Finding the REAL you

Singing a New Song: 
Finding yourself, healing from abuse and learning to dream again.

That's what this blog; Facebook page is all about; becoming the best YOU!!!! No matter what has happened TO you or within you. YOU deserve to heal, grow and enjoy your life.


Finding the REAL you...what motivates you???

Spiritual Journey

WELCOME 

to your spiritual journey...

an opportunity to question YOUR PATH in life 

as we muse along together in 

"finding ourselves, healing from abuse 

and learning to dream again". 

You have not stumbled across this blog by chance. YOUR DESIRE TO LIVE WILDLY, FULLY and FREELY and OVER THE TOP has led you here. This is a great time for YOU to take a few moments in your day to peruse over YOUR spiritual journey in life and ASK: 
IS THIS THE PATH THAT I REALLY WANT TO TAKE? 

Let's start at the beginning with our families. 

What "spirituality" did your family teach you? What was reinforced, allowed or encouraged? What holidays were celebrated? Were they "religious" or "spiritual" holidays or celebrated just because everyone else celebrated them??? What influence and benefit has your "family's faith" had upon your life? Has it been encouraging and OPEN or restrictive and CLOSED?

     Our families are our FIRST impressions of faith of any sort and my family; though morally decent was not specific on one faith view but just a "good" and decent family life and choices. I felt a void. A lack of spiritual guidance and unclear goals and very uncertain values and conflicting and some very obstructive, attitudes and prejudices by my father, mainly, which seemed to cause me to NOT just accept that our family's way of life was the best or that I would just automatically continue it into my own life.

How about culture and religious influences:

Did you or are you planning on choosing a different cultural or religious path than the one that you knew and were taught as a child? Are you "finding yourself" and your expression of faith in another expression of belief in God than the "one" that you have been taught. You know that it is VERY likely; that depending upon the area in which you were raised, you are VERY likely to learn and stay in the faith of the culture that you knew as a child, even if it does not serve to help you mature and develop spiritual. I find this to be a VERY sad FACT. 

     For me, I think that because I was NOT taught a certain faith; or trained to follow certain religious guidelines or was made to adhere to a religious tradition, that I SOUGHT many paths; I was curious about WHY certain cultures saw God in the ways that they did (do) and I read about so many other expressions of faith that the one that was (is) dominant in my residence. I lived in Ohio MOST of my life and only the past three years, here in my new home state of North Carolina.

Our choice of education and career:

Are you doing "what you love?" or have you chosen a career path that at least syncs with your values and your heartfelt dreams? Or do you "do what you do" for the money and have left your dreams on the shelf???

    Do you remember a class your had in high school or college; a career class, where you could explore your interests (perhaps complete a Strong Interest Inventory 

(The Strong Interest Inventory® assessment is one of the world’s most widely respected and frequently used career planning tools. It has helped both academic and business organizations develop the brightest talent and has guided thousands of individuals—from high school and college students to midcareer workers seeking a change—in their search for a rich and fulfilling career. ) to see what you really wanted to do fore a life career??? I remember my Human Relations class, Dr. Mac...that was his real name, he was a tall drink of water, a gentleman and had his Ph D. in Behavioral Studies/Psychology and was teaching High School. One assignment that he gave us to complete was most challenging; "Where do you see yourself in FIVE years"...I look back upon it and though my dissertation was somewhat vague for my 16 years of age, it was and has been very accurate in a general way of who I am and what I desired to spend during my revolutions around the Sun. Do you remember an assignment like this? If not, did you take the MPII in college or at University? I did...and it confirmed but added the field of Science as a great interest of mine; which still is to this day...

Choice of mate/life partner/family of our own: 

I found the most wonderful article on "falling in love" and that most people ONLY fall in love with 3 people in their lifetimes...Here is a wonderful, thought-provoking tool provided by http://thepowerofideas.ideapod.com/fall-love-3-people-lifetime-one-specific-reason/ 

We Only Fall in Love with 3 People in Our Lifetime—Each One for a Specific Reason   

By The Power of Ideas - January 27, 2017

It’s true. Philosophers and mystics have raved on for centuries about why we need 3 different lovers. Each one serves a different purpose and there’s no guarantee that all of us will make it to number three.But I bet you’re wondering: 

What the hell are these three different types of loves?

Well, the first one all begins when we’re young. It’s called the “idealistic love”. It’s kind of like a fairy tale. We believe we’re doing it for our family and society.You know, you find the one that is ‘just right’. Everyone will be jealous of you at parties because you’re the ‘perfect couple’. The major problem with this type of love? It relies purely on how other people see you, rather than how you actually feel.

