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Too Criticizing of Myself

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  • September 19, 2018 at 7:49 am #226313
    Anonymous
    Guest

    Dear Earth Angel:

    It will be three months tomorrow since your last post. I am wondering about you, how you are doing and what is going on in your life. I know you have tough challenges and I do hope you are doing well enough, being gentle with yourself, not “Too criticizing of (yourself)”. I hope to read from you soon.

    anita

    September 19, 2018 at 6:21 pm #226391
    Janus
    Participant

    Dear Anita

    The summer months were emotionally exhausting since my parents did not accept my gender identity and did not think it necessary for me to visit the therapist. I felt alone with a raging inner critic and I would burst into tears at least twice every two weeks. I struggled with disordered eating, avoiding certain foods and at other times eating a lot because I didn’t feel full. Then I was filled with self-hatred because I felt I had lost control over my restriction with food and my body wouldn’t be masculine enough so I would work out to the extreme and eat little for days to burn off the calories. I became tired of trying to live, tired of not being recognized for who I am, just tired of doing anything not really living and seeing a meaning in life because I hated myself and thought I was wrong. My parents did not think I needed any resources to help me that I was just being an irresponsible teenager and could change my thoughts to become positive. All the times I was misgendered by people because my parents insisted on my birth sex gender when telling people who I was and all the times the people who used to know me misgendered me, I felt myself want to hurt myself. I would eat very little, exercise to the extreme and also use ace tape (constricts breathing and leaves bruises) to bind my chest along with my chest binder to make it look flatter and make myself skinnier to become more masculine. This summer was emotionally exhausting. Even though things were fine on the outside, I felt tired and empty on the inside. I felt like a shadow walking through life with each passing day like I didn’t really exist. I hated myself for being myself as it seems to me I’m not sure if I’m enough for society or even fit into society at all. However I didn’t want to fit into society, I just wanted to feel like who I am will be enough. But I didn’t think I know who that is anymore. I feel like I’m split between two people, the gender I feel on the inside which doesn’t match the biological sex on the outside and I hate my body because of it. I wish I could just forget the thoughts in my mind and be at peace just for a day so I can focus on learning new things. My mind keeps playing the same loop over and over and I find myself losing my short-term memory and losing sleep. I keep feeling like the body I have doesn’t belong to me, like who I am on the outside isn’t who I want to be and how I see myself on the inside. It seems like my mind has become a one-track mind playing the same record over and over and it makes it hard to focus on learning new things. The inner critic in my mind laughs at me saying that I’ve lost control of myself and keeps telling me that I am wrong for society to be feeling gender dysphoria. On the days I have the worst dysphoria and the inner critic rages, I feel like I am carrying the weight of the world on my chest and it’s hard to breathe. Those are the days when I know I’m truly inside myself because the emotions that I feel like I run from most of the time are really intense and it seems like I am at war with myself. Disordered eating is a way to feel in control of my body when my dysphoric thoughts were causing me to lose myself. It made things worse because I was consistently cold, tired or had aches from working out too much and eating too little, but the physical pain was easier to deal with than the emotional pain and it made me feel like I had some control over the thoughts in my head. It’s like I’m splitting my personality into two different people: one who feels masculine on The inside and one who seems forced to portray feminity The dysphoria causes me to isolate myself from my body entirely because it’s hard living two people at once and wanting so much to be seen as the person I identify as and not the lie. Since I feel like I’m becoming more disillusioned with myself daily and the memories in my mind seem all fragmented, I try to seek a different person to make up for the fragmented person I feel like I am forced to be because I want to feel whole and this has caused me to be stressed and have short-term memory fog because I’m consistently trying to present myself as a confident whole person.

    And it’s hard to learn new things because all I can think about is my gender identity and it consumes my mind. It’s like I form the different versions of myself but they all play similar tapes and they loop around in my head, always the same obsessive thought that I’m trying to escape from. When I feel overwhelmed from all of it, it’s like my mental processes are sluggish and being controlled by this one loop that goes round and round and I go between different selves to placate the voice.
    I feel like I have an anorexic-like self who strives to be perfect, people-pleaser self that doesn’t want to make anyone mad, an adult-child self that still holds on to childhood ideals wishing I was still a child and life was easier.

     

    Sometimes I feel like I’m the wrong person for others, like I’m wrong for society and that the person I am will never be enough or have anything worthy to give.

     

    I felt severely depressed and just couldn’t figure out ways to cope with my self-hatred and gender dysphoria that it made it hard to focus on the things of the moment and daily tasks.  This was how I felt in the summer months. When August came around, I had hope because school was around the corner but it was still difficult. My college friends from Ocean Pride LGBT club initiated contact with me toward the late weeks of August and I was grateful to have people to talk to, but also felt bitter because I wish they had responded sooner when I had told them I needed comfort. I did try some online therapy,  but it felt impersonal and although it did help to express my feelings I wanted to talk with someone who truly understood me because I wanted a connection that would make me feel less alone. I thought about posting on tinybuddha, but was just drained emotionally and didn’t really feel like I would have the words to express what I was feeling or the motivation. The only thing that kept me alive in the summer months was one of my spiritual friends who practices Buddhist Wicca with me. She listened to me and gave advice and it was like having a therapist in person even though it was online groupchat because she gave detailed advice and encouragement that helped me have some focus when I was lost in my inner bully. The closer the days get to school, the more I feel like myself again because I know there will be friends there for me. It’s like being in school awakens a sense of self in me and I can focus on learning new things again because I don’t always have to tell myself that I am masculine enough to make myself believe it when told otherwise. It’s like the closer school gets, the less the inner critic talks and there are times when it seems as if the inner critic is gone and there is this void that I’m not sure of how to feel because it had been occupied by the inner critic for quite a length of time. It makes me feel numb and comfused as to what I’m feeling. I think I have a lesser form of dissociation because I do experience mental fog that makes it hard to focus on daily tasks, but doesn’t really affect my memory much. I find I am still able to remember an event someone tells me, but there are some things that are hard to grasp. It’s like my mind is a filter and the dense and important thoughts are remembered while the ones that people tell me at the moment I remember for ten minutes then forget. For example, someone will tell me that I need to do the laundry and I’ll remember to do it. But I have trouble focusing on things with a structured order like grocery list items. If someone check items in stock and write a list of items needed, I can do it but when people ask me what the list says when I don’t have it in front of me I find I don’t remember clearly what I wrote even if it was just five minutes ago. I do feel like the true me is trapped in a false self and I am aware of my true self and feel like my false self doesn’t exist. Yet I am aware of reality and the distinction between the false feminine self and true masculine self. My inner critic stems from my parents’ criticisms and I’m aware of it criticizing me daily. When it seems to overwhelm me, then all I hear is the inner critic but I know the inner critic is a part of me- it’s the part that internalized the shame my parents inflicted upon me and now tries to torment me on the inside. The inner voice is the other part of me that tries to stop the inner critic from destroying who I am. I feel my emotions at a deep level and it feels like I truly inhabit my body, but since it feels wrong for me I detach myself from it to stop the inner critic from raging. Yet this makes me feel numb and depressed, yet as I go through my days I know the events that pass and am aware of them, but they seem to not hold my interest. I think what is more accurate is that I’m experiencing a severe form of depression that causes me to feel lost in my life, causing me to become detached from myself to escape the self-hatred in my head and the fact that sometimes I can’t escape it and I feel numb and like the events in life hold little interest for me. My inner critic and inner voice are part of me and they war in my head and make me want to escape the thoughts in my head. The warring thoughts make it hard to focus on reality and myself. My inner critic is a response to the negative thoughts that I try to detach from in my mind. I find it easier to focus somewhere else, to imagine me as the person I want to be rather than the person that is there and in the body that is constantly hounded by the inner critic. The inner critic sees the worst in me and it makes them worse because it is part of me. It like fighting myself and losing control because of the self-doubt the inner critic makes me believe. Which is why I became anorexic and it is hard to let it go because the inner critic seems like a part of me and the more it rages the more I feel like I’m losing myself and anorexia feels like I have some control over my body’s appearance. But anorexia is not a way of control because it makes me feel more tired and drained. One way to avoid anorexia and the inner critic is to disengage from myself. To act as if I am the person I want to be and to say to myself “their opinion, not my reality.” This detachment from the world around me at home has left me feeling tired and withdrawn into myself and like I don’t really care anymore about fighting to be recognized for who I am, I just want to believe in myself and that will be enough. I don’t want to constantly fight my own thoughts and other people’s as well so I detach from myself and act as if I am the person I want to be and it gives me a sense of self and an escape from the inner critic in my mind that tries to get me to be anorexic so I can look more masculine.

