More thinking about neurotransmitters.  I'm feeling really paranoid that if someone finds out I'm having this pattern of thought they're gonna have me hauled away in a straight jacket. 

I was reading my NVC book and I noticed two phrases that Rosenberg wrote:

"I feel like I'm married to a wall!"
and
"It's like talking to a bunch of machines!"

both on page: 39. 

Suddenly I could see what my brain was doing.  I got so excited that I wanted to draw it or describe it or write it out somehow. 

All sorts of images came into my mind, but I could not stop them from changing.  They just wouldn't hold still so I could sketch them.  More and more perspectives, and higher and higher perspectives kept coming.  And the whole process was so important that I didn't want to waste any of it by settling on one still image.  I needed to record it while moving somehow.  But, alas.  I have no such equipment which could record what I was imagining at the speed I was imagining it. 

Does anyone?

So, I simply marveled.  Then it changed into something I could describe in words.  And this is what I wrote down:

"'I feel like: ___________________________'  This is a container for meaning.  We exchange these with one another using our language brain and our mirror-neurons.  If you hand the meaning to me in these words, my mirror neurons construct the picture that was described and fire, exciting the appropriate chemical releases.  Almost instantly the meaning becomes shared & is available should the listener want to integrate that into their perspective. 
'He who has ears to hear, let him hear.'"


I decoded a parable. 

It emerged from the writing and snuck up on me.  I didn't see it coming!  I swear!

I've often ogled the thought of writing Theology in my old age until I just keeled over.  Literally.  Falling over on a keyboard from a massive stroke.  I love it so.  But I doubt I'll ever be that immobile.  I'm just too active.  Anyhoo, then it occurred to me that I was writing about neurotransmitters again.  And just then, my mind took a picture of itself, much like The French Woman in "I Heart Huccabees" did.  [Click.]

"Wow." I said, feeling totally busted! "That's amazing."

And here we are. 

I wonder if this crazy crap will be decypherable when I'm no longer debatable. 

Why!!??!!

Why?  Why?  Why does this happen?  Why am I so freakin' curious about it?  Who cares?  Why does it fascinate me so?  It's like a frenzy of objectification, flattening everything out.  "Interior, Interior, let me in!" "Not by the hair on my chinny-chin-chin!"  SMACK!!  Up against the right-hand wall!  Everything is instantly "it"ified.  Only I Am not... for now...

I was actually picturing making this in film or a live-theater version.  Hiring actors and actresses to lip-sync to recordings of young girls trying to communicate in squeaky,  crying voices to others about: getting dumped by her boyfriend or raped by her father or gang-banged; and men about: getting humiliated by a girl in high school or raped by his father or finding out the girl he loved killed herself.  Stammering...  until they each finally lunge out in unison, "It's LIKE S/HE RIPPED MY HEART OUT THROUGH MY MOUTH AND PUT IT THROUGH A MEAT GRINDER AND THEN SHOVED IT BACK DOWN MY THROAT AGAIN!"  And all the parts in capitals are when they slow the recording down and their voices deepen and the lights go out all around them until only they are each lit and speaking in slow-motion. 

And when they finish, their images are frozen and I come voice over like Rod Serling and read all that shit I just wrote while their images fade to black.  And as I'm finishing, images of Jesus flash in fragments of seconds from various films about Him.  He is about to speak a parable in each fragment.  Finally, one settles in and the whole parable is played.  "The Kingdom of Heaven is like..."  Then the film closes to black and an audio speaks in the darkness from yet another film, "He who has ears to hear, let him hear." and the last word echoes to fadeout for at least 30 seconds. 

And the house lights come up. 

We could even do a sort of ska version where the last voice to be heard is just like the voice in the song, "One Step Beyond!" and then the saxophones begin: dah-nah-naaaaah.  Dah-nu-nu-nu-uh-nu-uh. ... 

I'm a freak. 

So, I'm thinking that would cover the upper left, to the upper right, to the lower ... something.  It creates a we-space.  But I don't know if thats a right or left thing.  I guess by wrighting it down in here, it becomes a lower right.  Heh-heh.  Lower righting. 

Whoa, man.  I'm out there. 

