Day Thirteen: Breathing

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I really can't stay ... Baby, it's cold outside.
I've got to go 'way ... Baby, it's cold outside.

This evening has been ... Been hoping that you'd drop in
So very nice ... I'll hold your hands, they're just like ice

My mama will start, to worry ... Beautiful, what's your hurry?
And Father will be pacing the floor ... Just listen to that fireplace roar! 

So really I'd better scurry ... Beautiful, please don't hurry!
Well maybe just a half a drink more ... Why don't you put some records on while I pour (excerpt from Frank Loesser's "Baby it's Cold Outside")

While in graduate school, I took an entire module that focused on the problem of ambivalence - when you're not even sure what you want, or you simply can't decide between a couple choices of behaviour. One of the most popular therapeutic treatments for ambivalence toward (stopping or continuing) a behaviour is called Motivational Interviewing (MI). In Motivational Interviewing, the therapist will be actively creating a non-judgemental and supportive environment that gives regular feedback to the client in attempts to help them see  a better future for themselves, based in reality. The key to MI is in the therapist's understanding that every client is at a different stage of readiness to change. Is the client getting help voluntarily? Is this mandatory treatment? These factors impact the client's potential to successfully move out of one behaviour pattern and into more healthy ones.

I bring this up today because this day's funs revolve around admitting to my own ambivalence. I believe (and I've seen it in session!) that we can literally be bound by our own refusal to admit certain realities to ourselves. Denial is a powerful defence mechanism, and while it does save us from some acute discomfort, it doesn't make the realities go away. Sometimes, our denial is hurting us, and the people around us even as we sigh in relief not to have to face certain truths about the world, or ourselves. Last year, 2011, was the most difficult year of my life so far, and I was quite unpleasant to be around, I think. By this time last year, I was depressed, on month three of no-pay injury leave and seriously questioning the validity of my existence. I worked a total of 3 weeks in the year 2011. True story.

My parents, by the middle of 2011 (or maybe even within the first quarter!) were saying that if I wasn't happy here, then I should just move back to England. I was saying no, because I felt like this was where I needed to be. I was seriously ambivalent about it on a deep level because I felt so unhappy. I applied for jobs everywhere from Texas and Norway to Sub-Arctic Canada and considered positions in the Middle-East, Nigeria and the UK. I believe that this was where I was supposed to be, but I prayed to God not to be there any more. Have you ever been to that place?

I'm talking about this now, because I can honestly say that I do not regret having had the year 2011. I don't know if I've publicly credited 2011 for it's good to me, but what a year! I did not enjoy going through many of the experiences I had then, but 2011 changed my life. Had I not been rejected by those particular grad programs, I'd never have had a job in the corporate world doing what I thought was my ideal job. Had I not severed my ACL, I would not have gotten counselling clients then been offered an office space. I might not have realised for several more years and dollars that I was slightly off-track. I started 2011 in all kinds of denial. I refused to consider that I was applying to the wrong types of programs (even though the thought crossed my mind that I shouldn't be applying at all), I refused to consider that the person I hoped would be my future didn't treat me with enough consideration (even though this was obvious) and I absolutely refused to consider that I could be happy without those things happening in the time-frame I preferred. I had my mind made up at the beginning of the year that there was no happiness to be had while I lingered in this space, and by December 2011 I had convinced myself quite thoroughly of that.

2012 has been a year where I learned that I don't get to control everything, and there is a line where responsible planning becomes some form of idolatry where I worship my plan more than I experience true life and the input (that I treasure) of God. This post is entitled Breathing because sometimes, that's all your space will allow you to do. Sometimes you are in a space where you are completely exposed, and you have to look at yourself clearly there, and it huuurts, but then you breathe, and you realise that no evil can come from truly seeing yourself, and you can't truly overcome into a more hopeful future until you deal with what you're desperately clutching on to. You can't do it alone though, and this is maybe the most valuable thing that I learned in the year 2011. I am not alone, and I don't want to be alone. Let the people in your life love you. Breathe it in, and give it: out.