    September 19, 2018 at 6:47 pm #226403
    Janus
    Participant

    That was how I felt during the summer. The fall semester started September 5th and I am back at Ocean County College for my second year. I have been busy with school work and thinking about volunteer peer tutoring for chemistry and calculus at my college. I have to see if there are times that will fit with my schedule and give me time for my homework and Ocean Pride LGBT activities. If I have time for volunteer peer tutoring, I can get paid while working and possibly save some money for therapy appointments. Currently I am using the free counseling services at my college to help me because of limited financial resources. The good thing about this semester is that many of my teachers know about my gender identity and they have changed their attendance roster and refer to me by my preferred name: Janus. Yesterday, I also got my college ID card updated to my preferred name, so I am glad. I have a busy schedule this semester with most classes back to back on Mondays and Wednesdays. Psychology is an interesting class and I enjoy it because it is fairly easy and I like the professor’s teaching style since he also provides anecdotes that further understanding that are not in the lesson plans and this makes the class interesting because you learn something new that you didn’t expect that isn’t on the syllabus every Monday and Wednesday from 12:30pm-1:45pm. My chemistry II class is my hardest class and also most science courses come with a lab component. Chemistry II is the class that causes me the most strain as lab reports have to be completed and there are calculations that you have to perform to find ratios of elements in a solution and the like. Anatomy and physiology plus the lab are fun because biology is my favorite of the sciences which explains why I like psychology as well. I like my Anatomy and Physiology professor because he tells funny stories and relates them to Anatomy and physiology. Also my lab professor makes us conduct cool experiments and there isn’t much work involved that you have to do at home except to study the parts of an animal you may have dissected. The class that keeps me the busiest is chemistry II chemistry II lab because there are lab reports due every week and practice problems/quizzes or readings that involve scientific calculations. And the last class I am taking is Physical Geography and it is just memorizing vocab and understanding how humans impact our environment. It is very interesting and the professor makes the class easy and doesn’t give much work. I am working on trying to maintain my health and not slip into disordered eating as well as to disentangle myself from straining conversations with my parents, but it is hard. I also find that I work on a tight schedule with my school work, seeking transgender resources, looking into peer tutoring volunteer, working out and trying to be healthy. Sometimes I find myself feeling frustrated with myself because I feel like I’m not getting things done in good time and my inner critic tells me that I have poor time management skills and that I am unproductive. This can be emotionally straining at times. Here is what my schedule looks like:

    My current schedule:

    Mondays: Psychology from 12:30pm-1:45pm

    Chemistry II from 2pm-3:15pm

    Anatomy and Physiology from 5pm-7:30pm

    Tuesdays: Physical Geography from 12:30-1:45pm

    Wednesdays

    Psychology 12:30pm-1:45pm

    Chemistry II from 2pm-3:15pm

    Chemistry II Lab from 6pm-7:40pm

    Thursdays: Physical Geography from 12:30pm-1:45pm

    Anatomy and Physiology Lab 2pm-3:40pm

    No classes on Fridays.

    It’s going to be a busy semester.

    I was not eligible for work-study but  I can still work on college campus and reduce tuition costs. My peer tutor volunteer opportunity coordinator said that if I’m not eligible for work-study, then there may be another way I can volunteer tutor students for chemistry and calculus and earn money. I will be working hours I don’t have classes. So 8am-10:30am Mondays and Tuesdays. Wednesdays 4pm-5pm and Fridays 8am-3pm.

     

     

     

     

     

    September 19, 2018 at 7:05 pm #226409
    Janus
    Participant

    After that really long synopsis of how I am: I hope you are well. Take your time with reading the news and I hope to hear from you. Sorry I didn’t post much over the summer and now school starts I’ve been planning lots of things with school work and being glad I can have counseling now. I hope I don’t overwhelm you with all this at once. I am glad that you reminded me that I have support on timybuddha.com. I received an email notification that there was a new reply in my forum and I am glad I saw it today because today was a hard day with my parents and I didn’t see any of my friends on campus, so I’m glad you are here. Thank you for being here for me and for reminding me that there is support for me when I feel alone.