Don't see this film.  Unless you've got a screw loose.  Then it's okay. 

Pain is good for art. 

Dopamine is the neurotransmitter for predict and control behavior.  I suspect it may be the hardest pattern to transcend.  It has carried the evolutionary impulse all this way, but cannot carry it all the way.  It is incredibly powerful and effective for driving this enormous engine of development.  Amazing.  But it has brought us to this dead end and the bitch is that it can predict what is beyond, but cannot attain it.  So many people die throwing themselves against this brick wall...  trying to either attain control or strangle the ability to predict.  Or maybe find that happy place where control finally quenches the urge to predict. 

Fat chance.  It just doesn't work that way. 

It's so intoxicating.  It wouldn't work so well if it weren't.  The reward for attaining control is beyond what most can contain or resist.  It rewards all of our brains at once - from the lowest to the highest.  If only our lowest didn't have to go along for this ride.  If only we could have dropped them off a few thousand years ago.  But no. 

It occurred to me after watching this film that it is absolutely a miracle that we've been able to drag that stuff this far up the evolutionary ladder.  I'm amazed we're still alive as a species.  God, is it worth it? 

I went to see it last night with my daughter and one of her friends.  It hit a little close to home. 

I'm taking risks in my work.  Big risks.  It scared my former boss so much that he couldn't speak to me about it without losing his composure.  I guess I'm what you call a "Loose Canon".  It's the PTSD pattern of not really ever being able to leave the field of battle.  My pain, fear and anger are such that even though I can Witness them, I cannot stop them from arising.  Yet.  They arise and dissipate.  But when it arises, it is a hurricane.  I still have to ride it out.  If I can learn to steer that hurricane over to something that needs to be decimated, then that may be the least non-skillful thing I can do right now.  Esp. when it has reached Level 5. 

If I could deal with the education system, I'd make a really great lawyer.  I'd be rich.  But I can't, so I won't.  And I'm not.  It's hard to find something at this economic level that it's okay for me to destroy.  I feel sorry for my kids and anyone who would want to be my lover right now.  LOL  I have this thin veneer of beauty and delicacy that barely covers a Monster.  And that Monster is protecting a vulnerable child.  Not destroying myself or someone/something else is full-time work.  And it's hard work.  And ever since my boss resigned, it's been my work, instead of his.  THANK GOD!! 

I was marvelling this afternoon at how wonderful recovery and developmental growth is.  God, it's beautiful!  I have been able to transcend to a higher level of gentlness and prudence precisely because I have integrated my impulse to destroy.  I have destroyed things.  I have destroyed some things which needed to be destroyed and were surrounded by other things which needed to survive.  And I have destroyed some things which can be repaired.  All in all, I have managed to prevent alot of colateral and permanent damage.  That's hard work.  And it's alot better than the way it used to be.  I used to have zero control over the destruction.  Of course, I ended up with the lion's share of the consequences of that.  I'm the one I hurt the most.  But that's how it goes when you have no control. 

I love it that now the one who contends with me about my destructiveness is me and no one else.  I may have to enter into negotiations with others, but I have achieved my victory, and can now surrender uncoerced.  That is a really beautiful responsibility.  And I don't know how else it can be accomplished for someone as damaged as I have been, without first utterly defeating my opponent - with my eyes open.  Nothing will expose the nerve endings of my conscience to the fact that I have a deep and infinite obligation to only use my powers for good than to finally stand alone at the top of the mountain and roar. 

I have to be so careful.  People's lives and livelihoods are in my hand.  I have to be careful.  And if someone needs to be punished by an unjust and stupid law that is directly contributing to the destruction and possible deaths of people with mental illness, then I will have to step up.  And even if this impulse of mine wants to serve only the Good, True and Beautiful, I will have to accept that those who only know how to abide by laws will want to consider me Evil, Dishonest and Corrupted. 

I feel so alone.  And yet I cannot slow this whirlwind...

...yet

"A generous friend
gives life for a friend
lets rise above this
animalistic behavior
and be kind to one another"

~Rumi

LOL

That's like the Rumi quote of the week - or whathaveyou. 

