What's hiding underneath the superhero cape?

In the past, there seemed to me to be two types of people: those who feel deeply, and those who are apathetic. I see now that there is a range: some people more willing to allow the experience of those emotions than others, although I still find that certain people feel on a deeper level than others.

Those beautiful creatures who feel deeply are those who love with their whole beings, they feel their emotions from the very core of their being to the ends of their fingertips. Joy and pain alike have powers so strong in these people that those feelings sometimes seem to be the essence of who they are.

Scared of feeling exposed. "We all have our super hero capes, don't we? Perfectionism and overworking, snarkiness and apathy, they're all superhero capes. We all put our superhero capes over our real selves so our real tender selves don't have to be seen and don't have to be hurt."
"Lessons from the mental hospital"

What is your cape? What do you hide underneath that shell? We've all created one. And it was meant to be. Sometimes, especially if we are sensitive, feeling the pain of an emotion or a situation can be overwhelming, and so that cape provides the much needed solace. It IS a protection. And that's okay. That's coping.

But what happens when that protection has been around for so long that we don't remember what was underneath? This, my friends, would be what you might recognize as selective amnesia. We might think that this is rare, but I've seen people realize things about their past, and their childhood in particular, when they look like regular, healthy, put-together people. And that's because they are. There is no shame in protecting oneself.

As adults, pursuing growth and expansion of our selves, we must face the pain underneath in order to move past it. While the superhero cape, the protection, is present, the effect that the pain or trauma had on us will be hidden from the world, and most importantly: from us. Accepting that pain and allowing ourselves to feel it....now THAT is being a superhero.

So I challenge you today to remove that cape, take the step:

DREAM of who you are underneath and what you are capable of.
DARE to expose yourself, and challenge those around you to do the same.
BE vulnerable. And BE present for those around you who are there too.

LIVING with AWE

AWE:

"an experience of such perceptual vastness you 

literally have to reconfigure your mental 

models of the world to assimilate it"

Do you spend a lot of time thinking?

 I think about what to say. I go over what would happen if I said this verses that. I imagine the possible outcomes, then I rate them based on positive and negative possible reactions and outcomes. I think through as much as I can. What about this? What if that?

My friends, it is time we, as this blog says: "go after the things [we] want!"

Ryan puts it perfectly. We hold ourselves back based on what society expects, or what we expect from ourselves based on societal 'norms' or 'rules:'

"Don’t follow these rules of modern love. They’re shit. Imagine yourself at age 90 and filled with regret. Imagine being surrounded with “what if”s and “how come”s and not being able to do anything about it because you’re too old now, you’ve been edged out of society and the only thing you have left to do now is die. That’s what will happen to you if you keep on holding the love in."

Ryan is absolutely accurate! It's not worth the fight, and forcing ourselves to live according to expectations will get us exactly that: what is expected. I don't know about you, but I know that my desires are never so easily tangible and fixed as that.

My deepest desires have nothing to do with the most common measures of success: a high-paying job, a big house in the suburbs, the newest electronics. (Cue Little Boxes song! <3 br="">

What does that get me? Vacations scheduled months in advance and maxing out at 2 weeks per year, a mortgage which (let's face it) so many of us can't actually afford without massive amounts of debt, and some pretty gadgets which ended up making life more complicated instead of sophisticated.

Can that possibly the summation of success? Is the peak of my life as an adult limited to how much money I have, what I can do with it, and how well I've marketed myself in order to be a 'successful' business woman?

The answer is a resounding no.

I want so much more. My desires are based around a deep belief that I am in the world to do more that fit a consumerist/ business-based mold.

I am here to experience desire, AWE, and beauty, and then, through the amazing thing that is human connection and love, to share that with those whom I also share love. It is "the difference between disengagement and radiant ecstasy, between being unaffected by the here and now, and being absolutely ravished!" What more could I want?

The beauty of life means, as the lovely Jason Silva says in the last link: "to breath in --- to take it in, we fit the universe through our brain and it comes out as nothing less than poetry."


Let's promise, here and now, to live our lives according to what we actually want, what we desire. Let's take leaps. Let's change what we expect of ourselves and other to actually fit what we believe. Let's trust ourselves to obtain those things for which our hearts TRULY YEARN!!! The possibilities are endless.

it's taking over

Waking in the mornings, sometimes I get this gut feeling in my body.

