Dear Anita,

it is 2 am and I am awake. I fell asleep at 8 Pm last night, likely from mental exhaustion! So of course waking up at a strange hour. Hopefully will be able to fall back asleep.

I woke up with some feelings I want to document. I’ve asked you in the past, or my feelings trustworthy, if I am feeling distressed does that mean that I actually have those true emotions, or is it that a lot of it is the trauma and they are out of proportion of reality.  I forgot how I worded  this question to you, but what I meant is, am I to trust my emotions?  Your answer is exactly what I believe is correct, yes and no. Yes in the sense that often our packed up emotions come up in many different ways. Also no, because so much of it is distress, and it isn’t that it is exactly a reality, but fear-based and anxiety.  So I’m not going to say everything that I feel at this exact moment is true, I will just share.

Right now I feel sad, uneasy, and not safe/secure. I do not feel calm and content, yet worried. It felt like I woke up to a worry – but of course a vague sensation. It all makes sense and is entirely my baseline.

I do not feel safe. I ask my 2 am self why? Perhaps because there feels like constant threats. Perhaps because I have been a warrior too long.

As I’ve said to you, I like to read certain things in the tiny Buddha website, but less and less over the years as I am finding our interactions and personal talks to be far more helpful than general writings. But when I logged onto the site right now I read this:

“Be selective with your battles. Sometimes peace is better than being right.”

Wow. Just wow.

This is what I am struggling with. I want to fight the “right” war. Good or evil, justice over injustice. But frankly it is not worth it most times, and look at the characters involved. A smart inner circle oriented Cali Chica would focus on the fact that both her and her husband are depleted, so fighting battles with inconsequential people will just take away from inner circle.

Yes take away from inner circle. I notice I constantly do this. It is so so not innate for me to stick to inner circle.

There will be women like this everywhere. And yes I need to be more selective with whom I let down my hair and am open and spontaneous with as you wrote. I must have more restraint. I will then perhaps make myself less vulnerable to hurt – or being a target. Not that I want to either in the background. But focusing on inner circle in essence makes me less motivated to be maybe less friendly with just anybody. Let’s see.

Choosing peace is out of my repertoire. It’s like a foreign language. I have never ever seen my mother do it. And my mother had never ever advised me to do so.

Whats more is that choosing peace

1) never even seems like an option as it appears foreign

2) if and when it does it seems like “giving in”

3) peace must be defined.

Peace is not settling or giving in, its equanimity. It’s not being shaken, and it is also maintaining your own – not giving away.

I of all people I know, maybe more than anyone so to speak, really really really needs to keep the peace these days, don’t you think. Learn that it is an option and in fact a great one. No harm no foul. Just peace.

I think what I wrote above is important because it feels important. I know we will discuss in the morning.

—-

so last night I RSVP no to the last wedding we have been invited to. She’s a colleague of mine from residency. She was very involved in my wedding. I get a passive aggressive answer back from her. I look at it for a few seconds. These are the thoughts that come to my head – she has no idea what My life is, and If I never talk to her again I would be fine.

Interesting. I have truly shed over 50 percent of my friends over the last year. I guess each person is one less person to keep in touch with, be obligated to, and that may potentially take away.

My favorite thing, or one of my favorite things that you say is: win-win scenario.

It is only recently that I really started understanding this. What I thought was win win prior was simply:

Pattern and guilt driven.

But choosing only what Cali chica truly wants to do often leads to win win. And you know- win win can change. I had a good conversation with a friend the other evening after my intervention with mean lady. (whom I’ll be working with today by the way in just 4 hours, I oh I hope I can get some sleep).

The old me would have told her all about the interaction and felt the need to vent. To anyone. I didn’t. That was a first. As I said, I kept it composed and smart. Non frenzied; so there was no uneasy frantic energy upon leaving the scenario. What a new feeling.

Now of course professional life is not the same as navigating personal. And at the end of the day professional life has code and conduct and common goals.

Personal life is a free for all.

I don’t think I would have been able to handle that same intervention with say a personal life individual the same. And then it occured to me— I don’t have to. Why am I even thinking about this? Because my brain is programmed to worry.

What if I just stopped. Stopped being involved. Stopped. Showed up to places like you said with some restraint with those who matter.

So I just thought of something Anita, I think you’ll appreciate it.

