stopped having contact with them.

What are the results of this experience?

Intimate relationships trigger my family abandonment issues. It usually takes a while for them to kick in but I will start getting very angry when the partner does something I don’t like. I mean really angry. The problem is I can’t control it. And it has a devastating effect on the other person. The anger is my childhood trauma coming up.

The other issue is codependency. I act like the way I think the other person wants me to be. This acting takes a lot of energy, so I cannot maintain the illusion and have to have time out and be totally by myself to recover. This pattern keeps going as long as the other person can put up with me…then they end the relationship or I will.

Even around friends, if I go on holiday with them, I will need to have to have time out so I can just be myself.

All that hatred I experienced as a child has had me feeling very unworthy. I’ve spent most of my like feeling unloved and unworthy. Knowing this stuff is very powerful because awareness is gold.

Just good to get this out there and on paper. Gavin.