My eyes flutter open peacefully, I roll over, half awake, my mind becoming aware of its presence in my body. I take a deep breath without having to think about it, my body does the work naturally. I might stretch a little.

Waking is a beautiful process.

And then.

I'm on the verge of consciousness, coming to my senses, aware of what room I am in, of what the day holds for me, of what place I am in my life, of who I will see that day.

And that feeling starts. It seems to scream at me, muffled somehow, but obviously screaming at the top of its lungs:

"SUSANNE!!! URBALAHRUCHDGHIEOINWFUIEWNTHEDJM!!! "

Um..... pardon?

That's correct, my gut screams at me. Not literally, this is no disturbing case of tummy troubles. This is the honest feeling which I experience many days. It's right between my chest and my pelvis. It's a pang, a dull, hard-to-understand, gut feeling.

I believe that our bodies are connected to our minds in a special way. Our mind is not purely cognitive, there is something there which I don't know how to explain. Some call it the Soul, the Spirit, the third eye. There are types of psychological study just looking at these ideas, the phenomenon of being able to sense things before they happen. It explains how we can meet a person and know things about them before we actually know them (outside of appearances).

If you've ever felt something was wrong without knowing why, or known that you LIKE something or someone without an explanation of the reason, then you have probably experienced some level of this feeling which often visits me.

So, what do I do with this scream coming at me from my gut? I freak out a little bit, a mini panic attack hits me, I don't breath for about two seconds, and then, like any normal, balanced, rational woman who western society taught how to cope, I shove it.

Yep, I push it down as deep and far as it'll go. To my feet. Actually, I push it to the worms in the dirt under the floor beneath my feet. And I HOPE THE WORMS EAT IT! cause I sure don't want to deal with it.

 And then, again, just as I always have done and every person around me seems to do as well, I shower, eat my cereal, blast my music in my car and then go through my day at work trying to convince myself that I didn't feel anything at all. And I usually succeed.

After all, it's NORMAL to not want to go to work, nobody likes their job, right?

It's FINE if you're not always happy, no one can feel good all the time, right?

Gut feelings are just in my imagination, they don't mean anything, right?

Right?
RIGHT?
RIGHT?!?!?!
VALIDATE MY INSECURITIES!!!!!

Most people do:
"Everybody dislikes their jobs, you just have to do it anyways because we all need money."
"Don't worry, once you get to work it'll distract you."
"Well you like the people you work with at least!"
"Didn't you make top sales last month? Doesn't that make you happy?"

No.

No, no, NO.

Pushing that feeling down has gotten me one thing.

 Frustration.

I can try to ignore it all I like, but it stays there.

And even when I'm distracted because I'm working with a client, because I'm busy filling my already full schedule, or because I'm stuffing my face with delicious chocolate cake (hello perfect distraction!), that feeling is still inside of me.

Try as I might to get the worms to eat it and make it go away forever, I actually never succeeded in shoving it down at all.

It's right in my core. Eating at ME, just like the worms in my mind would eat it.

So, I have two options.

One, I continue to ignore it, and let it eat my soul and my guts away, nibble by gruesome nibble, until, like most of the people around me, it seems, I forget that I ever had ambitions to be happy and to contribute to the world in a fulfilling and meaningful way.

Or, two, I let myself feel the pain of it. The gnawing, yes. I face the fact that I've been letting it eat out my guts for so long, but also the actual pang itself. Try to listen and discipher those jumbled aches into actual meaning.

 You're probably saying right now: "What's that, you say? HA! Guys! come look, this chick thinks her gut it talking to her!"

You know what, yes, yes I do. I won't take it back. And if you don't get some feeling down there, I call BULL!, or else you've ignored it for so long that you forgot it's even there.

And it's taken over.

I won't let that happen to me, and I hope you don't either.

Instead, together let's stand up, face our fear straight on, and tell it it can go away. Because HERE WE ARE. We are a force to be reckoned with, and we will keep going. We have a choice: To let the pain stop us, or to use it to grow and learn. I choose to learn. What are you going to do?