IMPERFECT Lady

Who you are with!

As I sit at the end of another year, 55 years living, I am very grateful for where I sit...mentally, emotionally, and especially spiritually.  I feel that I have grown into the space of appreciating my journey and loving me.

I can also see me from many points light...and most often from an expanded view and ever more often with the eyes and heart of love.

For me, there isn't a troubled area that needs my attention today.  Nor, are there places that I feel lack and neglected and unseen and unheard...by me.

I see me.

I feel me.

I am with Me.

My personality and soul seem to be traveling arm and arm.

I will be doing a daily meditation following Melody Beattie's book "Journey to the Heart" this year.  And in the forward she writes about her experience of writing this book...

"In my sixteen years of professional writing, this is the eighth book I've worked or collaborated on and the second meditation book I've written. Yet it is the first.  It is the only one that has not been based on, rooted in, grounded in, the concept of overcoming devasting pain.  Instead, the book, like my journey reflects a spirit of excitement, adventure, freedom, and joy.  Yes, sometimes pain is still part of it, but suffering no longer plays the role it once did."  Melody

I feel this is where I am.

My journey through last year and continuing on is one of adventure, excitement, new experiences, new friends, new learning, more freedom of expression and joy.

Joy of seeing my children continue to grow and learn new experiences and go through phases of life's milestones.  Joy of being with my kids.  Of hearing them laugh and seeing the wisdom pour forth.  Of doing what they love and to express themselves As themselves; being unique.

I am beginning to see the seeds that I have planted in those early years beginning to sprout.  

I believe that my changes are rippling outward, inward....around.

I leave 2014 with no regrets and instead marvel at the orchestrations of the Universe, my life and journey...and look forward to what 2015 will present to me.

I have no resolutions or demands for next year.

I am content and quite grateful for today.

It is my intention to stay present.

To pay attention to the artful displays of nature and life unfold.

Melody says her book is about Discovery.

Imagine what is going on in each moment of time...how much can you see, feel and hear?

I am more excited about being here now....and letting the future be here when I get here.  For this is where the real thing is....right here, right now, with who you are with!

 

 

100% Me!

I went for coffee with two self proclaimed Christians, who we jokingly said they were 90 proof....or 90% christian in their content of who they are. I replied I was zero proof, that I no longer define myself by any religion.

It was surreal for me to sit there feeling completely empty and yet completely full.

And to find that my content label was missing the old ingredients...being replaced by new ones. 

My old content label consisted mostly of unworthiness and sinfulness, sprinkled with a bit of hope of making it to a heaven one day IF I could keep myself from sinning which was unattainable for any extended period.

The old label actually consisted of the beliefs of my old church...filling me up to the brim (90 proof) of its image of a wretched and poor humanity and a body full of sin... leaving 10% as being worthy is a stretch.  I am thinking I was 99% sinful.

Under the old label there was no content that I would have consider Me.

In fact, early on, say 10 years ago, when I discovered the denial I had lived in, I felt lost, and that I was going to go find myself, but I didn't know who I was OR even that I had been missing.  My whole content had been given to me via religion and how my parents treated me.  I was reading my label with their eyes.

My content of Me, lacked Me.

Now, sitting there at the table, I felt completely at ease with Me.

My content I knew.

My content I loved.

My content was perfect.

I was completely complete and I have no content that suggests any religion.

What seems so insane is how religion teaches us about our selves, our bodies and how it sees them...as NOT perfect.

That it is impossible to be perfect.

And, when I suggested that "imperfect" actually says, I M Perfect, so there is no imperfection....it wasn't believed.

How easy it seems it is to believe in our wretchedness and sinfulness and how impossible it is to believe the opposite.

That we are completely perfect.

What would happen to the world's religions if humanity at large knew that they were completely perfect?

Is it not a war against reality to think that things ought to be different than they are.

Like how can my body be sinful?

It loves what it loves and feels pushed back from what it doesn't.

And, in my experience, it had reasons to not want to be close to my parents.