Lets rise above.  Shall we?  Over 700 years ago, that was probably pretty revolutionary.  I can see them now with blank looks on their faces,

"What?  Rise above the willingness to die for a friend?  But that is the highest call!  What could we possibly give more than that?  And how is being kind more than being willing to die?"

The failure to identify and articulate why being kind is "higher" than being willing to die is the main reason we are in the mess we're in today economically, politically, religiously and culturally.  And it's gonna take a while to untangle this mess.  Most people just don't get it. 

And it's not because they're not "willing" to get it.  Willingness is one of the strengths of people who are "willing to die".  Before the arival of this level of development was a true lack of willingness to care much for others.  So, willingness is not the problem.  The reason we're not going to "rise above" that brutal mindset is because our lives are still being asked of us.  Until our lives are no longer asked of us, we're not going to let go of this level. 

As the Jewish scriptures say, "The life is in the blood."  But it's also in our time and space and energy.  Every living resource that is limited is a container of our life.  If I give it to you, it is gone.  I'll get more time and energy, but that is for tomorrow.  Yesterday's is gone.  And if I have spent it unwisely or you have lied to me or exploited me in order to get it, I have given my most precious resource in exchange for something that will not serve me or what I am trying to serve.  And if I am willing to give my life to serve something beautiful and true and good, but you take it from me without allowing me to serve those things, you are still demanding my life.  No paycheck is enough to compensate me for that.  No number of years of good to fair physical health will make the loss of my life any less real. 

So, everyone who thinks we need to "rise above" should take a moment and take a little inventory of how much of their lives are actually still required of them, and what unkindnesses they've had to perform in order to meet that demand.  No time to stop and help someone at the side of the road because you're already late to work.  Being snippy to the bank teller because she's new and slow and you're on your lunch hour which is now almost over and you still haven't eaten.  Being indiferent to the desperate pleadings of a family member, friend or beggar because you've struck a deal with the housing authority who says you can't have guests or pets. 

I know of people who are voluntarily homeless because they won't let anyone make those kinds of demands of them.  They won't relinquish their autonomy to give to whom they want, when and for what they want.  I admire those people so much.  I wish I was strong enough to do that.  ...and strong enough to bear the derision of people who ass-u-me they are merely sponging off of society...

Our lives will never stop being asked of us.  Therefore it is not appropriate to ask us to "rise above" giving it.  The only way to reach something greater is to transcend and include that "animalistic behavior" and offer our lives with as much autonomy and in service to as much kindness as possible.

[since when are we not allowed more than 10 tags? That's really annoying.]

I'm in my 40's and I still haven't found someone who can create and sustain a container for my pain.  Unless he charges 100/hour. 

I seriously can understand why some married men see prostitutes.  Out of love for their wives, they don't try to get them to meet their infancy needs.  They remain the "strong provider" for their women and get those needs met somewhere else.  And they don't start an affair for fear of falling in love and then leaving the woman they love.  They see someone who has set their own infancy needs aside and won't try to get him to meet their needs...  for 100/hour or so.  A gigolo is so tempting right now... 

I'm so lonely. 

The door to the room where I keep my Vulnerable Child was opened tonight, and he actually did allow it to stay open for a few minutes while he talked to her and admitted that he is selfish.  And he apologized.  Then he fell asleep.  And she is left awake and starving.  She is starving to death. 

This graphic image has stuck with me over the years after reading Corrie Ten Boom's book, "The Hiding Place".  That of how the Nazis would experiment on people such as seeing how long it would take for a humanoid to die of hunger or thirst.  I say, "humanoid" because, of course, they didn't really believe those people were fully human.  Or they believed in a humanity that was a genetic code that was vulnerable to corruption, and valued junk code as mere practice material.  Whatever.  But the image Corrie described of someone dying of thirst has stayed with me.  It is more gruesome than one might imagine.  I always used to picture someone simply too weak to move, and calmly breathing their last.  I think real death is rarely like that. 

