Category: Self esteem

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So I have my entire life been unable to fit exactly any label. I was sporty,  nerdy,  geeky,  a loner,  a bookworm,  social,  antisocial,  introvert,  extroverted,  a joiner…well you can see where I am going with this. It was not a true issue for me,  and was all in the same breath. I always felt like I was on the outside.  I laugh… I collect labels… But then I would hide the fact that it hurt.  Why should I be a label?  I have never been very good at limiting myself…

That being said…. My twelve year old is very much like me.  She is fluid in who she is and what she does. She asked me today…. Mama why do people have to label each other?  Why can’t they just accept that each person grows and change with each passing day? …….how is it that this child who has not yet reached even a decade and a half umderstands something that eludes over half the human race?

Perhaps we need to learn instead of separately labelling each other,  to instead celebrate the uniqueness that is the human race.

Define Art

According to Wikipedia… An artist is : An artist is a person engaged in one or more of any of a broad spectrum of activities related to creating art, practicing the arts or demonstrating an art. The common usage in both everyday speech and academic discourse is a practitioner in the visual arts only.

I find myself so often considering whether or not I should use the title of artist.  I know that I am an artist… But I feel like what I do doesn’t seem as good. Yes this is my anxiety talking. But part of the issue is art is truly subjective. I can look at a picture and feel like it is genius,  and then you can look and see it as garbage. The same thing goes for any kind of art…. Paintings,  poetry,  yarnwork, music.  With no baseline to measure the art against,  is it really any wonder how many artists fail to have strong self esteem?  Add the fact that you then are expected to,  if you want to make a living from the art,  find the way to sell these small expressions of your soul. It takes a huge amount of courage to even show another soul what you have done. Then deciding what you are worth?  Bah I see it as nearly crippling.

Seasonal Blues

Screenshot_20161214-060114.pngso this time of year it is so hard for many people.  I often feel like it is the worst because of the expectations we are put under to be nice to people who we can’t stand the rest of the year.  Or the fact that we are separate from the ones that we love and have no way to remedy this. Sometimes it is just the weather changes and the sickness that seems to linger about making it even more difficult to be social.  I just wanted to reach out and say that you are not alone.  If this is a difficult time for you,  reach out.  There is always someone who you matter too… Whether you know it or not.  And in the holidays we some times forget about telling the ones around us how much we care.  For some the inner voice is not a kind thing.  Trust me when I say that you are not alone.  ❤

random thoughts

Ok remember I said I was half mad….here is another slice of my mental world.

  • pen names seem to have more uses than I thought, but I wonder if it really matters
  • people keep expecting me to tell them who my writing style is like…I really can’t begin to explain that I write, and know that others like what I write…but I will never be a good judge.
  • I have no self image. I am me…but I don’t see myself as good or bad…I just am.
  • this sounds like I am whining.
  • the holidays suck because i want so badly to be with everyone I love…but how I see them isn’t usually how i am seen.
  • my daughter cracks me up. she has such a delightful intelligence and a smart sense of humor.
  • I have an editor for Death of Neverland who actually made it less stressful. my insecurities make such things painful.
  • youtube has some really great science based experiment videos
  • I wish I was less insecure
  • I am unsure how to express my thoughts when I am not writing poetry or stories. I end up having trouble with what I say being misconstrued. I am a very honest person, but it doesn’t always come out exactly how I mean.

Self worth

So much I find myself having an issue… I am crawling my way to being healthy and a “successful ” person.  For me it is a constant struggle. It means that I have to put the work I do creatively in the world.  I face rejection. Ok,  you say,  and?… Well it comes down to what kind of day I am having.  And I know that I am not alone.  I so often on bad days convince myself that two monkeys with typewriters could write better than I do. And I won’t even get started with my art. It isn’t just depression,  it is self worth.  If you spend your whole life hearing that your opinion is not worth a damn then eventually… You believe it. This is not something that you can just get over!  This requires you to retrain yourself to believe that you matter.  That the systematic erosion of your dreams and desires was not in fact truth. That you can make a difference in this all too dark world.  So if I seem to be attention seeking with my art or my writing… It is not because I am actually attention seeking.. It is likely that I am losing the fight that day against seeing myself as worthy of doing it at all that day. Please don’t hold it against the writing or the art.

Dear Mama

Dear Mama,

I love you. All that I have ever wanted was to feel like you were proud of me.  I tried to be who you wanted.  I found that didn’t work. Then I tried being myself.  I found that I was happier,  but you still were not proud of me.  Mama I am fourty one,  and I have succeeded.  I am published.  I am usually a happy soul.  Yet when I fall,  and I do occasionally fall.  It is your voice in my ear,  telling me you expected it all along.  When I get rejected for my poetry, (as rejections are normal for the writer to recieve) that everyone else would tell me I wrote so well?  I hear you telling me that you didn’t want to hear it because of how depressing it was.