     

    The questions I have are:

     

    How do I stop a negative conversation that is only wasting time and move on to a compromise or something more productive? How do I avoid being dragged into one? It seems like my parents irritate me more each day with their close-minded views and the more I distance from them the more they want to rely on me and burden me with things and they criticize the things I do saying I don’t do things right or they never understand the feelings I have beneath the surface. They never listen to the true meaning of what I have to say when they want me to talk and then they tell me that I don’t have anything of value to focus on, that I get worked up over the little things, that I can never learn what’s important in life. I cannot live with trying to make them understand who I am with the words I express because they never see beyond their close-minded views. I would love to have some advice on how to just avoid conversations with my parents all together, to remove myself when they try to attach their burdens to me and to just live with myself in peace believing who I am. I do not want to fight the people and fuel my inner critic because I’ve proven to myself who I am and that is good enough. I don’t need my parents’ and negative people validation of who I am and I don’t want to fight daily either or get irked over little things because I have more important things to do. I often do my school work at school because my parents irritate me to no end lately with every little thing. They are so judgmental, think that everything is about them- that when things go wrong others are to blame and they never seem to see different views or they don’t seem to want to learn different views. I want to be a better person than my parents will be and be open-minded to new things and not let things be run by anger or the facts that I am right or the fact that I don’t need to learn some things because they are unimportant. Yet no knowledge is unimportant, knowledge gives people power and you never know when a particular information may be useful.

     

    How do I deal with the fear of my parents not approving of my gender identity when I’m around them without losing myself? I feel like I am becoming more knowledgeable about who I am and I don’t want to keep living as the person I truly am at school and then having to put on a false facade at home because I’m afraid of my parents. I just want to be able to express myself no matter where I am.

     

    How do I avoid feeling overwhelmed and calm myself down in healthy ways when I feel like there is so much I have to do, like I don’t have time to do it all (sometimes this happens with school work)? Also I can become overwhelmed when people try to seek me out for counseling, but I don’t have time or energy to shoulder their burdens. I do not want their burdens and it makes me irritated when my parents try to place their stereotypes of gender on me or their burdens on me and I argue with them. I believe that I can be my gender identity as a transgender male even if my parents and some others don’t see it. I don’t want to keep feeling strained whether in fear, anger or depression because I’m not sure how people will react to me being myself. I know I have strength to achieve my goals, but I don’t want to keep being surrounded by negativity at home. One can only be strong for a while before one starts to feel frustrated, tired of battling the doubts of others which will bring back the negative inner critic that I try to dismantle time and time again. I don’t think my inner critic will fully go away when I’m living with my parents, I am tired of them saying things about me, tired of being afraid that I won’t be able to support myself if they kick me out of the house as they have said that I can’t be transgender in the house (that I don’t know enough to be transgender, that I am just being immature). These days it’s like all the sadness of the summer has turned into an intense drive, an intense will to fight for who I am. Yet, I find myself fighting so much that it can be draining and also I find that I still have a fear of my parents because I know that as a 19 year old college student I still have a lot to learn to survive in the world and having to do things alone will be hard. Here are my sentiments lately as I have become more confident in myself and feel an intense fire (that I feel like can be too intense at times and may burn me) for what I believe in. I do not care for gender stereotypes anymore and I don’t care about other’s opinions because they are not my reality. I am tired of my parents and other people who don’t understand me who try to look and judge me on the surface for who I am. This is more of what I currently believe and have discovered: Understand your worth is not the worth of the world, but the faith and value you place in yourself. The world is filled with people trying to fit themselves into societal ideals and others who try to place stereotypes on others trying to understand themselves. You don’t have to be the person the world expects you to be, just be good enough for yourself. Make yourself matter above all. Listening to the stereotypes of who you should and how you should act only strains you more and causes you to lose more of yourself until you become tired of trying, tired of trying to fit in at the cost of your true self, tired of watching life pass you by, tired of trying so hard at something and not feeling valued. The world does not give you value with it’s stereotypes, you are more than the stereotypes and labels of the world. Listen to yourself and find your own definition of who you are not what the world dictates because that rigid structure is inflexible and will never fit you. You will be left callused and bruised trying to fit into a skin that doesn’t belong to you. And over time that skin will become tight and suffocating because it’s not meant for you. Your worth so much and you have so much to give if you look within and appreciate how special you are. Our imperfections make the world beautiful by filling it with diversity and lessons for us to learn on our life’s journey-lessons of compassion for ourselves. The world is filled with stereotypes and things that try to explain who you should be one after another, it takes courage to look within and look at who you are on the inside. You cannot be happy following the stereotypes of the world and someone else’s version of how to live your life because it is your life. And stereotypes change and limit us from trying to see ourselves. I still struggle with some gender stereotypes being from a strict stereotypical Asian cultural family who is unsupportive of transgender people, but I cannot allow their views to dictate my life. If I try to fit myself into the stereotypes just to avoid being hurt, I realize that there is more hurt in me because I’m letting others control who I want to be and the pain of not being able to be me is enough to make me realize that I don’t want to fit into any stereotypes. There is no set gender stereotypes of how a male or female should behave. Men can be compassionate, artists, emotional, sensitive, healthy build (don’t need lots of muscle), strong. Women can be body builders, tool repair workers, engineers, strong, balance finances. The societal constraints that women have to be compassionate and emotional while men have to be strong, analytical and the money maker don’t need to be true. These rigid stereotypes hurt our society by causing limiting beliefs in both genders. Both feel like their is pressure on them to act as certain way because of societal stereotypes and if they don’t act that way they aren’t masculine enough or feminine enough, but that is not the case. People do not need stereotypes to tell them how they should be, to limit them and to make them feel low in self-esteem because they don’t have the traits that make them masculine or feminine like society deems. Yet, you don’t need to be muscular, breadwinner or handyman/analytical to be masculine. You don’t need to be compassionate and emotional to be feminine. These are societal constructs of gender and all they do is limit who we truly want to be. It doesn’t matter what gender you identify as because you are valid regardless of whether you fall into societal stereotypes of what it means to be a man or woman. Men and women are both special. Both can be compassionate, strong, money makers, analytical, tool repairs.

     

    Most of my sense of conflicting emotions: sadness turned to anger to motivation/happiness which can lead to overwhelmingness because the emotions are so intense most of the time. When I feel sad, I feel empty and devoid of life and the only voice in my head is the inner critic. When I feel anger, I am tense and I will say what I believe in (I’ll think about what I’ll say and I don’t say anything offensive), but I make it clear that I want to be respected for who I am or I will turn into a fiery soul that will burn the illusions from your eyes by not giving up no matter what you say and I won’t stand for what you believe if it doesn’t make me happy. I don’t have to prove to the world that tries to put me in stereotypes of what masculinity or feminity should be, I just want to be enough for myself. So it irritates me when I’m at home and I have people who don’t see beneath the surface, who don’t hear the meaning of the words I say, who never seem to fully listen when I have something important to say, who always tell me that something I do is not right or how I can’t be this or that. Well, I know what I believe and I can and I will do whatever it takes to make me dreams of being a genetic engineer and transition to a male a reality no matter what the critics say.

     

    Note the times I use “you” I’m referring to the negative people around me like my parents and not you. You are a great person and I am glad you are in my life, Anita.