I liked what you wrote about earlier about the concept of not letting my hair down so to speak. It is a perfect saying. I had a flashback right now to the mother voice. My mother would often have incidents in which she would be going to an event or someone had done her wrong in the past or have been jealous of her, whatever she said, I’m not analyzing that right now. Just telling the story. So towards the end over the last few years, I recall her saying these things often, “well I’ll just show up there and not really talk to anyone, I guess I’ll just be mute.”

or “I guess I’ll bring my iPad and just beyond that, so I don’t have to interact too much with people.”  What she was trying to say is that she didn’t want to set herself up for more injury, she didn’t want to be involved in yet another conversation in which she may be taunted or target.

Now I’m not taking my mothers words for truth, we both know that half of what she said was a lie, and her version of the reality is not to be trusted. But I noticed that these words definitely head wait for my sister and I. Since we were older at this time her and I would laugh. We would dau to each other. oh god look at mom trying to act like she’s going to go there and be some sort of saint, you can’t show up to places and not be who you are.  I would even joke with my mother and tell her that it would be very awkward if she tried to do that, and she wouldn’t even be able to do so, she is naturally are friendly and talkative person. She would agree with us. I saw the pain in my mother’s face sometimes when we were talking about this, or wanting to change her in itself in a away.  Or not change but something.

Now, I can’t take this individual’s emotions or any words to be truth, or a learning point. But it does bring back this memory. The concept of if you are friendly and open and off exposing yourself to others by being that way and not being reserved and restrained, you also may be a target. Yes in my mother’s case she was off and Shelly and had a lot of other bad behaviors. But I do believe the success of coarse even if that’s not the case. Like the conversations we had yesterday. For someone like S, it would be important for me to be more reserved, have that reserve smile and make small talk, but not get involved in any personal way.  But see Anita this is something I am seeing after the fact. If I truly saw this as what it is, I would now know that there are many people like her in the world with whom I have no business letting my hair down so quickly. Remember I told you the concept of jumping into someone’s lap, this is what I am trying to say. What business do I have being open to mere strangers, who I don’t know anything about deeply, I don’t know how they see the world or how they’re going to react. I just know the surface. I don’t want to live in a way in which I am so distrustful of the fellow person that I will be extremely reserved it wouldn’t be possible for me anyway, as you know I’m not very good at being fake. But see it’s not fake. The reason I bring up the memory above of my mother’s comments, is that she would attribute people who did things like that as being smug and fake. My sister and I have not been taught the art of careful composure. It is like we only were taught to things.

Be extremely open and outward, or be reserved and fake. Of course the latter having a negative connotation.

Careful composure? What does it mean. It sounds nice doesn’t it.

It doesn’t seem innate to me, it also seems like a foreign concept like the above quote, choosing piece over being right. But I know I can do it, I did it with the main lady at work, and she is definitely a know very difficult, top five most difficult people sort of person. So I have the ability and skill. It’s just that emotion and anger and all of the above are laced  in with everything.

Perhaps given the above story about my mother, I am afraid of losing myself if I am restraint. Perhaps I quit being restrained and carefully selective as equal to losing my true nature of being a bubbly friendly person. Perhaps the mother voice tells me that this is me not being myself, and it is fake.  Perhaps I believe it is selling out, but if I have my whole life been able to be so gregarious and such a good people person, why would I stop now, I don’t think I could even stop it’s a part of who I am it is really my. Not Something I do as an act or a show or for anyone, it is how my nature is. It’s not even relevant and how people believe this to be a great quality of mine, because either way it is who I am  .

The mother voice might be telling me that it’s not possible, or it is not authentic. But choosing peaceful composure may not seem like my innate self at first, but who said that everything that is innate is actually working? Clearly not.

You said to me last month, that I have to change my behavior, so much that someone on the outside must notice. If the outside person does not notice or make a comment, I’m not doing it hard enough.

Perhaps I fear that outward person noticing, perhaps I fear there, and, I hear them saying something like: well that’s not like you, or Oh I’m disappointed I would expect you to do this or that.

But first of all no one is going to say this, second of all if they feel this, they probably don’t know me well enough and the state of my life right now. Third of all- yes. It isn’t like me, because I am changing. I must allow myself to grow and change. If I was giving this advice to me from the outside I would say, that you say back to the mother voice or whatever voice when they say: wow I’m surprised that you made that decision, that’s not like you. The response is nope that isn’t really like the old me, but it’s suitable for me right now. Of course this is obviously a conversation with your own self, because in reality the struggle is within my own self. Perhaps I am afraid of choosing piece because it seems like it’s letting the mother voice down. Perhaps I am afraid of restraint because of who the mother voice tells me I am. But I must show some change and growth, including restraint and choosing peace.

Ravp no to a wedding is easy. What’s much harder is to Be in front of someone and wanting to be open and friendly, but shutting your mouth and having a small smile, knowing that using excess words will only open you up to losing your energy and power