The second type of love is when shit gets real. It’s called the “hard love”. This is where we delve deep into our sexuality, our desires and begin answering the question: Who am I? At times you’ll think that you’re both fated to be together forever. At other times, you’ll want to bite each other’s heads off. It’s passionate, it’s wrong and it’s heart-wrenching. You might break-up, get back together, then break up etc. Each time realizing that it just isn’t meant to be.The good news? You’ve learnt a TON about who you are and what you really want in life.

The third type of love comes out of nowhere. When you meet this person, you’d never consider that you’d end up with them. Perhaps you’re not looking for a relationship, or you think that you’re personalities would clash, but when the connection ignites, it will take off like a lightning strike that neither one of you are prepared for. When you start dating, it just fits. Your personalities bounce off each other like a trampoline. You compliment each other’s strengths and weakness and you both feel like you take on the world. It just feels right. And so it should. You’ve been through struggles, bad breakups, and people who have just plain tried to take advantage of you. But now, you know yourself better than ever, and most importantly, you know deep in your soul that you want to spend the rest of your life with this truly special person.

All of these loves have their reasons, and the lessons you learn through each phase will only help you grow. The people I really feel sorry for are those who never make it to number three.

     I had reviewed my "love lives" prior to reading this article and in my naivete, I deemed that though I had "3 loves" that I had not truly YET experience the "true and lasting" kind of love... They had, very neatly, fallen into the descriptions given in the above article. It has caused me to be thankful; I HAVE HAD 3 loves (two loves to many, I truly only desired to know, marry and love JUST ONE man for a lifetime: but that is not possible) I still am looking and waiting for the idealistic "true love" to find me or me, him. It was upon the FIRST love relationship and it's demise that I chose to begin "finding myself, healing from abuse and learning to dream again"...I did not know about his Borderline Personality Disorder at the time and returned to him...to experience a "dream come true" only to endure the heartbreak of it turning into a "BPD nightmare" complete with infidelity on his part, refusal to "let me have my things" that I brought into the relationship and a TON of broken promises.  I then married my first husband and learned about addictive behavior and abuse (and how NOT to be codependent) and religious dependency or identity that is fake or shallow at best. My second husband, which I thought would be my "last" is my son's father (some say "sperm donor") from whom I learned all about MALIGNANT NARCISSISM, misogynistic abuse and religious "control".   After healing and soul searching, I returned to my "first love" only to find gratitude in all the lessons that I had learned about myself and abuse through marriages with husbands #1 and #2.  

Thank you for reading and please feel free to SHARE this post with others who are needing to embark on their healing journey of "finding themselves, healing from abuse and learning to dream again". I know it may sound cliche, but it is not. It is not trivial, drivel or trite "sayings"...it is OUR life and we deserve to spend it JUST AS WE WOULD LIKE it to be...

I wish you peace dear one...may this posting find you WELL, HAPPY and WHOLE...

D 

Singing a New Song 

Obstacle or Opportunity?

Thomas Alva Edison didn't stop to think that he would discover thousands of ways to NOT invent the light bulb when he started. He just refused to see one little "un success" as being a failure or obstacle when the opportunity was clear and ahead of him.

I have not failed. 

I've just found 10,000 ways that won't work.

Thomas Alva Edison 

I had the opportunity, many years ago, of visiting Thomas Alva Edison's Winter Estate (summer home) in Fort Myers, Florida. I was awestruck by the number of "failures" that he endured before each success. It seemed that success didn't come easy to him, failures were exorbitant and that he did not let his failures dissuade him from inventing the wonderful things that we take so much for granted today. He seemed to realize that every success is paid for by many failures and that one failure didn't mean the end of his vision; it meant only "one way that it didn't work".

I would like to me more like Thomas Alva Edison. I wish that our lives was not filled with the weight of failure but the hope that we are one step closer to succeeding and have found one way "that it doesn't work". Relationships are like this also. We can try many ways to "reach" a loved one and if they are suffering from a mental illness; especially Borderline Personality Disorder, we may discover that there are many more ways to fail that we ever have believed because it seems, that there is no way to succeed in carrying a relationship with someone who is not able or capable of providing their healthy half.

So is mental illness the obstacle or the opportunity? Yes. It is an obstacle. If you expected an healthy relationship whether romantic love or familial connection with a person who suffers from mental illness; you are bound to be disappointed and find that it has become an obstacle in your life and in the life of the one you love.