My body has held my truth...for the body never lies.

Perhaps if you need me to forgive and forget, and the body refuses, I could see how you would 'not' trust the body; for you can't get it to adhere to the ways of the mind. It literally has a mind of its own....gut feelings.

Mostly or lastly...I feel that most religions keep us away from the body and its innate intelligence...and even tries to keeps us our essence and away from the freedom of being unique and an individual; a complete and perfect gift from God.

I am 100% me 100% of the time.  Failing to do so reduces my own self worth.

There is absolutely nothing I would change about me, nothing I could add or take away.  There is nothing I seek to be fulfilled.  Inside of me is the wide open space of the Universe.

It was funny to hear someone tell me I was full of sin.  

I couldn't find it to be true.

If, I had felt guilty or had low self esteem...we would have agreed.

We didn't.

My experience of me and her understanding of humanity didn't match.

We didn't see me the same.

What was beautiful is we both left with our own contents; completely happy with our labels!

I love mine...

Mine reads...100% Me!

 

 

 

Back at Me

My journey is now ten years out.  Ten years of awareness from denial. 

Ten years is a long time.  

Ten years of seeing me.

Ten years of standing by my truth.

Ten years of walking the path less traveled.

Ten years of being seen as mental by those who walk differently...or ten years of being different.

Ten years of doing things the opposite of what I was taught.

Ten years.  

Is a long time.

To be walking against the beat of the family.

To be the odd man out.

To be separated.

To stand a single soul... against so many.

My lone voice drowned to silence by the sheer volumn of numbers speaking differently; joined together in family harmony.

The comfort of the group, lulls them...is there really safety in numbers?

Ten years I have had, to get comfortable being different; being the blacksheep of the family. Being the one who is standoffish, cool...indifferent to the family drum beat.

It is truly hard to believe that ten years have passed.

Ten years is, again, a long time.

I feel that it has taken that long to separate myself and feel whole coming from a family in denial of abuse.

It is in fact, their denial that has been the hardest to be with.

Or denial is what separates us.

In their denial they can't see me.

Well, certainly they can see me, but they don't get me. 

It is the lack of understanding or commonality that separates us.

They literally have chosen to preserve the family unit over the integrity of a child's abuse.

It is that simple and that complicated.

I represent the abused child.

And my actions have always leaned in that direction.

And in doing so, lean away from family.

The direction we lean into is the only meter we have to measure denial or awareness. 

After ten years of leaning in a direction that is the opposite of "Family"...I know to the depth of my soul, that the reason more victims don't stand by their own truths, is that they will feel the family pull away.

The only interactions I have had with my family over these ten years is to tell me how off I am, how insane, cold, bitter, hardened, nuts, etc.  The family will literally and figuratively turn against the child, as the child speaks of being sexually abused by a family member.

I am a grown adult speaking out.

Imagine how a child would survive this?

The Huhta's have banned together to uphold and support our family.

Ten years and counting...or decades and decades....generations upon generations. Children with grown children who now have young children, will feel the legacy of abuse, due to the way they all lean.

Ten years is just a snippet of time that encapsulates the history and how it repeats itself.  

How families band together to form a tight connection that keeps abuse securely inside.  Somehow they naively think that the threat of abuse left when Ray died. New offsprings of Ray were born when he abused them...they are now tightly held inside the family. (Also victims typically attract other abusers....the threats are not from the Huhta's alone, but from the ripple affect of others they hang with.)

Ten years I have stood outside.

Ten years abusers tightly held inside.

Abused and the abusers all coexisting under the same false pretense of family.

Love and acceptace of abuse. 

Shuning and indifference to me and my words.

When I see my sisters, sister-in-laws...I see warriors against the truth.  Mini versions of my mother. I see the cycles, the new generations of girls/boys beginning my journey.  

I see nothing among them that inspires me to think abuse has lessened.

Instead I see the perfect landscape for pedophiles.

Ten years have been quite fruitful for them. More victims being born...

Pedophiles LOVE the warriors against truth...the ones who overlook and move on, to not stare at abusers and hold them accountable.

