Aversion Therapy

Some people wear rubber bands around their wrists and snap themselves when they have an inappropriate thought or do some undesirable behavior.  I'm not much for rubber band therapy... but am no stranger to the overall concept of aversion therapy.  Do or think bad...punishment follows.  My punishments are typically logical thoughts following the illogical/bad thoughts.  I very rarely do anything bad these days.  For the most part, logic wins and I don't have useless thoughts for long.  Sometimes it's extremely simple... so simple that the second part of the thought can cancel the first.  For example: he's really hot...except for that neck tattoo.  

Apparently there's a down side to prolonged use of aversion therapy, though...  Once you've gone through the logical thoughts...a few dozen times...to no avail, they cease to mean anything at all.  I can tell myself an honest, logical truth...and immediately dismiss it for the more favorable/interesting bad thought.  Eventually I'll skip the logical part altogether...because maybe he looks good in turtlenecks, and that IS a book he's holding...  If I'm reminded of it somehow (this is Arizona and no one wears a turtleneck when it's 110 out), I push it out of my mind immediately (everywhere is air conditioned..and he can read).  This is a conditioning thing.  Clearly I'm able to ignore myself...go against my best interests...to satisfy my hedonistic fleeting desires...anything with a neck tattoo would be fleeting.  Clearly my punishments aren't good enough...or I'm just not able to trick myself.  I'm guessing the latter.  Either way, this is a side-effect that I sort of anticipate.  If I want something bad enough, no amount of reasoning will change my mind.  The want becomes a need...and then there's no turning back.

There is a side-effect that I didn't expect, though.  I had no idea there'd be a subconscious...leaking...of desire.  I can do avoidance - physically and emotionally.  I can remind myself time and time again that thinking/doing/seeing/etc. will lead to suffering on some profound level.  That's good enough for me because I don't like suffering, especially not over and over again for the same reason... so keeps the avoidance going strong.  Sadly, I have no control over my subconscious.  Now I have dreams about the things I avoid.  The dreams are vivid and emotionally charged, and they're impossible to forget.  I'll spend an entire day in a dream haze...and there's not a damn thing I can do about it.

And the absolute worst thing about all of it is that my dreams are almost always a million times better than the reality of any situation.  They're better than the best possible outcomes.  It's not a reiteration of the logical side of things... it's what would never happen, even in the best of circumstances, if the illogical thoughts/actions were the right choices - they're dreams in more than one sense.  There was a time recently when I dreamed of cheeseburgers most nights.  It was the result of not being able to eat greasy foods without pain (gallbladders are not fun when they misbehave).  I thought about foods that I wanted, but never gave in because the pain wasn't worth it.  I was so consumed with what I couldn't have that it seeped into my subconscious and flooded my dreams.  I still can't really have the foods I want, but my mind has given me a cheeseburger break.  Guess it has bigger issues to sort out... and leave me reeling from all day.

Not that I'm complaining...not really...I love the dreams.  It's like living an alternate life.  If only there weren't that little bit of disappointment that comes with waking up...

To-Do...Today

I hate it when I have a huge list of things I want to do, but I'm scatterbrained...and sort of going from one thing to another without finishing anything (story of my life, right?).  Today, I need to do the following:

- Go to the store.
- Clean floors (living room, kitchen, bathroom).
- Pay bills.
- Check school site...because I don't know when the semester starts.  I've already gotten all that I need about one character from the textbook, so I'm feeling less interested in taking mythology...but still more interested in mythology than I've ever been.  Guess that's a good sign...
- Get at least one pile of yard trash into the trash can.
- Laundry.
- Make a meatloaf.
- Read....a lot.
- Finish the bio I've been working on for this blog.  In case you haven't noticed, the blog looks different, and I added a short character study style bio last week.  The bio I'm working on is a HUGE thing, complete with pictures from birth until now.
- Take more Motrin and work out...at least a little.
- Repaint toenails.

There are probably a few things I'm forgetting.  And naturally I'm being distracted by Rachael Ray (who had PLL cast members today).  When this is over, there's a PLL marathon...and a new episode tonight.

Oliver goes back to school tomorrow, so it might be better to leave some of this until then. At least I've written it down...which is actually more than I figured I'd get done :)  Maybe I'll just add it to the other to-do list that I keep in my phone.  Maybe I'll just turn the computer off.

A First Sunday

This is the first Sunday that Oliver has spent at his dad's in a while.  It's been odd.  I had a moderate freak out moment in Walmart when I realized my cart contained no kid.  I remembered quick enough that there was no screaming or running around frantically...

Then, for whatever reason (I'm pleading blonde moment) I spent a few hours fairly certain that it was Friday.  I only just realized, for the second time, that it is Sunday.

