Just Journaling ~ and other wonderful stuff ~ Part 2

~ Posted, 28th October 2017 ~
 
24th October, Tuesday ~ My mentors strengthening letter
The hard drive crash was very, very hard on me personally.  I struggled greatly to surface from it as I tackled the exhausting task of piecing back together my lost work (office work) in what seems to be a painstaking and hopeless impossibility that would never really get me back to the place of order I once comfortably enjoyed and felt reasonably safe in. 
 
After visiting and speaking to my mentor on the 2nd October, I felt so much more reassured.  She had not realised exactly how hard my struggle was… she also didn’t know how much of my own treasures and works I’d lost and had not had time to get to yet to sort through and see what was left.  Once she understood, she suggested that I stop trying to fix everything, and rather just start over.  It was something about her reassurance that settled my mind, taking away the constant sense of panic I’d been experiencing since June.
 
But… by then, my mind had already fallen back into that place in my far distant past where all those horrible, negative, destroying script messages were pounding on the walls of my cold, dark inner-child’s dungeon. 

I FELL BACK INTO MY DUNGEON!
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I fell back into my dungeon!
Flat on my face!
Sprawled out all over!
A disgusting disgrace!
It’s dark and it’s dank
And cold to the bone!
I cannot bear it,
But I’ve lost my way home!
 
~ Panayiota
(31 January 2009)

You’re useless I was telling myself… old and redundant… everyone is pointing fingers at you now… soon you will be asked to leave so that someone more efficient can take over… you’re no good… stupid… stupid… stupid good for nothing idiot… (my mother’s idiot child!)
 
My abuser’s voices from my past, still with so much power in my present… No adult logic today could convince me that all this self-destructive conversation in my head was wrong… that it was lies…
 
NO-NO-NO!  I had totally and utterly convinced myself that it was all over for me… I had failed my mentor… my students… and no longer belonged in my Logotherapy world.  All I knew was that I had to FIX as much as I could, before I left… so that I could at least selvage some of the broken fragments of my reputation… if any. 
 
Then today… 24th October, out of the blue, my mentor and boss sends me the most beautiful letter… so uplifting… so affirming… comforting, reassuring, understanding and just beyond anything I could have imagined at this time…
 
I sat there reading the words… first blankly… without emotion… as if it can’t be true…
 
I mean… how do you go from your own negative self-destructive script to suddenly being told by the positive uplifting script of someone you deeply respect and whose word you have always trusted…
 
It’s a bit like sitting in a dark place… staring into the darkness… empty… having become accustomed to it… like it’s expected… it’s always been that way, so why fight it anymore… you belong there… just keep doing what you must do, until “they” tell you you’re not wanted anymore… then just go away quietly… just go away…
 
But then… when you least expect it, someone switches the light on… it’s so bright that it hurts your eyes… you aren’t ready to open your eyes to it yet, so you keep them squeezed tightly shut!  You don’t know how they found the switch… did they make a mistake…
 
It takes a while for you to realise that the light is meant to be on… it was always meant to be on… you weren’t created to be sitting there staring into that darkness… when the first person in your life switched off the light… it was their own light they were switching off, but all this time, you believed it was yours and it was meant to be yours…
 
It was a lie!  Can’t you see that… it was a LIE!!! 
 
My mentor’s letter authenticates me and there are no lies in her words… she believes in me still, even when I have forgotten how to believe in myself…
 
How can this be… it’s so hard to fathom such unconditional acceptance of me… there is so much power in her TRUTH… it is to be my truth… I just need to keep my eyes open to the light of the truth of my existence… that I was born for a reason… my life has a purpose and I just need to keep moving forward, even through those dark places that try to take me back to my past…
 
The past is not where I belong… that is not where I was created to stay… my present and my future is where I was created to be…  I just have to trust in it and keep going strong… always towards the light of my Father in Heaven’s UNCONDITIONAL LOVE for me which shines on me in so many ways… like all the billions of stars in the sky, whose light refuses to go out and seem to shine brighter than ever, even in the darkest of nights…
 
I cannot allow the abusers of my past to snuff my light out!
 
I must NOT allow myself to snuff my own light out because of them and their lies!
 
I cannot allow the darkness of my past to stop me from seeing the light of my present or that of my future…
 
THE LIGHT OF MY LIFE MUST STAY SWITCHED ON!
 
When I read my mentors’ letter again, I cried… overwhelmed with feeling unconditionally accepted… truly belonging… truly understood… truly loved…
 
Suddenly my past lost all its power over me once more… another beautiful new day had dawned on me…
 
My mentor is arranging for me to have an assistant, and also for another trainer to mark the introductory students’ portfolios… I will miss those, but she has identified and outlined my most important function at work and I feel I will be able to really breath at last.
 
25th October ~ Wednesday
The gardener came and finished off my garden beds… what a wonderful worker he is.  In the evening after 9pm, I planted out all of my neighbour’s seedling-gift into the new beds.  I cannot  begin to tell you how much satisfaction and fulfilment I feel to have a promise of a food garden growing.
 
Between my mentors letter the day before, and my beautiful garden being prepared so well and ready for planting, I was totally hyped up by the time I went to bed… I ended up only sleeping for four hours… a disaster for me!  I need my sleep or I just don’t function the next day!
 
26th October ~ Thursday
Today was the Advanced course plenary session at Unisa.  I nearly didn’t go because I was already so tired, but I wanted to so much that I risked a possibly terrible day of tiredness and just went.  The morning started off with me feeling as though I was drifting… and depressed, even a little tearful and yawning so hard for a good few hours…  it was just ridiculous… but after a while, I seemed to get over my absolute exhaustion and the rest of the day went really well, thankfully. 
 
Dr Kanda, another mentor and friend of mine, lifted me to and from Unisa in his car and we had a chance as always to have some very deep and meaningful conversations.  As a result of my realisations once more of my own destructives mildest and behaviours, after rending my mentors letter and talking about it with Dr Kanda, I have decided to create another presentation on the subject.  As soon as I have time again, I will do so.  I am going to call it: “The self-destructive power of the damaged mind” – relating to a past of child abuse.
 
I also would like to create a presentation on the subject of: “The wounded healer” … another subject that has come up in conversation and at the workshop today.  I find it very interesting and an important topic to talk about.
 
I am so glad I was able to make it through the day at the workshop, because I thoroughly enjoyed interacting with the group there… it was a wonderful day as always.
 
To be continued…
 
Thank you for sharing with me…
 
~ Panayiota