     

     

     

     

     

     

     

     

     

     

    • This reply was modified 6 years, 2 months ago by Janus.
    September 19, 2018 at 9:08 pm #226427
    Janus
    Participant

    The note I added only applies for the “you” in the last paragraph.

    September 20, 2018 at 7:47 am #226461
    Anonymous
    Guest

    Dear Earth Angel/ Janus:

    I am so glad to read from you this morning, so very glad. Please let me know how you would like me to address you in the future, Janus, Earth Angel, or both?

    You started your second year in college September 5. You have a busy schedule. You are using the free counseling services there but hoping to be able to afford therapy by making money peer tutoring, if not as part of the work study program than otherwise. You are involved with the college LGBT community (who unfortunately was not responsive to you in the summer) and you are looking for more LGBT resources.

    This sentence that you wrote stands out to me loud and clear: “I want to be respected for who I am”. Therefore I was glad to read that many of your teachers have changed their attendance rosters and refer to you by your preferred name, Janus, and that your updated college ID card has your preferred name in it.

    Next in my reply to you I will be quoting from your recent posts under categories that I came up with:

    1, life at home (summer off school)/ life in school (Sept 5 and on):  “my parents did not accept my gender identity and did not think it necessary for me to visit the therapist… my parents did not think I needed any resources to help me and that I was just being an irresponsible teenager… The closer the days get to school, the more I feel like myself again because I know there will be friends there for me. It’s like being in school awakens a sense of self in me and I can focus on learning new things again… My inner critic stems from my parents’ criticisms…- it’s the part that internalized the shame my parents inflicted upon me and now tries to torment me on the inside… I am working on trying… to disengage myself from straining conversations with my parents, but it is hard… today (Sept 19) was a hard day with my parents and I didn’t see any of my friends on campus, so I’m glad you are here… for reminding me that there is support for me when I feel alone…my parents irritate me more each day… I don’t want to keep living as the person I truly am at school and then having to put on a false façade at home because I’m afraid of my parents. I just want to be able to express myself no matter where I am… I know I have the strength to achieve my goals, but I don’t want to keep being surrounded by negativity at home. One can only be strong for a while before one starts to feel frustrated, tired of battling… I am tired of them saying things about me, tired of being afraid that I won’t be able to support myself if they kick me out of the house… These days it’s like all the sadness of summer has turned into an intense drive, an intense will to fight for who I am… as a 19 year old college student I still have a lot to learn to survive in the world”.

    2, disordered eating, over-exercising and ace tape, summer: “I was filled with self-hatred because I felt I had lost control over my restriction with food and my body wouldn’t be masculine enough so I would work out to the extreme and eat little for days to burn off the calories… and also use ace tape (constricts breathing and leaves bruises) to bind my chest along with my chest binder to make it look flatter and make myself skinnier to become more masculine… I was consistently cold, tired or had aches from working out too much and eating too little”.

    3, obsession and compromised mental functioning, summer: “My mind keeps playing the same loop over and over and I find myself losing myself losing my short-term memory and losing sleep… my mind has become a one-track mind playing the same record over and over and it makes it hard to focus on learning new things… all I can think about is my gender identity and it consumes my mind… always the same obsessive thought that I’m trying to escape from… it’s like my mental processes are sluggish and being controlled by this one loop that goes round and round… it made it hard to focus on the things of the moment and daily tasks… I do experience mental fog that makes it hard to focus on daily tasks… there are some things that are hard to grasp… I have trouble focusing on things with a structured order like grocery list items… when I don’t have it in front of me I find I don’t remember clearly what I wrote even if it was five minutes ago”.

    4, depression, summer: I became tired of trying to live, tired and empty… like a shadow walking through life with each passing day like I didn’t really exist… I felt severely depressed… I feel numb and like the events in life hold little interest for me… the warring thoughts make it hard to focus on reality and myself”.

    5, gender dysphoria: “I feel like I’m split between two people, the gender I feel  on the inside which doesn’t match the biological sex on the outside and I hate my body because of it.. like I am at war with myself… it’s hard living two people at once and wanting so much to be seen as the person I identify as and not the lie.. I do feel like the true me is trapped in a false self”.

    And now my thoughts: you established it yourself very clearly that it is unhealthy for you to live with your parents. As a matter of fact, you established it clearly that it is unhealthy for you to be in contact with your parents. You established these facts for years on this very thread and in these recent posts. You asked me questions about how to make your life better living with your parents, but I have no answer to that, not a single one. Because, I believe there is no answer. In other words, living with your parents and interacting with them otherwise makes you sick and keeps you sick.

    Not living with your parents and not interacting with your parents is the answer, there is no other.

    If you accept this reality, it will be better for you. I understand you can’t just leave at the moment, or at least you strongly feel that you can’t, but accepting the fact that for your health you must leave as soon as it becomes possible, is very important. If only there was a LGBT resource available to you that provided you a place to live and eat while you attend college, that would have been wonderful.

    You have a strong will to live and to live a life true to yourself, but living at home/interacting with your parents is robbing you of that will and that energy, that fire, as you called it. That fire almost died during the summer away from college and it was awakened when you resumed college. But your contact with your parents continues to feed your sickness and damp that fire, and will continue to do so for as long as you are in contact with them.

    Back to the sentence you wrote that stands up for me: “I want to be respected for who I am”. Who you are is more than your body and gender identity. Your thoughts, your feelings, your values are who you are as well and none of these have been respected by your parents. This has been the case and still is. It is extremely unlikely to change.

    You need to be respected.

    When you are free from the extreme disrespect that you experience when in contact with your parents, then your disordered eating, over-exercising, obsession (the mental loop), compromised mental functioning and distress over your gender dysphoria will greatly improve on an ongoing basis. You will think better, feel better, and function better. You will need help for a while, as you do now, therapy and otherwise supportive individuals in your life.

    Please do post again and again, Janus, anytime you would like. I am withdrawing my prior request from you to shorten your posts. You don’t have to ask me questions either, something I encouraged before. Ask if you genuinely have a question for me. If a post is too long for me, I will skip or read quickly through parts I don’t need to thoroughly read, so I will manage.