Mama,  I have published five volumes of poetry,  three children’s books,  and a novella.  You know that family have hardly even acted like it mattered?  I am doing what I told you I wanted to do at nine.  I am a writer. So I may never be a  novelist,  children’s books still need written. I have never asked for much.  Just a hey,  that is awesome.  Or even… Uh sharing it on social media that you have a daughter who is printed.  So I put space between us.  I admit that I was tired of feeling like you just didn’t care. I deserve to be someone who is cared about. I’m sorry that I was never the daughter you wanted,  but Mama,  I have always just been me.

Love always,

Your daughter.

Therapy

Not everyone is healed by medicine,  not everyone is healed by therapy.  Don’t get me wrong,  it can do a great deal.  Still it is alot like an addiction,  being mentally ill. Unless you are ready to heal,  all therapy will do is give you someone else to depend on. Someone else to expect judgement from.  This is often more detrimental to self esteem than helpful.  I have been seeing a therapist since I was nine years old.  For me it was just something that I had to do.  I have had some good ones,  ones who could make me see them as human.  I’ve had a few who abused my trust.  To tell the truth,  I have done more towards healing when I was not seeing one.  I used to dissociate.  For the ignorant among my readers,  the term Dissociate is technical jargon for saying that I was multiple personalities.  Twenty years ago I was a true mess.  Nearly twelve personalities that we knew of.  I was never sure where I would wake up,  and how much time would have passed.  One of my personalities was cutting. As stated,  I was not in a good place.  When I was in control,  I was having nightly nightmares. I was terrified of being put in a hospital. Mostly because I figured I  would not be let free. I am extremely claustrophobic. When I was little,  I was molested. I finally got the courage and told him that if he came near me again I would scream.  Well I guess he believed me… But he did decide to put one last scare to keep me from talking.  He locked me in the trunk of his car and told me I would die there.  I am not sure how long I was in there.  But I was there long enough to scare me.  I was nine.  It took me four years to gain enough courage to speak.  He said that I would never be believed.  Damn him for being right.  I was told that I was insane.  I showed all the symptoms of a abused child.  So much so that I was put in therapy.  I was put on medicine… But I speak up… And I am insane.  Fine.  I am fourty one.  I am finally one,  not many.  And I am insane.  He raped me at five.  He raped me until I was strong enough to say no. Then he raped my mind for the majority of my life. And if I had been believed he wouldn’t have been able to rape the girls after me.  He wouldn’t have been free. He is in jail,  but I check on occasion.  I am fourty one and I am scared of a small man who ruined my life.  I am not sure I will ever not be. Ask my family… I am a depressing poet who has always been crazy.  Oh wait,  many of them (not all)  will not even Acknowledge that I write. I embarass them. After all,  I was telling the truth.  I don’t lie,  because thanks to the dissociation,  I often have a hard time remembering things.  So why lie if I will only be caught. I am not crazy.  I need no therapist to hear me.  I am whole.  I have good coping mechanisms. And I will not hide who I have become for anyone!

Speak your own truth.  No matter what anyone else thinks of it.

Tired ramblings

Last night was not a good one.  I doubt that I slept even a full hour.  Every time I would try it would be falling into yet another nightmare. I have had them all of my life,  as far back as I remember. I rarely remember them,  only wake feeling afraid and small.

So I have been sleep deprived and shaky… Not a good combo. Well it has had me trying to gather all of the random thoughts swimming in my head. Quite unsuccessfully I should add.  So much so that I have decided to post some here to help my mind to relax.  And that it is a glimpse for you of my chaos?  Bonus.

1. I miss my grandmother,  well both of them.  But mostly my maternal grandmother.  I have been trying to learn to crochet.  And she was amazing at it.  She was just plain amazing,  but it is the crochet that is bringing her to mind this time.

2. Samhain.  Yes I am pagan.  And this is a time for family.

3. I am very likely not going to end up with the death of neverland as anything but a novella.  The halfway point is 5000 words.  So I find myself wondering if I am trying to exceed my reach.  I am a  poet.  I am a children’s author. I apparently can do short stories (aka novella). But can I do a novel?

3 i really am enjoying doing the art thing.  If you are curious about how my art is… Myne drawings album is public on my personal Facebook (Patti Harris).  Go ahead,  look!  I would love new input.

4. My daughter is starting to get into create music.  I really want to encourage that.

5. Yule.  I have a idea for a few of the people on my list.  Not that my list is big. I am not able to afford much for even those.

6. Butt coasters.  A friend of mine on Facebook is doing novelty crocheted coasters (www.facebook.com/nothingbuttcoasters/) and I am so tickled by the pug ones… (Thinking about them for one of my list…

7 money.  Always a issue.