Ironically, this weeks movie of obsession has been "Harold and Maude".  My daughter brought it for us to watch together.  What a gift.  We are both obsessed with Bud Cort.  Poor guy.  After googling him and reading about him for hours the other night, I realized that he is still living in this fated eliptical orbit around Harold.  To be Harold or not to be Harold, that is the dilemma.  He can be neither.  And, so, can be nothing else.  He's been in films since, but I never notice it.  In fact, he sometimes plays roles and is not credited - important roles such as the mysterious Dr. Sirius Leary in the movie "23". 

Anyway, for the first time, I noted the irony of Cat Stevens' song "Trouble" at the end and how the line, "I'm beat and torn...  shattered and tossed and worn...too shocking to see.  Too shocking to see."  And how, even though the editors may have left quality footage of him after Maude's death, that was too shocking to see, on the cutting room floor, I'm sure it was there.  After trying so hard to shock his Mother with his elaborate displays of death and dying, and failing, he had finally come back around to a true suffering that really could not be looked straight at.  To do so would induce real madness that directly reflected the rather logical desperation he felt to see some kind of love coming from his Mother. 

Madness. 

The things we do to stay alive when our awareness has looked upon real suffering and death.  I can't bear to look at her.  She is so lonely.  Imagine a small child of 2 to 4 years old, not yet able to speak words about her feelings, and recoiling from any experience where she may have to have needs and feelings because she knows that as soon as she does her Mother will recoil from her like a hand from a hot potato.  Just trying not to exist or be a person because its all just too painful to see her Mother not like it.  Imagine what it is like for her, when she tries to be a "Good Girl" but still her Mother withdraws.  Imagine the frantic, confusing, desperation at trying to figure out what to do to make her Mother love her, without being needy or emotional in the process.  Imagine finally being developed enough to disassociate and what a relief that is!  Imagine not being developed enough to do that yet... 

Oh, my God.  I'm so lonely.  It burns.  My tongue is swollen in my mouth and everything burns.  I drink my own tears because it shows that someone gives a damn and I consume them like a forest fire consumes small drops of water.  I'll drink the sweat off another's body trying to relieve the burning.  I suck on one kiss like it's going to quench it all.  My flesh is shrinking inside the bag of my skin and becoming toxic with high concentrations of rage and fear.  I moan and writhe in the impossible madness, and still the burning...

Is there no one?  Is there nothing?  Is this how it ends? 

But it hasn't ended.  It goes on and on. 

So, I mezmerize her with distractions and lay her down and put her back in that room and close the door.  I write about her like she's someone else.  And I try and get some sleep.

Maybe you'll guess.

I'm surfing the weird science of my mind.  I haven't done this in 20 years. 

I'm playing some relatively new Alice Cooper for my son.  Alice is amazing.  Do you realize he is 60 years old?  You know what that means, don't you?  60 years old is a Rock Star.  Not the other way around.  Alice Cooper has permanently disconnected the identity of "Rock Star" from youth.  Imagine 50 years from now when our grand children will associate Rock Stars with the geriatric crowd, like we associate Jackie Gleason and the Honeymooners with them now.  Have you ever felt an association disconnect like that before?  I just realized that I can hear so much better like this.  My brain is processing very differently.  This is what I was thinking about while I was trying to make dinner.  I managed to cook chicken and baked potatoes and create two salads with different kinds of dressing and serve up without causing something scary to happen.  That was amazing.  Anyhow, as I was saying...   I was cooking dinner and the surfing came to the topic of if it was the neurotransmitters or the location in the brain that created these effects.  The effect of the moment back then was paranoia.  Oh, Marilyn Manson now.  The Beautiful People.  God, I love this lyric.  Then I realized that every time I get like this, I land on the topic of neurotransmitters.  And I revisited the question of why that is.  Why is that?  Because here I am again. 

So what is the debatable topic?  Because what I'm doing right now is totally legal and reallyfreakingharmless.  I'm thinking fairly randomly.  When don't we do that? 

And when I thought of whether it was the neurotransmitters or the location I also thought of something else which caused me to think about thinking.  My state shifted.  Randomly. 