    You can make it, Janus, I have great faith in that fire in you!

    anita

     

    September 20, 2018 at 6:29 pm #226539
    Janus
    Participant

    Dear Anita

     

    Thank you for your response. You are great at pulling out the key points and organizing them. You can call me Earth Angel or Janus whatever feels easier for you. It is great having a person I can share my feelings with. Ocean County College has a need for more chemistry and calculus tutors this semester, but I’m not sure if I will have time to do paid volunteer peer tutor and have time for my studies and seeking resources. I am glad today that my Anatomy and Physiology Lab and my Physical Geography class both did not give class assignments so I have time to rest and also do other assignments like catching up on chemistry. Tomorrow, I have an appointment with my advisor about course plans and also possibility of graduating from community college in Spring 2021. That is the earliest I am hoping for to transfer to a four-year university where I can live in a dorm and be away from my parents and I am looking forward to it. In the mean time, I am seeking resources and have a counseling appointment at my college 9/25. I rarely see my old Ocean Pride friends from previous semesters and my new ones have course schedules that don’t match up so when one wants to hang out the other is in class. I am working on a meditation routine to help me focus more on my inner self and to make myself more confident. I hope that I can establish a good sense of confidence when summer comes. I may choose to apply for a summer job before summer rolls around because I won’t have the stress of school so I can work more flexible hours and this will give me time to be away from my parents. I am not sure of every step of the way, but I choose to live in the moment choosing to plan a little every day to get closer to my goals. I know that I don’t have to be a certain way or know certain things to be valid as my gender, I just need to find what’s right for myself at the moment. And what’s right for myself at the moment is to relieve tensions in my life, do well in school, build my knowledge and if possible see a job that works with my school schedule and if not then have one over the summer. I do not need to know everything like how to do car or house repairs and I will learn to manage money. Just because my knowledge doesn’t seem practical to my parents doesn’t mean I can’t survive in life and it certainly doesn’t mean my knowledge is useless. It is not easy trying to lessen the inner critic in my mind son I can focus on things, but I know I have people who help me build up my strength. Thank you Anita for always being here for me, always listening and helping me better understand my feelings. It’s people like you who make me realize that I am not wrong for society and give me hope to keep going for my goals. I have some questions: What are good ways to keep track of your goals? How can I be certain that what I believe in is not what others influenced me to believe? How do I break myself out of a negative habit? I feel like I can be too compassionate at times and sometimes I feel obligated to help people with their burdens. With my parents, I am obligated to help them whether I want to or not because of shelter and financial stability and I wonder if there are ways to avoid helping them in situations that cause strain and make a person have a negative habit. In my parents’ case, it is being judgmental while in my case it is being self-criticizing. I feel like my parents contribute to my bad habits and if I can’t escape from them entirely, maybe I can lessen the burden. I believe parents will always be able to place shame on their children no matter how old the child is, but that doesn’t mean I can’t lessen the shame so it controls my life. I rather incur my parents wrath and live in slight fear of going against their values if it means I can have a sense of being myself and be happy. Yet, their wrath comes with a shame that binds in which will only heal fully when I part ways with them. I do wish there was a way to be myself and not incur the shame of my parents. And the last question is Should I forgive a person who seeks forgiveness for hurting me? I know that forgiveness may help release the pain from controlling me, but the guy who sexually assaulted me in middle school (whom I saw Monday before my Ocean Pride meeting on campus) wants forgiveness and I feel like I’m not ready to trust him or let it go yet. I still need time to heal. I thought I was healed, but seeing him again brought back memories and now he wants forgiveness and I’m not sure how to act. Does it make me selfish if I don’t forgive him readily as he is asking to mend things between us? Is forgiveness truly possible? Even if I do forgive him, is it possible to truly let the pain go? I want to let myself be healed, but I still don’t trust yet so is it better to wait? Would the pain become buried deeper if I didn’t forgive and release it? There are so many conflicting thoughts in my mind and it also makes me wonder if forgiveness is possible with my parents (maybe forgiving them would allow me to release the hurts), but is it really good idea to forgive someone who has hurt you so much? Maybe with time when I’m away from them, I may forgive myself but not forgive them and I wonder if that is really forgiveness.

     

     

    September 21, 2018 at 9:33 am #226597
    Anonymous
    Guest

    Dear Janus, Earth Angel:

    You are welcome and thank you for your kind words. As to the part  of your recent post before the questions you asked me, it all reads reasonable, sensible and wise to me. I am positively impressed by your strong logic (not surprising, knowing your strong scientific inclination and interest) and maturity.

    I want to repeat to you the following: it is very important that somehow you give up completely any hope and expectation that your parents will see you or hear you and listen to what you think and how you feel, what you value and so forth. They can only see and hear themselves. Their criticisms of you were never about you but about them. In other words, they are blind to you and it is not within your power to make them see you. I am sorry about that, I really am. I wish it wasn’t so, but it is and it is necessary for your mental health to give up on the quest of being seen, heard and approved of by them.

    Seek to be seen and heard and approved of elsewhere, be it here on your thread, being seen and heard and approved of by me. It is amazing, isn’t it, that a person you never met in person, who has been communicating with you for a much shorter time than your parents have been in your life, that I see you, I hear you.. and I do approve of you. So better seek those things here than seek it from your parents. It is a lost cause. But you, Janus, you are not a lost cause.

    As to the part with your questions, not in order: “How can I be certain that what I believe in is not what others influenced me to believe?” stick to the scientific method, state the belief and test it through observations and experimentations, then reject or accept, and restate if a correction will make it true to you. You are welcome to do it right here on your thread, if you would like my input.

    “How do I break myself out of a negative habit?”- the hard way, because there is only one way and it is the hard way, through gently resisting the habit and practicing a new behavior, a new thinking and behavior that over time will become a new habit. I didn’t understand the question regarding your parents: “I wish there was a way to be myself and not incur the shame of my parents”- I don’t think there is a way, is my point from before. And again, there is no way to make them see you or hear you and approve of you, it is a lost cause.

    “Should I forgive a person who seeks forgiveness for hurting me?.. the guy who sexually assaulted me in middle school.. wants forgiveness and I feel like I’m not ready to trust him or let it go yet. I still need time to heal… seeing him again brought back memories… Even if I do forgive him, is it possible to truly let the pain go… Would the pain become buried deeper if I didn’t forgive and release it?”-

    Emotions have their own timing and own logic and none of our emotions operate in isolation. And so, it doesn’t work so easily as..  if I express forgiveness then my hurt and anger will be released, problem solved.. Do  not forgive him because you are not ready to do so, you stated it yourself. It is unjust that in addition to having been assaulted, you would now feel bad for not forgiving to the one who assaulted you, as if you are the bad person. You don’t owe him to forgive him, not now, not later. If he demands forgiveness, then he did not yet take responsibility for doing wrong to you. If his regret is sincere, then he must understand that forgiving him is a privilege, not a right,  a gift, not something he deserves. You can tell him that you are not ready to forgive him at this time and that you are not available to consider such at this time.