Ten years and not a word of mine have they heard.

There is no part of me that wants to move towards these women...even after ten years.

Ten years and counting outside of the cycle of abuse.

Its legacy is one that is not easily escaped.

You literally have to turn against family and embrace your own truth.

You will be at odds.

In order to heal, you will no longer attend their functions, be part of their lives.

They, are the old you.  They are what you need to be different from in order to end the cycle.

They and you can't be alike at all.

It is to shed the traits and images we naturally pick up in families; it is to re-invent yourself into someone who is completely different than say your mother.

I was a mirror image of my mother.

It has taken 10 years to change my reflection.

My reflection is now of my own self.

It shines from within.

My truth I see...and it shines back at me.
 

 

True Self

While listening to a novel today on the route, a phrase caught my attention....in regards to "Changes"..."you can change for the better or for the worst."

Somehow, I naively thought that change only is in the direction of good...not that you can become worse.

We are not sitting in neutral, we are either going one way or the other...and this is huge.

Instead of standing still and NOT making changes to improve, we can actually make changes to become worse than we were.

Each opportunity we are choosing...and we are not choosing to stay the same, our needle either moves forward or backward....better or worse.

Changing for the worse is a choice we make as we continue not to better ourselves or make life improvements.

Who would have thought life changes could be making us into a worse person than we already are.  

Worse in the sense of karma and adding to our inability to follow our truth or authenticness....but to become worse at being our true self.

This gives me a visual gauge....where I am unable to stand still, but either make a choice to move towards betterment or into being worse.

A good thing to know as we approach another year.

In life we do not stand still....until we die.  

I see our lives as on a continum of growing either darker or lighter...we don't get to hide in sameness.  But rather are adding to ourselves in degrees of better or worse.

Which way are your choices moving you...into the dark away from you....or into the sunlight of being your true self?

Do you see what I see...

Signs are popping up, saying... "Keep Christ in Christmas" and I wonder how exactly is this achieved?

What is the application of adding Christ and how does one do this, according to the sign owners?

Is it really done by just saying "Merry Christmas" instead of "Happy Holidays"?

That you can literally remove Christ by using a different phrase?

I marvel at the narrow-mindedness or perhaps the shallowness of how Christ is seen or viewed; like words can trump actions.

That you can literally mess up the season by using the wrong words, regardless of your actions this season.

How do a select amount of people know what you are doing for the holidays, what is in your heart and soul, and feel capable to judge you by their ruler of what is proper for Christ.

I don't know how you can keep Christ out any more than you can add God to your life.

I don't believe this is something that is yours to add or delete; It IS.

It is in the love.

It's in the giving.

It's in the baking.

It's in the wrapping.

It's in your emotions.

It's in you.

You can't remove it; for you didn't put it there.

It isn't something that is held in a special box or one date on the calendar, it is in the actions we live each day.

It is in the freshly baked loaf of bread a gentleman hands to me at the mail box.

It is in the wide smile from a man with no teeth.

It is in the wag of tail from a dog happy to see me.

It is the clouds artful design.

It is in the tears of sorrow.

In the emptiness of grief of missing someone.

It's in the perfectly wrapped packages or the ones hurriedly gotten.

You can't take Christ out of Christmas; nor the rest of the year...or someone's life.

By focusing on your idea of what Christ in Christmas looks like, you will not see Him everywhere.

You may be looking for the perfect Christ-like behavior or worship or ritual and miss the million other finely displayed Christ images.

It is in the fine detail of a single leaf, a snowflake, a glitter or sparkle on the snow, the friendly wave or the hurried shuffle by.

Please tell me how you can leave Him out?

He is interwoven in all things.

It's in Art and the Artist...in the fabric and design....Inspired means "In Spirit".

 It's in a gift from 30 years ago...lovingly displayed each year.

It's in the eye of the beholder...and what it beholds.

It's everywhere and in everything, only you can choose not to see it; but it will not be removed.

"Do you see what I see...."