A little while ago, I also realized that I could hear in a different way.  I am listening to Tears For Fears now and clearly hearing the instruments or the voices more separately than I usually do.  I could pick out way more lyrics without having to read along.  Even from the other room.  So it's not about which position I have the speakers in.  Oh, dear.  Donnie Darko Soundtrack.  How wonderful is this? I'm enjoying music.  How debatable is that?  Opeth may be debatable, but not enjoying music.  No.  Actually, I love Opeth.  So does my son. 

Oh, here's another fun rabbit hole.  My son played a song for me tonight.  It's by Immortal Technique.  You can hear him on MySpace.  Shit!  Did I just write that?  Oh, I'm so busted!  LOL  Yeah.  Okay.  We all do that, right?  We all check out peoples' MySpace Pages too.  Right?!  Anyway, this guy is sick.  As in OMG-Great.  He get's irritated if you call it rap, tho.  So just don't.  He's the Artist-Usually-Mistaken-As-Rap.  That's about as close as I'll dare get.  Amazing.  It reminded me of a friend of mine I met on a trip some months back.  Someone magical.  I may have written about him.  He performed some of his work for me while we were on that trip.  He's one of the most gracefully traumatized individuals I've ever met.  I still day-dream about him.  You just don't see more beautiful people on the world.  So, now it's that song, "Closure".  OMG  Even while I'm crunching on a carrot, I can hear more details.  Do you know that one of our Participants picked out several months ago that Dick Dale's "Misirlou" is Turkish folk dance music?  I knew that.  I didn't think very few people knew that!  It freaked me out!  Why the hell would that freak me out when I wasn't even like this?  Or is it that I'm projecting my current state on myself in the past.  Am I really freaked out now, but wasn't then?

And here I am again.

How debatable is this?

I got a hug yesterday.  His lips were on my neck.  It was from one of our Participants.  It confirmed a connection that I had sensed on another level.  He is one of the few men who understand how to connect with a woman.  Some people think homeless people are stupid.  Most have no clue.  These people are amazing.  And we may have a better chance if all the wealthy and housed people were to strangely die off and the human cock-roaches of the earth lived on to build up the next speices.  You think I'm kidding.  They understand community and how to survive in the urban jungle as sophisticated animals.  But, they require prey.  So, if their food source died, they probably wouldn't make it either.  I don't know.  It's a toss-up.  So, this man.  He's in his 60's or 70's.  Has a weakness for...  oh, wait.  That's too big a hint.  Nevermind.  He's amazing too.  There's so much I want to say, but won't.  The bubble might pop.  Bubbles need tension.  But not too much.  Bubbles are good. 

Freakin' Dick Dale, man.  Shit!  I wonder if he tied weights to his fingers like metal players do now. 

I'm sure I could go on and on.  Forever.  But the example is set. 

Awareness of awareness.  I was acutally discussing it with the b/f last night.  And he understood what I was talking about.  Oh!  I remember the amazingest thing I thought of while cooking dinner!  What if the whole expanded awareness thing was simply a metta-version of whatever we've been doing up to this point?  I think I remember that in the Cosmic String theory.  This would be what I'd imagine infinite spirals inward to entail.  Folded is how they described it, but I don't know if that really does it justice.  Difficult.  Would that be the Actual 5th Dimension?  Or are there more? 

Oh, dear.  Yes, when this isn't under control, it's silly.  Fun, and silly.  Lord, knows that debatable!  I seriously wonder what creates this.  How does it work?  Why do we sometimes get paranoid?  How is it that everything can be played with?  Everything.  The consciousness as "play" and the Universe as "toy".  I've heard so many ways to describe it.  One of the most frustrating ones is emptiness vs. form.  I just can't get it straight.  It's so unnatural.  Ripples vs. Water.  Water vs. Reflection. 

My boss resigned this week.  And we're not getting anymore funding next fiscal.  I am going to give it a valiant fight to raise up a totally new animal in place of what I've been doing over the last year and a half.  If I lose it, I lose it.  Or should I have said that I'm going to play with a totally new toy after this one finally breaks.  Like a skate deck after too many rail rides.  If I fall and break my collar-bone, I fall and break my collar-bone.  Oh, wait.  That could hurt. 

Gee, I see why this could be a bit debatable.  But then, when don't we minimize damage that we do when we risk? 