Anyway... the new year has treated me well so far.  I'm making progress on all of my resolutions :)  Oliver sorted the laundry...and I'm learning that letting go is active rather than passive.  I've been reasonably friendly and open with the people I know...only snapped at one person (who deserved it) and I've had no occasion to bite my tongue...or later regret having done so.  I've only finished reading one book, but have every intention of finishing another today.  I've spent less time on Facebook and, as a result, more time outside.  My hands kind of ache today from excessive yard work yesterday.  I'm sort of fine with that.  Oliver will happily stay outside for as long as I let him...and yard work keeps me occupied while he plays in the dirt.  He actually helped rake yesterday :)  I've dealt with insurance and will be dealing with a doctor in the near future... and as much as I dread it, I'm looking forward to getting it over with.

The I button on my laptop is uneven... kind of sticking.  This is the price I pay for letting Oliver use the laptop.  He really likes his tablet, though...I put a bunch of matching games on it and he is awesome at them :)

The only one of my resolutions that I've made no progress at so far is finishing something.  I can't even find some of my note cards :\  I don't think that finishing happens overnight, though.  I need to learn to focus on one thing at a time.  I had this awesome new idea running around in my head all of last week...I even started outlining.  That idea had cut off the story I was working on previously.  Today one of my textbooks arrived and I got sidetracked by the story that goes with this book.  I'm taking a mythology class to get to know these characters better...and to figure out who'd hate them enough to want them to suffer.  Dieties are fickle and petty, it seems...so probably any of them for any reason. I'm being vague... and I shouldn't be... but it's tough to explain without telling the whole story right now...and it's impossible to do even that, since I don't know the whole story yet :)

Anyway... the projects I'm currently working on, in the order that I started working on them (* means working title): Dead Girl*, Whisper, Apollo and Aysel*.  Whisper is taking up the most of my attention right now, because no one is formally named...and because, of all the plots, it's the least complex and therefore the easiest to write.  Thing is, I can't write until everyone is named.

I've also been giving a lot of thought to the project I started a while back...it continues to give me trouble.  I'm beyond frustrated with it.  And I'm also doubting the name of my main guy.  It suits him, but only one side of him...and I think the name might belong somewhere else, in some other story.  I chose the name, but then changed the direction of the story...slightly...and now the name feels too...earthy.

I spend a lot of time on names.  The wrong name can ruin a story... I'll actually stop reading something if the names piss me off (seriously, don't give all your characters random one-syllable names like Lox and Pim and Gat...I don't care what the setting is, that shit is annoying).

My bread is done...

See, I wasn't even able to focus on one thing for this entry... :)  There's a good chance that I'm hopeless...at least in this respect.

First Post in a While...Last for the Year!

How do I spend NYE?  Typically, I hide in my house and avoid contact with people.  Oliver is with his dad tonight, so I took the tree down and watched some Criminal Minds.

So, since I'm not a NYE person, it should go without saying that I'm not a resolution person.  Really, I can't recall the last time I made resolutions on NYE, or any other time. It's not like I don't set goals...I just don't make resolutions.  There was some study done on resolutions made on NYE, and like...all of them were broken. Someone said something about them being a sure-fire way of setting yourself up for failure.  For the most part, that's always how I've seen them.  Thing is, I've done plenty of failing all on my own, without the aid of resolutions.  Perhaps for someone like myself resolutions aren't destined for failure.  And in any case, what could it hurt?

So here goes....my first list of resolutions in a very long time:

1.  Let go.  Seriously.  I've spent the better part of the last year wasting time and emotion on a person who isn't the least bit deserving of my attention.  My subconscious may do as it pleases...I have no control over it...but the rest of me is well within my control.  I'm not even saying that I'll remove this person from my life.  I'm just not going to give a damn anymore.  It's not worth the ups and downs.  And, at the same time, I need to be more real in the relationships I have that matter...I need to let people in... allow people to know me, not just about me.  I also need to treat people more as people and less as character studies or psychological research projects.  And one more thing in this area...be fucking honest.  So many issues in the last few months could have been cleared up if I'd just said exactly what I was thinking or asked the things that would have cleared things up.

2.  Finish something.  I'm not even concerned about WHAT I finish at this point...just that I FINISH something.  Anything.  Really.  I have 4 projects in the works right now, all in various stages...and many more ideas that are just hanging around waiting to sidetrack me at any moment.  I look at my stacks of note cards and can just see myself turning into my father.  One of the first arguments I ever heard he and my mother have had to do with a 3-legged deer painting.  My mom was furious that my dad had unfinished paintings everywhere...the most annoying of which was a 3-legged deer.  My books are just like that damn deer.  I need to stop this before it gets any worse.

