Grasshopper learns patience

In the past week, I've cried more than I had in the last two years. It's a really strange sensation, feeling things again. Usually the Effexor keeps me on a pretty even keel (read: emotionless). What's changed? My perspective, I guess. New ideas. This is why, according to Paul, young scientists are in demand. They give the regulars a new way of looking at things. I thought I was lending a room to a friend. I didn't realize I was lending it to a master. Grasshopper waits to learn.

Last night, I mentioned to Matt I'd known him since he was 12 years old. "No way," he said, then paused. "Oh my god, you're right!" I asked him if it bothered him that, when we fell out of touch, he was always the one to contact me and not the other way around. He told me, "Well, sometimes it hurt my feelings that you never sent me a message or an e-mail." I cried and leveled with him: "I thought you'd grow up and get new friends and that'd be that. I didn't want to hold you back from living your life. I thought you'd move on."

"I did move on," he told me. "I just took you with me."

Oh boy. That hit home. Why had I never looked at it like that? None of us are stuck in one place like mosquitos preserved in amber. We're all constantly moving and changing and evolving. It's up to us to choose who and what gets to come along for the ride.

I think that for too long I have felt slightly out of control of my own life. I've been playing by others' rules: The university controls what I learn; the authorities control what I do; the tenets of my past control what I think. Well, no more. For god's sake, I'm tired of that. Nobody's in my head steering me around ... except me. And nobody's stopping me from doing exactly what I want to do. It's totally up to me. Holding on to that glimmer of freedom that's been lost for, like, 15 years absolutely elates me.

And here's where it all ties in. I'm not a patient person. I want to know and do and be and live everything right now. Why? Because it always feels like my hand is forced, so I might as well give in and get it over with (and try not to think about how much I'm hating it). When Lori told me I was searching for my purpose, I grilled her for answers. Did she know what I was supposed to do? Where I was supposed to go? How I was supposed to figure this all out (and as soon as possible)?

Well, last night, I had a sort of mental breakthrough about the whole thing. I don't need to push myself to learn everything right this minute. My life is up to me. Instead of looking outside myself for knowledge, I'm attempting to reach back inside to a place I was many years ago -- my core -- to heal myself piece by piece. And it may take me a long time to figure out what I'm doing. It simply doesn't matter. What matters is that the important people -- my gurus -- are waiting in the wings. They're ready to teach me when I’m ready to learn.

They're waiting for me to grab them by the hand and say, "I'm moving on. And I'm bringing you with me."

[EDIT: Wanted to added a slight postscript. Because my life is in my hands, I decided to wear my favorite clothes today -- my flowy black skirt with red pants underneath (why the hell not?!), my black ringer and my grey hoodie. Oh! And *white* socks and my favorite hiking boots with Rainbow Brite shoelaces. Hee hee!]