8. After the first of the year,  do I want to do another bedtime tales?

9. Zombie castaways.  Android game..  The villa (a building to make needed items in the game)  if you combine love and rubber… You get bedsheets….

10. I really want a small crockpot for the truck.  I wonder if I can pull it off this month.

11.whether I should do a blog post about religion.  Or poets that I love and why….

12 my sister’s faeries.  I feel like I should help more than I do…

So much rambling.  I am heading to bed soon.  I hope that I sleep better tonight.

What is writing?

So I am a published writer. I have just recently published my third children’s book.  I have published several volumes of poetry,  and a novella.  I write this blog and contribute regularly to another. After all of that,  sometimes I feel doubtful that I should claim that I am a writer. I do not have a novel,  and the current story that I am working on… Well I am likely doing a novella again. I am at five thousand words… And I realized that I am about half done. So should I stop calling myself a writer?  NO, because I am still writing.  I will likely have a new volume of poetry to release early in 2017. I will still finish the death of neverland.  I may never write a “Full” novel,  but I wonder if that really is that big of a deal.

So what is writing?  Writing is taking one’s heart and pulling it out through the fingertips.  Writing is creating a tender spot on your own soul,  and exposing it to the world. Writing is late nights,  sore fingers and crying yourself dry. Writing is the feeling of accomplishment of a job well done. Writing is all the tortures of Hell and all the pleasures of heaven. And in the end… Writing is an obsession stronger than any.

#amwriting #always

 

define strength 

                          I am strong.  I have not always known what that meant. A lover I had once told me I was strong,  and I asked him to define what strong,  emotional or physical. He said both.  Perhaps because it was what he thought I wanted to hear. Truth is I have never been a physically strong person.  I was a bit more then though. I was walking two miles a day in high school and lifting weights.  By the time of the conversation,  I was starting to be less active due to pain. So physical strength has lessened by time and disability.  

              However,  if I am honest with myself, I have always been emotionally strong. Which takes a toll.  I have had to heal. I am quick to cry,  and very quick to defend my boundaries.  Those boundaries don’t have to make sense to anyone else. They exist because of my life has been a mess of epic proportions. 

                  I was born to a pair of teenagers. Mom worked all the time,  she was rarely home. She managed to graduate high school when I was five.  Daddy was in and out of my life.  We moved alot.  My parents married when I was six,  which lasted about four and a half years.  The first four years we moved 27 times.  So as the new kid, constantly,  and the shy introvert… Well I had trouble making friends.  So much so that my grandmother introduced the idea that reading could fill the gap. 

                Which is why I was I was able to be molested.  I was not a  social child and he took advantage of how lonely and misplaced I was. I was strong enough to gather my courage and tell him to stop.  I told him that I would scream and not stop if he came near me again. So he made sure to scare me. Which keep me quiet for four years. *not that speaking up did any good * 

                   When I was eleven,  Mom met an amazing man. She moved us,  my brother and myself and her,  into his place. He had six sons,  though most were grown up and gone.  He had his youngest two still.  He lived in a two bedroom trailer on land he was buying. The trailer didn’t have running water. We lived a mile from the road,  three miles from the store and six from town. Mom worked.  My stepdad worked.  So often it was just me and the stepbrothers. 

                  We moved into the new trailer two years later,  six months after my son was born.  I was thirteen. It had running water,  and I was no longer sleeping on a couch in the living room. However,  now I had my stepbrother threatening to kill me,  and I was expected to do all the household chores. The boys were allowed to help outside. (Mind you I am a terrible housekeeper).  

              My mom took custody of my son,  to try and allow for all of us to grow up. During this time,  because of my stepbrothers actions,  she kept sending me to stay with family.I was raped during this time.  I was over at a friends house with my son,  and a guy who I had been seeing used it to abuse me.  Him and four of his  friends. So I was suicidal,  because the first thing that was really good in my life was being taken from me and I was not as important to my mother as her husband’s sons,  and because I was so very tired of life hurting. This is when I started dissociation. I had been told I was lying about the abuse,  And I was feeling like I was losing my mind. My mom and I were constantly fighting,  because of it.  She couldn’t see me,  all she saw was a mirror.  So I  moved in with my favourite grandmother.  She was a special lady.  She had broken her back three times and had to have it fused five.  About the same time,  she had been put on oxygen for emphysema. So it was a case of her needing me and I needed to be somewhere mom wasn’t. 

                  I have struggled to put the pieces of my life in a way that makes sense.  What I have listed above is sixteen years.  I am fourty one.  I have not had an easy life.  I doubt that it will change,   but I am strong enough to handle what ever comes my way.  Just occasionally I have a day when I have to say…