    “What are good ways to keep track of your goals?”- first state the goals, those that are most important. Don’t bother by unworthy goals such as forgiving your parents who didn’t ask for your forgiveness. And don’t bother with what others want you to do, such things as this guy wanting you to forgive him. Focus on what you need for your own well being, which is to proceed to the four year university, live in the dorm, away from your parents, build a career and your ability to make a monthly income so to live independently.

    anita

     

    September 21, 2018 at 10:26 am #226605
    Janus
    Participant

    Dear Anita

    Thank you for your insightful responses! Today I spoke to some advisors and I may be able to graduate after completing my physics 2 course in Summer 2019 and apply for Rutgers School of Engineering in the Fall 2019. Along with the physics 2 course, I may have to take 2 Systems and Physiology classes at Rutgers over the summer as well so I can be prepared for my classes at Rutgers in the Fall 2019, but otherwise my credits transfer okay. My advisors are still checking to see about my computer course and my college experience seminar course and whether going over the credits for graduation at Ocean County College will be a problem transferring. One advisor did say, it should be okay because my extra credits could be electives at the four year university and as long as I don’t go above the 90-100 credits range at my community college I should be fine. I will have 71 credits total from my community college when I graduate. I am excited to graduate sooner than expected. The only thing is that my state scholarship doesn’t cover tuition for summer so I will have to find ways to finance the courses which will mean more arguing with my parents because they think college puts a financial strain on them. They want me to have a good education, but they always question the things I do and they say that I incur more financial strife on them than my brother which can be emotionally draining at times. I like your idea of using the scientific method to question if I am staying true to myself, your wisdom and creative ideas are very inspirational and help me see myself in a better light. Thank you for helping me see where I can use what I know as strengths to move me forward. I ran into the guy today in the same building after I decided to find a quiet place to organize my schedule and process what my advisors told me. He could tell I was busy, so he didn’t say much. While, I was busy planning my schedule I heard him tell a friend that he wishes I wasn’t so busy so we could hang out because he regrets what he has done and wonders if I can forgive him. I did tell him before Monday’s meeting with Ocean Pride that I wasn’t ready to forgive him yet. Now I feel like he is following me around pressuring me to forgive him. He left awhile before a Bible Study Group came in and invited me to join their discussion. I feel like I am being pressured to forgive when I’m not ready and I am also being pressured to consider a religion that I’m not really interested in. Christian clubs at my college have asked me to join them and some Christian missionaries keep coming to my house telling me to embrace Christianity. but I am a firm believer in Buddhist Wicca and even though I accept their religion I’m not interested in embracing a new religion that I feel doesn’t really fit me. I have told them that I rarely read the Bible an disagree with some of its teachings and don’t think Christianity is right for me, but they seem to keep pressuring me to give it a chance. It can be a bit annoying when I am busy doing school work (and I find myself annoyed because if I’m in the middle of a science calculation and my concentration is broken, it takes a while to get back to what I was doing) and they tell me to spend time with the Bible. I wish they would stop pressuring me to adopt a religion and stop interrupting me when I have important things that need to be done. So the questions are: How do I tell people politely that I need time for myself and not to disturb me when I am working with other information? How do I stop my inner critic from raging at me when the schedule I outline in my mind doesn’t go according to plan and my inner critic said I wasted a day being unproductive? What are good ways to practice time management skills? What are good ways to develop better communication skills and increase my confidence when interacting with others? What are good ways to deal with pressure that I can control? I think you are correct in saying that i might not be able to get my parents to understand me and as the things go on and college courses go there will be more financial strain and pressure. I wish there was a way to avoid it, but since I can’t I am working on meditation to shield and calm myself from negativity. Thank you Anita for everything! Talking with you helps put my thoughts in order and helps me better understand who I am as a person. Thank you for your compassion and for helping me become a better person each day!

    • This reply was modified 6 years, 2 months ago by Janus.
    September 21, 2018 at 11:09 am #226615
    Anonymous
    Guest

    Dear Janus, Earth Angel:

    It is good news that you can graduate sooner than later.

    Regarding the guy who is  a Christian, I think I understand his motivation then, he probably became a born again Christian lately and it is a biblical/ church instruction to ask forgiveness. Thing is, according to Christianity he can enter heaven without your forgiveness, all he needs is god’s forgiveness and that is, according to the religion, available for him without your participation. In any case, tell him and the rest of the active Christians in your college, and elsewhere: “thank you, but I am not interested”. That is all.

    For a born again Christian, anything more than a short statement indicating a complete lack of interest indicates to them some openness and they may keep  on pressuring you. So, thank-you-but-no will be appropriate.

    You asked for “good ways to practice time management skills”- my answer: eliminate tasks that are not necessary or are wasteful. Eliminate communicating with the Christians in your college and elsewhere, that will save you valuable time. Then, eliminate all communications with your parents that are not absolutely necessary. In other words, eliminate time and energy wasters, that is good time and energy management.

    Regarding the inner critic, we discussed that many times. When you notice its voice and the distress, breathe in slowly and deeply, relax best you can and voice to yourself a correct thought, one true to reality.

    You are very welcome, glad to be helpful to you anytime that I am. I will soon be away from the computer for the next 16 hours or so. I know you don’t have classes today, I hope you prepare yourself for next week classes.

    anita

    September 21, 2018 at 1:58 pm #226625
    Janus
    Participant

    Dear Anita

    Thank you for your encouragement and wisdom. I have decided to make a schedule to organize my tasks. I learned a lot today about transferring to four year universities and I am excited about it. I am going to spend my weekend catching up on my chemistry notes and trying to understand one of the lab problems. Otherwise I don’t have any homework other than to study for Anatomy and Physiology quiz which won’t be too difficult because I still remember much of the concepts from AP Biology in high school. I will miss my college friends when I graduate after another semester and a half, but I can visit most of them since they live nearby. I hope that I can apply for some internships at my four year university and I have at least three teacher recommendations that can help me. Since I will be taking a class on campus over the summer, I will still have support and it will ease the gender dysphoria even if it is only for a portion of the summer and for only three days on campus. I am planning on using my winter break Dec. 22-January 13 to prepare some college essays for transferring. On my breaks I may also do some spring cleaning so when it comes time for four year college or to move out I don’t have lots of clutter to carry around. I will also use the time to read books from library about life skills like money management and car repairs as well as transgender resources. It’s going to be busy, but I am excited for the opportunities that lie ahead.

    September 22, 2018 at 4:16 am #226651
    Anonymous
    Guest

    Dear Janus, Earth Angel:

    Excellent thinking, I am genuinely impressed with you. Your scientific thinking is solid, your logic and your planning. Here is one I particularly like: “I may also do some spring cleaning so when it comes time for four year college or to move out I don’t have lots of clutter to carry around”- I like the moving out part, this is why I italicized it!

    I know from communicating with you for so long that your parents do not see you, do not hear you, do not approve of you (how can they, they don’t see or hear you) and they do not respect you.