However, there is a little thing called "acceptance" that can turn that obstacle into an opportunity. IF your mentally ill loved one can see clear to believe that they are suffering from mental illness without the horrible stigma that society perpetuates upon it, and accept a healing journey of DBT (Dialectical Behavior Therapy is therapy designed to help people change patterns of behavior that are not effective, such as self-harm, suicidal thinking and substance abuse. This approach works towards helping people increase their emotional and cognitive regulation by learning about the triggers that lead to reactive states and helping to assess which coping skills to apply in the sequence of events, thoughts, feelings and behaviors that lead to the undesired behavior. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dialectical_behavior_therapy), then you have just seen an obstacle turn into an opportunity.

Whenever I hear or think of the words "opportunity" or "dream"...I am reminded of this quote of Thomas Edison's. I remind myself that failure will proceed success. Rarely do we succeed the very first time. That is not usually skill but possibly luck and nothing that we can count on or duplicate. Failure doesn't have to the obstacle in "finding ourselves, healing from abuse and learning to dream again". We have put way too much importance on "doing things right". I give you permission to make a mistake and learn from it and not judge yourself for "not getting it right" the first time. It is unrealistic to believe that anyways; why not allow ourselves to see obstacles as opportunities.

Are you ready????

I have heard, time and time again, someone say 

"I will do it when I am ready". 

Really? 

Do we really believe 

that by making that statement 

that we will EVER REALLY 

be ready?

In preparing for a test, writing a college paper or report, learning to sky dive or competing in sports or the arts, even after all our our dedicated hard work and effort, do we ever really feel that we "are ready?"

Being READY all hinges upon how confident we are in any area. If we are willing to START accepting ourselves, loving ourselves and being patient with ourselves, we may see that we might not KNOW ourselves as well as we think we do. We do not "have to be ready" to know ourselves more...we just have to WORK at KNOWING OURSELVES more.

How about HEALING? The kind of healing that our minds and souls need to fully function in this world. The kind of healing that we need to have an healthy self concept, self respect and aspirations to live life "wildly, fully and freely and over the top". Do we really "need to be ready" to START find out the things that NEED our attention in our lives?

How about woundedness and pain of abuse? Painful memories, flashbacks and fearful images that block out any possibility of happiness. Aren't we READY for them to be confronted, identified, and given what they need to become part of an healthy life? We may have said to ourselves, excusing our attention to our own pain, "I just wasn't ready to face it". Are we EVER really ready to face the deepest and darkest part of our soul? How about the part that we deny even to ourselves though others may easily see? Aren't we READY to let go of the pain, learn from it and become stronger because of it?

How about DREAMING? When was the last time you spoke of a DREAM that you have had? I know that until I had "found myself and healed from abuse", at least to about an 80% point, that I was not dreaming. I didn't see it as a possibility. It was merely an exercise in futility and waste of imagination to dream of things that I KNEW could not possibly come true. Did I feel ready to dream? No. But as I was along my healing journey, I began to experience my dreams rising to the surface, breaking through the sludge and mire of my life; surfacing to breathe deeply of the fresh air and light of self knowledge and healing...The things that were most important to me, would no longer stay hidden. I no longer denied that dream as being REAL. I knew that I "just had to" find out if what I had believed to be true, WAS true...I didn't stop to ask myself "am I ready to do this?". I never even gave it a thought. I learned that there is something special about the heart's desires. What the heart wants, it is ready to receive.

There is no better time to ENJOY YOUR LIFE than right now. Don't ask yourself "Am I ready?"...by the time that you ask that of yourself, you have been making progress on the healing road of "finding yourself, healing from abuse and learning to dream again". There is no time to waste.

If you have loved and lost...

"'Tis better to have loved and lost 
than never to have loved at all." 

- Alfred Lord Tennyson




I have loved. I have continued to love. I will continue to love; no matter how much I have lost. I have taken refuge, comfort and consolation in Tennyson's famous quote: "'Tis better to have loved and lost than never to have loved at all." It reminds me that NO MATTER WHAT I have lost; I have not lost "love". I may have lost the subject, the person whom I loved, or may have lost them "for a time" but I have not lost LOVE. I do NOT REGRET LOVING no matter how painful that it had become to LOSE that one whom I loved.

Most of us have parents. Some of us even had good parents. Upright mother and father; maybe a bit quirky and not so perfect, but loving, providential and respectable. They may not have done everything right but we are thankful, like so many others, that they did not do everything wrong. I have enjoyed my parents who are both "gone" now. Today would have been my father's 90th birthday (Mom would have been 91 this coming January 18th). I miss them terribly but I don't regret anything that I did for them out of love. I regret nothing and am thankful for so much. 

