Blog entry for:

may simply be sadness.
so i hear it all the time, how what i perceive is an exaggeration or minification of what is actually happening. what others perceive as their emotional state, however, falls to them. this morning i am all about naming and surviving my feelings, and allowing them to be put into their proper perspective.
i have know the clinically depressed and those who are bi-polar, and whole i have my own theories on the medications that big pharma and the medical industry foists upon them, i also see that they seem to function better, when they follow the advice of those self-seeking and incestuous industries. so my little soapbox over that is done. i have never had to deal with clinical depression, but i have been diagnosed as having panic disorder. that mental state is manifest in the symptoms of anxiety in all sorts of situations and yes can be medicated as well. i am grateful that the professional who originally diagnosed me, believed that medicating that disorder was a disservice to their patients and that cognitive behavioral therapy was the direction to go, once i got my feel on the ground in recovery. well, thinking my way to better behavior has never worked, but behaving my way to better thinking certainly does. naming the fact that i am anxious, looking at the situation in a rational manner and determining the true risk, and finally allowing the feelings to wash through me and go away, once i realize that they are unfounded, is the only thing that has ever worked for me. the result being, i am not a shut-in recluse, living in a dark house, afraid to go outside my yard, as could have been the case, IF what that professional once said was true and accurate.
what is it that i am trying to say here? well for one, the old meme of “i have never died from a feeling, ” still rings true. i have never seen anyone die from a feeling, although the news is filled daily with people innocent or not so innocent dieing from reactions to feelings. what i get from, my sponsor, my friends and my peers in recovery, is the HOPE that whatever feeling i may have, it will pass. i also get grounded in the knowledge that even though i think some feeling or another is some fVcking big deal, most of the time it is just another feeling and it is not nearly as earth-shattering or ground breaking as i am making it out to be. yes, when it comes to my feelings, i still a bit of a drama queen instead of being a dharma king.
it is also true, that one of the greatest side-effects of using, was that i could control my feelings, enhancing those i enjoyed and numbing those i judged to be unpleasant. i have often thought that this was my prime motivator for using, but as i get further and further away from that last use, i am less and less convinced of this being the case. that whole argument becomes less and less relevant as time rolls by, and what i am left with is the idea that decades of active addiction left me ill-prepared to face THE world of feelings, and only an active program of recovery allows me the freedom to feel my feelings and allow them to move along. i am always saddened that people feel sad or depressed enough to end their lives, and it is especially sad when that selfish act turns out destroying the lives of random people. BUT, it was not depression that downed that plane, it was a man, who felt depressed and reacted poorly to that feeling. it speaks volumes of how, as a society, we scare those who are feeling like that, from seeking a way out. the end result of the stigma attached to admitting one is anything but normal, is often tragedy in the truest sense of the word. so just for today, i will be honest with what i am feeling and allow myself the FREEDOM to feel whatever comes down the pike, hoping that it is not homicidal rage.

∞ DT ∞