    I do hope you survive the remaining time you live with them. Your plan to have some school activity in the summer is excellent so to not have a repeat of this past summer experience when you were isolated and therefore more exposed to your parents’ disrespect. When you move out, oh, I can hardly wait!

    But I will wait. It will happen soon enough, keep aiming at it, structure your time with this aim in mind. Eliminate time and energy wasters, and keep posting here anytime you want, any length per post is okay with me.

    anita

    September 26, 2018 at 7:27 am #227595
    Janus
    Participant

    Dear Anita

    Thank you for your enthusiasm and encouragement that always makes me laugh louder and feel grateful that I still have opportunities to go far in life. Thank you for helping me see the value in myself. People can be their own worst critics and sometimes my inner critic will tell me how I am not strong enough or knowledgeable enough to survive in this world as a man. I think talking with others, learning more about myself and fighting my dysphoria so it doesn’t overwhelm me are the most important things currently. It’s rough when you discover that you are more like an adult than you feel you are. People will expect you to be able to take on adult responsibilities, but they can be hard when you are still taking care of yourself and feeling a bit lost. I think it’s important to focus on yourself first, to make sure your emotions don’t overwhelm you and find ways to cope with them first and then work on learning the life skills you may need. I don’t think there should be a set time for people to learn how to live on their own since I believe trying to find yourself and understand who you are is more important. You can learn all the skills you want, but if you lose who you are then it won’t be worth it. Also it can be hard to learn things when you are trying to be yourself in a world that tells you otherwise and the sadness may make it hard to focus on learning new things. I know the most important thing for me is to learn how I cope with my emotions so they don’t overwhelm me and cause me to not be able to learn the things I want to learn. I feel I may have delayed my learning of life skills like automobile maintenance and money management because my depression made it difficult to focus on things. It takes time to develop a strong will to fight the inner critic that tries to bring you down. It’s not just about focusing on positive thoughts and things will be okay like my parents think. It’s about reevaluating who you are as a person, understanding your feelings, seeking support, dealing with the relapses as you try to heal, struggling with the fact that there are people who just think you are just being immature and making you feel invalidated, struggling with yourself trying to disentangle yourself from you being your own worst enemy and working on healing. It’s not as easy to just focus on the positive thoughts when you need to figure out who you are and that is hard. People may not find out who they are entirely, but they can live a life that makes them happy by taking time to understand themselves. When it feels like you are working on understanding yourself and fighting to be recognized for you, sometimes other things seem small in comparison. It is difficult to focus on learning life skills when you want to get out of your head at times or when you feel the weight of the world sits on your chest. I realize that the most important thing for me is to research more about how to present myself as me and become wiser so I don’t entrap myself in the stereotypes of the world. There are people who want to see me as who I was and those people tend to limit me when I try to become who I am. But now I know that I can be strong enough to overcome obstacles in my way. For the first time, I feel like and believe that I am not alone and I sense that my words are on the surface and I am about to speak the words of my spirit. I think I have the courage to fight my gender dysphoria and survive. And with that hope, I hope to learn the life skills I need that I sometimes have trouble focusing on learning because I’m fighting my depression. But I think I feel like I will achieve my goals and even though I may slip at times and it may be difficult to fight and work on learning new things I have hope that I can overcome. There are two guys I know who try to bring me down by refusing to acknowledge who I am. One of them has asked me for forgiveness but it turns out he just wanted to get back into my life and have a justification for hurting me again because yesterday I ran into him again and he called me by my birth name and I corrected him. I told him that things have changed and that I identify as a man. He said some rude things like asking me to show my body to prove that I was masculine and asking personal questions like “So have you gotten surgery? Can I see if you have Male anatomy?” It made me feel angry and I told him that I was going to therapy and that I didn’t have to prove that I was transgender to him. My gender identity doesn’t match my birth sex and it isn’t your business to ask these personal questions. Then he went on to say “So maybe we could hang out because in the past I had the feeling that you liked

    September 26, 2018 at 7:57 am #227601
    Anonymous
    Guest

    Dear Janus, Earth Angel:

    You are very welcome. I looked at your schedule and next you will be having your psychology class. I wonder what it will be like, today’s class. I know statistics is a strong element in psychology classes post high school, correct?

    Your post, once again, makes a lot of sense, excellent insight, intelligence, maturity, my goodness! I keep feeling impressed by you!

    You wrote, and I agree: “I think it’s  important to focus on yourself first, to make sure your emotions don’t overwhelm you and find ways to cope with them first and then work on learning the life skills you may need”. As a matter of fact, I can’t think of a life skill more important than making sure one’s emotions do  not overwhelm the person experiencing them.

    It is clear to me that you always needed and still need (and who doesn’t..) to be seen, heard and understood as who you are, not a stereotype, not what your parents want to see (and complain about you not being what they want…). I want to see you and understand who you are more and more, in the context of this thread. What I see about you pleases me. I like who you are.

    You asserted yourself very well with this guy. You will continue to have tough time with people who will comment about your gender identification. It is going to be part of your life. I suppose you can get used to  it, expect it and be prepared, have a prepared response.

    Looking forward to your posts, anytime you post, I will be glad to read from you and reply.