3.  Read 50 books.  I have more than 50 that I haven't read, so this shouldn't be a challenge... :)

4.  Be proactive about my health.  The last couple months have kind of sucked, and I'm just getting tired of feeling awful all the time.  So, that'll end.  I shouldn't be so scared of docs, but...I am.  I just don't like 'em...and I don't like the thought of medical testing or procedures of any kind, or medication.

5.  Less time on Facebook.  This one should be fairly self-explanatory.

And one that's not just for me...
6.  Teach Oliver some basic little kid skills...like how to make himself one meal, how to put away his clothes, how to sort the laundry... get him better at phonics...he's so good already, but I'd really like it if he could do some basic reading by the end of the year.

There's that.  I could probably have added some other things to that, but....I'm new to this.  Six seems like a good place to start.  Wonder if I'll remember having written this in a year so that I can check my progress.  Someone want to remind me in a year??

There's No Place Like Home....

It's finally over.

The last week was one that needed to happen, despite all my reluctance to let it.  I'm now absolved of any guilt I could have possible felt from saying that I won't ever go back there.  It was a horrible week full of all the things that demonstrate so very clearly how I just don't fit there...and how I never will...and how happy that makes me.  It feels good to let go.

It's weird to learn a lesson that I'm planning to teach a character I'm writing...and weird that I'm learning it so late in the game.  While it's true that there is "no place like home," that home is not necessarily the place you were born or raised; it's the place you make your home.  I'm using the word "place" wrong, I guess... I mean the people, too.  Technically, KS should be my home...and in that sense another saying is true, no matter that its contradictory: "you can't go home again."

It's also nice to see home for the first time...again...every once in a while.

Apples and Trees

Fairly recently I made some derogatory comment about apples and where they fall in relation to trees... and I'm pretty sure it had something to do with one of Romney's douchebag kids.  While I don't take that back, I think that the last couple days have shown me just how far apples can fall.  I'm sitting in Middle of Nowhere, KS, giving some serious thought to my family orchard.

It's like...at one time there was a hilltop covered in little trees that were my ancestors... and for the most part, they all stuck to the hilltop.  My parents may have been born on the hilltop, but in time they were located somewhere on the side of the hill... and little apple me, having never been anywhere near the top of that hill, fell...rolled down the side of the hill, fell off a cliff and into a river, and then floated all the way to the ocean...where I floated in and out with the tide for a while before coming to rest in the sand in some sunny, beautiful place.  I'm like... a beach apple.  I see so little of myself in my family...apart from my mother, and to some smaller extent, my father.  The important thing here is that...I'm glad.  I don't mean to be talking shit, but it's just that...I can't imagine what I would be like if I held such horrifying beliefs.  I can't fathom what would lead anyone to the REALLY think the things I've heard in the last day.

And yes, I did (stupidly) watch a little of the presidential debate with family.  I knew better.  I didn't make it very long, and ended up with the kind of headache that comes with nausea.  Not exactly worth it.

I'm sitting in the only coffee place in this little town... which is an odd improvement over home - I'm not sitting in Safeway.  AND they have wifi, which is good since my phone says I've reached my data limit.  The place is cute... wood floors, tin ceiling, exposed stone wall (not brick...i can't remember what it's called, but pretty much all the old buildings here are made from it).  The only problem I have with this place is that it closes at 3:30... who does that??  It's a terrible time to close.  Normally, I'd be sitting here with my headphones in...no music...listening to the conversations around me.  Considering where I am, I think it's best if I avoid eavesdropping.  I know it'll take little time for me to end up horrible offended, and I'm trying really hard to behave while I'm here... at least behave well enough to not end up lynched.  Opening my mouth in a public place would prove dangerous.

There's also an archery shop right across the street....

Ok... I should do my homework before this place closes...

Also,

And I apologize for the intentionally vague nature of most of this... but I find it frustrating when my deep, foundational beliefs are challenged and found to be lacking.

No, I don't believe in any deities.  Sorry if you got your hopes up...as I know some of you did.

It's just that perhaps I'm  not the pacifist I have always thought myself to be... and the challenging aspect of this is that it's a side of myself that I've been shying away from for some time...yet I've been unwilling to admit my own changes even to myself.  It's only in the last weeks that I've actively sought the changes...rather than passively searching out the possibilities online.

What do you do when you really want to do something that goes against everything you've ever believed?  And what do you do when...you do it.  And like it.  I spent too much time justifying this before acting... and it brought me a lot of peace...but I am still stumbling a little.

It's good for me.  Change is good.  It wasn't a bad foundation, but it's served its purpose and now I need a new one.  Reconciling the acceptance of this new side of myself into the hippie mold I've always lived in will take some time.

Over-analyzing is tiring.  Why am I unable to over-analyze in just one area of my life at a time???

And no, it's not a bdsm thing...I've read over this a couple times and every time it seems worse.  I just want to shoot things with arrows.  Nothing that's alive.