I lost a child to stillbirth. That is really a loss that no one can prepare a woman to endure. That lose included the loss of my dreams. The loss of being a mother to a daughter of my own. I was going to name her Mikaela Rose (my family name as her middle name) and she was expected to be beautiful. A mixed and conflicting feeling overcame me as I learned that the child whose heartbeat had stopped just a few hours before, was a boy. A beautiful boy, I later found out after I "gave birth" to this precious child. My dreams of being a mom of another boy or girl of my own evaporated into a fog of sorrow and "loss". 

I have lost a love...one that I thought was "the one". One whom I had loved most of my life. I had lost him to mental illness. He was unable to "find himself, heal from abuse and learn to dream again". Maybe, it was during this time, that I realized the value of "Singing a New Song" for so many people who did not suffer from mental illness. Unlike a person who suffers from mental illness, one who has suffered mind bending, heart wrenching and soul crushing mental illness and was beaten with verbal and emotional abuse has HOPE for healing, health and wholeness. The loss of that love reminds me of an "eternal loss" as I promised that "I would not return to him...again". I loved him deeply and I am so glad that I had some opportunity to share my love for him, with him. It was a love that mental illness stole from both of us. I don't know which is worse: having lost it or having it stolen from you. I still do not regret loving him and never will. 

Never, ever regret loving someone. Even if it is someone who did not deserve your love. You have LOVED and that is the most wonderful, the most valuable power on the face of the earth that dwells within the human heart. 

Journey to myself

"I'm NOT lost, 

why do I need to FIND MYSELF?"

For many years, even while not knowing that I am and was at the time, an introvert, I was always curious about my life. Curious about how I felt and what I thought. I was always asking myself, "DO I KNOW MYSELF?" This quote by Herman Heese "Each man's life represents a journey to Himself"...speaks to me...

what about you???

What has this world become??? A place where when we "think of ourselves", we are being "selfish" and "conceited" or "self-absorbed"? ...and then we travel quickly to the extreme of lacking "self-awareness, self-insight and focus and purpose" in our lives. We become our own WORST ENEMY...Life must be (and if it isn't it should BECOME) the MOST WONDERFUL ADVENTURE and even though the GREATEST JOURNEY that we can ever embark upon is the "journey to ourselves", there are ROADBLOCKS to face and tear down.

One roadblock is when The SELF is not a constant presence in our lives. Due to mental illness or abuse; a disconnect has occurred between a person's SELF and their identity of themselves in this world. We can focus on becoming someone and MISS the mark of BECOMING the "BEST ME" that we can be. We are not looking for our selves because we do not KNOW that we are lost...

I have often thought that we have been AFRAID to face ourselves, that maybe we were not interested in learning more about ourselves because the little bit that we did know, did not intrigue us or draw us into learning more about ourselves. Maybe we didn't want to know anymore because the people who we haphazardly have become, are not people we would even want to know. This is tragic.

And then we know that ABUSE has left us with pain and damage to our SELVES that has changed how we are able to look at life and our selves. It hurts. We feel actually pain in "body memories" and even "flashbacks". The journey to our selves become like a path riddled with weeds and poisonous spiders and creatures that can further hurt us. We don't want to be hurt, so we do not "go there".

Whatever the reason; it is little more than an excuse to not "Live WILDLY, FULLY and FREELY and OVER the TOP". Don't "give up" on yourself or neglect to invest in your own life. No matter what is done to us in this world, should NOT be allowed to stop us from "finding ourselves, healing from abuse and learning to dream again". Not now, not ever.

We are worth it!!! 

In process...

Where are YOU in the process of "Singing a New Song"? 

"Finding yourself, healing from abuse and learning to dream again". This is the process that I have found to naturally occurring in my life. It may be helpful to you as well to "plot your progress" along with me as we work "through the process" of "Singing a New Song".

We have often heard the saying "It is IN PROCESS" meaning that it, whatever "it" is, has started but is not yet completed. It is somewhere "in the process". I often ask on the Singing A New Song Facebook page and our blog at this site, the same question over and over again.

WHERE are YOU in the process of healing from abuse? 

Have you begun to find yourself?

 Are you struggling with healing from abuse? 

Are you thinking about learning to dream again? 

Do you feel a different life within you from the one you are living in "reality" and perhaps, it is a "new song" that is being written within your soul...can you hear it??? Hum along. Is it a jazzy little upbeat number, a bit on the happy side or is it a spicy, exciting adventurous or mysterious tune that intrigues and entices you to dance a bit? Maybe it is a beautifully soothing instrumental meditative melody that creates a blanket of comfort and a place of rest and relaxation. Perhaps...oh, we could go on and on...only YOU know what may know what "your song" sounds like...even if you are still "in the process" of "Singing a New Song". It is there. You will find it. It WILL be glorious!!!