    anita

    September 28, 2018 at 10:54 am #227957
    Janus
    Participant

    Dear Anita

    I am grateful to have met such an inspirational, creative and encouraging person in my life. Your words always uplift me to be more courageous and self-confident. These days, I feel like for the first time I have a sense of purpose in my life. I feel like for the first time I have value in society and that I am more than the stereotypes that try to limit me. I am still working on establishing my self-confidence, but I can feel myself start to embrace who I am as a person. I am starting to accept myself for me and not what the world wants me to be and it feels like some of the burden has lifted because I have become less interested in what the world sees in me and more of what I see in myself and this has given me a sense of purpose and self-worth. Self-worth comes from the inside and not from the outside because there are so many stereotypes of who to be. I may not be able to break free fully from the stereotypes while still living with my parents because I will still have a fear of them. I fear them because I am currently still financially dependent on them and if they revoke the financial support because of something that I’ve done that displeases them I will be left on my own.. But I can still do little things that assert who I am and not conform to what others want me to be because I don’t want to lose myself. I want to make my life worth living and be proud to be me. Thank you for helping me be that person with your encouragement. My inner critic continues to sneak into my thoughts, but I have been able to lessen its voice. I imagine the inner critic as a TV screen that drones on and on and I have the remote. I can shut the TV off or mute it or change the channel. It is not always easy at times, but I am making progress. I remember my inner critic berating me when I did poorly on my Chemistry Lab Report and also a Chemistry Quiz. The inner critic said “You are pathetic! You never know how to manage your time! You are stupid and will never pass Chemistry! Why don’t you just give up?” Recently (9/11/18), I did not do well on a Chemistry Lab Report because I did not understand the concepts of paper chromatography and how to solve for the retention factor (distance an ion moves on the paper with respect to the origin) as well as some of the terms for the lab. I tried my best to make sense of it and worked on the lab experiment Wednesday. I was disappointed to receive a 50% on my lab report. A few days later (9/14/18), I attempted Chapter 11 quiz for Chemistry and I got some problems with vapor pressure (pressure exerted by a liquid as it enters the gas phase) and some problems for the labeling of phase diagrams wrong so I received a 45% on my Chemistry quiz. My inner critic made me feel mentally strained and I was already upset over my Chemistry lab and quiz results. But I did not want to give up. I took a break with a walk out in nature feeding some of the birds in my backyard. While I was walking, my inner critic said “What are you doing? Why are you being unproductive? You should be studying! You’ll never pass Chemistry! You are a failure!” I was tired of my inner critic so I imagined a hand holding a giant eraser and I erased those thoughts from my mind and I said “Listen inner critic, I am not a perfect person! Failure is a part of life and I can learn from it! I am okay, I only failed one quiz and one lab report and the teacher drops the lowest grades. I still have more time in the semester to improve my grades. One mistake does not mean I am stupid. I will not listen to your criticisms, but find my voice of reason!” The silence in my mind that greeted these words was blissful, I felt glad to have won a battle with the inner bully. After my walk I felt more refreshed. I returned to my Chemistry work today and decided to try Chapter 11 and re-organize my notes and it makes more sense. I may not get a perfect score on the upcoming exam this Monday, but I feel much better because I understand vapor pressure much more. I still need practice reading phase diagrams, but I have hope and will not let my inner critic get in the way. I will also start Chapter 13 this weekend and review its concepts for the exam since the exam consists of Chapter 11 and 13. I will work better and harder on my next two lab reports on chemical reaction rates (working on learning the equations) and also freezing points (working on figuring out how to manipulate the data) for Wednesday.

     

    This week has been a busy one, but it feels rewarding. I feel like I am making progress toward my goals and the more I counter the inner critic the more I can focus on my goals.  On Monday and Wednesday, my psychology professor talked about statistics and how it is used by psychologists to establish correlation coefficients that describe how likely a behavior will occur in an organism. I enjoy my psychology class because he explains topics quite well, summarizes the key points and reviews concepts that were previously taught every start of the class. Most people don’t really like statistics much and my brother said it was hard for him in college. But my psychology professor makes statistics sound interesting. He did this experiment where he said that “In a room with thirty or more people, at least two people will have the same birthdays.” It was really intriguing example of statistics that turned out to be true because there were two classmates that shared November birthdays. After a few explanations, I began to understand different terms that correspond to experiments with more clarity like independent variable, dependent variable, correlation and correlation coefficient. I felt like I understood how scientists make experiments and use statistics to report their data in numerical values of charts and graphs.

     

    Also, after being approached by the guy three times on campus in the student center (twice on the second floor and once on the first floor) I talked with my counselor and she filed a report with a CARE team (I think it stands for Center for Access and Resources for Equality)  and now he doesn’t bother me. Before he approached me 9/17/18, 9/21/18 and 9/24/18. I saw him once yesterday on my way to my World Physical Geography class and he didn’t seem happy, but I don’t regret reporting him. I want to move on from the past memories that he tried to make me remember again with his awkward questions.  I enjoy my World Physical Geography class a lot. The professor has a great sense of humor and inspires his students to explore various parts of the environment. He shows us videos of national parks and also makes us aware about the importance of maps. Being in this class brought up a past memory of middle school when I had a history teacher who taught us how to read maps and also create our own. Although I had some difficulty mapping out the distances in maps, remembering the countries of Africa (hardest test in seventh grade history) and also drawing my own map I had lots of fun in that class. I am grateful to my World Physical Geography professor for bringing back those memories and possibly I will reawaken my ability to read maps and create them again rather that using my GPS which can shut down in remote places.  Lately, I have had flashes of past memories come to mind because of various events in the present that I didn’t know I still remembered. I welcome these memories because they provide me with more insight on who I am as a person. I think some of the memories were repressed because I was depressed this summer and now they are resurfacing. Last night I had a great dream that filled me with hope. I had a dream that I was sitting alone by an abandoned house lost in the shadows when the Buddha came by. In his hand he carried three books, I was confused at why he was showing these books to me. The Buddha said “Remember one time you asked what you should learn and read first to help you further in life? And then you waited for an answer that you didn’t think would come because you were lost in yourself? You gave up hope and that is why you sit in the shadows. Well, I am here to show you the way.” The Buddha raised his hand and there was a sprinkle of silver sparkles and my vision cleared so I could see the titles of the three books:

    1. Moving Forward, Keeping Still- A Book of Quotations

    2. The Journey of the Soul by Michael Newton

    3.  Llewellyn’s Complete Book of Mindful Living
    Awareness & Meditation Practices for Living in the Present Moment

     

    I was confused and asked the Buddha how I would acquire these books because I don’t have much in finances. The Buddha said “Have faith, money will come to you.” I felt myself spiral out into the universe and a golden light fill my vision. I arrived in a meadow with yellow grasses. At first, there didn’t seem to be anything worthwhile in the meadow. But the Buddha appeared and said “This is the meadow of your soul. You can choose who you want to be. You can create abundance.” As understanding flooded me, I began to think of those books the Buddha had showed me that would guide me in life and I felt myself reach into my wallet and discovered I had just the right amount of money for the books. I was amazed and asked the Buddha how this was possible. And the Buddha said “What you think you become. I have cleared a path for you so you can see much clearer your goals in the distance, but you still have to travel the distance and meet some obstacles. Yet you are closer to your goal than you realize and I know you will achieve it soon.” I was filled with a warm light as my body began to glow, suddenly the meadow felt like it had a vast array of possibilities. Smiling the Buddha left and I was standing in the meadow glowing. I looked around to see where the light was and realized it was in me. I began to think of all the possibilities that could happen in my life and I realized they all could be wonderful. I was creating abundance; I had the strength to move myself toward my goals and keep my focus. And in the distance of the meadow appeared a mountain that had not been there, but I was confident and climbed it. There was a boulder that came down and tried to crush me, it missed me by a few inches and I was shaken as I was on the ground. But a hand picked me back up and I heard the rush of wings as I was carried off the ground. I felt my body dissolve in a golden light and merge with the universe and at that moment I knew I was being healed. I knew that I could overcome my obstacles and I was not alone in my path and I had power to create abundance.

    • This reply was modified 6 years, 2 months ago by Janus.
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