Naïvety

NOTE: This is something that I wrote some time ago as sort of a poetic rant. Here seemed like a good place to share it.

It is the gentlest of us, the kindest, the most naïve, the generous, those with the best of intentions, who end up battered and bruised. We are the compassionate ones; the empathic. We look at the world around us and attempt to filter out the negativity. We strive to see the good in everyone, the silver lining to every situation. We walk around in a constant state of optimism, always quick with a smile for each stranger we pass in the street, and to step lively to open a door for an elder. 

Suspicion is not something that comes naturally to us. It takes several incidents for us to even begin to bring our guard up. And so we don't notice the deception, we never see it coming. We wake up one day and look around and wonder how we could have been so blind, so trusting, so oblivious. And we attempt to rebuild the shambles of our lives, weaving together the shards of our psyche with stray wisps of sanity. And suddenly we find ourselves hiding behind layers of masks, our former selves peering hesitantly around the edges. And so we bear the scars of Humanity and slough off the dead tissue to reveal new skin with the shedding of each mask.  

But eventually, let the last of them fall away again; we have to. The day we stop having Faith in Humanity will be the day we climb upon the funeral pyre.

Temptations

The minute that someone explained to me that things like fear and doubt could be classified as temptations, a switch flipped in my brain somewhere. Temptations? *scoff* I know how to deal with temptations. You're looking at the girl who didn't have an ounce of chocolate for 6 months. The same girl who gave up alcohol for over 8 months. I've never had a problem with impulse buying or spending beyond my limits. I am a very budget minded person, and have no problems ignoring all of the afore mentioned temptations. Now I had the weapon with which to slay my inner demons.

What nobody tells you though, is how much energy it takes to stay strong. When you're dealing with a degenerative neural disease, you don't really have a whole lot of energy left after fighting your mind, body and emotions all day. I honestly don't know what people are talking about when they say I'm so strong. The person who snaps or lashes out because she's so damned sick and tired of being sick and tired does not seem very strong to me. I do try to keep my temper reigned in. The good news is that I happen to be a very self aware person, so I win more than I lose on that front.

As we come out of Christmas and my birthday, and therefore out of the only season I permit myself to gobble whatever food I like, I'll be eating smaller portions again and doing more exercise, in hopes that as I show my body who's boss, I'll also be able to work on controlling my fear and my temper.

The good news is that I have already noticed some progress on that front. I'm able to notice the temper tantrums as they build instead of after I've become a whirling dervish of fury. And I'm already noticing that my motivations in my everyday and personal life are no longer rooted in fear. I am able to look the fear in the face, acknowledge it, and then step around it. I can't even begin to explain how amazing that feels.

As far as diet and exercise goes, a recent visit to a Nutritionist has left me with some useful advice that I have already put into place. Let's see what my weigh in is like at the end of the month.