My song has always been a "declaration of freedom" and a spunky and gutsy "free to be me" anthem sung full voice, with color, confidence and clarity. Some times, it has softened to a love song...a longing to "do what I love" and to fully embrace all the beauty around me and even an encouragement to create more beauty outwardly that I see within.

No matter WHERE you are in the process, it is MOST IMPORTANT that you become aware of your process of living. What area of life are you wanting to start spending more time and effort into developing and enjoying???

If you are are struggling with self-esteem, self-image or damaged core beliefs,
     You may be ready to "find yourself".
If you feel psychic and emotional pain, struggle with triggers and flashbacks of past abuse and it is obstructing your ability to enjoy life,
     You may be ready to focus on "healing from abuse".
If you LONG for a better life, have visions, identify misplaced hope or delusion and realize that you have lived in denial for too long,
     You may be ready to begin to "learn to dream again".

Where ever you are...don't judge yourself in how you got there. We have all gotten to the same place where you are right now by just being human. By trying to survive. By trying to love. By being hurt and hopeful and disappointed.

You are NOT alone. You are not a loser. You are WORTH all the effort that you can give and a good counselor could invest, into "find yourself, healing from abuse and learning to dream again".

If you don't know where to start on your healing journey, START by believing that YOU ARE WORTH IT...
because you are!!!

Making room for your dreams

~Learning to dream again ~ 

It is a wonderful part of our healing journey and the last but not least part of our "finding ourselves, healing from abuse and learning to dream again" that we focus upon here at Singing a New Song (blog and Facebook).

It is not the last step but more of a goal. Once we can "learn to dream again" we will have "found ourselves and healed from abuse".

How DO we make room for our dreams??? 

Let's walk through the process of "learning to dream again" as if we are redecorating a room in our home or perhaps, better yet, a room in our parent's home that has collected many items that are "stored" among the furniture and living space. We have already dreamed of how we would like that room to look, until we walk into it and are overwhelmed by the emotions and memories found there. Our memories are represented by grandma's antique chair, the framed picture of dad in military attire or even a picture of ourselves in our mother's arms. There was so much living that happened here...how could we ever think of cleaning it out? We need to remind ourselves of our dream and how much we really want to see that room transformed.

Sometimes we need to see past all the stuff that has taken up the space where our dreams will come into existence. We have to dare to imagine that the room can look differently and then we have to find the desire to want it to look differently then we can begin to make decisions for many of the things that are in the way. This is deep emotional work. Many people have great emotional attachment to things and to give away, sell, or donate any possession can be traumatic and this is especially true for survivors of abuse who may have strong memories attached to these things. It would help us to start with a blank palette, as a painter does, in creating a place in our lives for our dream.

When we realize that we are willing and ready to let go of the past, we can patiently and carefully move aside all the stuff that are in our dream's way. This can be an arduous task but making it a labor of love to open up this room for your dream will make it all worthwhile. Try to see it as if you are decorating a baby's room for that expected little bundle of joy that will be arriving. We need to expect our dreams...welcome them and this is the way of giving them entrance into our lives by making room for them. As we toil, we may relive every moment, every tear and every joy that we shared there. We may even need to say "goodbye" to some of the things that we owned but we can take solace that finding them another home, another space, maybe even storing them while we decide where they will best belong.

We may need to prepare that space by doing some deep cleaning...soul searching. self-acceptance and even time of solitude throughout the process. Allowing ourselves to converse with our hearts and accept our dreams as reality is deep dream foundation work. We may need to do some serious deep cleaning to make room for our dreams. Like laying new carpet, we need to build our dreams upon a solid foundation. They deserve to have a fresh start.

Like welcoming a friend into your home for dinner, we are excited, prepared and happy to see them and looking forward to our time together. And when your dream is ready to "move it", we will have peace knowing that we have found other safe homes for our memories and our dream will move right in.

While your dreams are waiting for a place in our lives, let's open the windows and allow the sunshine to welcome them into their new home. Start seeing the room, "as it will be" once your dream moves in. Imagine the exhilarating freshness of the breeze through the open windows, the mirror on the wall reflecting the light upon a floral centerpiece holding all of your favorite blossoms, the crackling fire in the hearth, the softness of the carpet beneath your feet and the sound of a "new song" being played and you find yourself humming along.

Learning to dream again, isn't about fantasizing or imagining a life that is impossible. It is really about being mindful and aware of what your heart already feels, what it already knows, what it already sees. All you have to do is be open to hearing what your heart is saying to you. When you can "set aside all the stuff" that is taking your dream's space in your life, and imagine your dream THERE and that is when you will be learning to dream again...and I am sure that your dreams WILL come true!!!