I thought long and hard tonight about whether or not to record this.  It's anonymous enough to keep me safe.  And ambiguous enough to keep others safe.  If I should put myself out there, this will be over before I make enemies desperate enough to use this.  That's how I got onto paranoia. 

And the rest is history. 

Here's a quote:

"...a rich and fruitful topic for further elaborations - the reconceptualization of psychopathology within an AQAL matrix of indigenous perspectives. "

Excerpt C: The Ways We Are In This Together: Intersubjectivity and Interobjectivity in the Holonic Kosmos

Uh, yeah.  So let's get on!

Only last week did I find out what Ken's idea is about BPD.  Where the hell have I been?  As it turns out, he believes in a kind of lack of boundary between the self and not-self.  An actual or partial lack of unconscious.  This is a tidy predicament.  All perspectives, all the time, no buffer.  Get gestated, get born, GO! 

Zero protection from the world of contentious perspectives starting before one is even verbal. 

The result is a rotating cycle of repress and project and split and break.  Like torturing someone to death, resuscitating them and then doing it sommore.  Yeah.  That sums it up. 

So, I'm kinda manic right now.  I don't really know why.  But I'm going with it.  I tend to want to make grand decisions when I feel like this, but I'm starting to wake up to that not being a good thing.  So, I think I can contain that impulse.  But in place of decisions, I think I'll just make a grand fantasy instead. 

I want to be one of the first Clients to develop Integral Peer-support and Recovery Structures.  I think I can do that.  LOL  Okay, I'll stop short of saying I will do that.  But only just!   I envision a web of Nut-house Salons around the country, linked via the Internet.  I know I'm not the only Client interested in Integral!!  LOL  Oh, the irony dripping off that sentence!  I suspect many integralers are some of the most insidiously insane people on the planet.  Like many artists.  We are pointedly driven and conspicuously pruned to grow into a certain shape and crevice.  Why the hell would people want to develop this way?  It hurts!!  Jesus!  But hurts more, bothers less.  Eventually.

I was commenting on a blog the other day and started thinking about whether Borderline is a sort of evolutionary mutation.  Like Asperger's is often thought of.  What if human beings begin to simply not develop an unconscious?  Like a tail.  What if we lose it because our balance is contained by some other unforeseen adaptation?  Like a Manx cat hops with it's hind legs almost bunny-like to maintain the sense of balance.  What if that were to start happening on a large scale so that people would HAVE TO learn to parent better and be more responsible for the protection and care of young. 

In the past, evolution favored mutating away from vulnerability.  The law of the jungle required that.  But we have a different law now.  What does this new law require?  What if vulnerability went with increased sensitivity and awareness because the new law required that?  We're gonna get mashed up in the machine for a while until...   what?  Critical mass?  Like Ghandi's law?  Enough bodies pile up and finally the world's attention is drawn to the Brutality rather than the Glory and Order. 

Isn't this exactly what Hitler wanted to regress back away from?  The tolerance of vulnerability?  He favored the Law of the Jungle so as to strengthen the human race again because our progress was being slowed down by the weak.  Why else would that be a bad thing unless the weak had some hidden gift to give - besides the opportunity for the rest of us to be slowed down by them?

How's that for a reconceptualization?

Midnight, full-moon, pre-menstrual thoughts.

Much madness is divinest sense to a discerning eye;
Much sense the starkest madness.
'Tis the majority in this as all, prevails assent, and you are sane;
Demur, -- you're straightway dangerous, and handled with a chain.

~Emily Dickinson

Oh, it's bad.

I'm handling it with Valium right now.  That's messed up.  I have completely failed at expansion and have totally contracted down to the death impulse.  The nervous system is a powerful thing; so important when we're trying to survive a deadly predator.  It's so hard now to interpret this any other way than a deadly threat.  Even if no one else sees it that way, they don't have the programming that I have or cannot interface with mine enough to understand.

After finding no one willing to help assess him for Asperger Syndrome and getting squeezed tighter and tighter between the world's demands that he be normal and economically viable, the b/f has descended into his own insanity, drug use and lying again.  The tragedy is completely intolerable....  wait.  No.  What words would work here?

Many things have been said about the English Language.  But one thing is for sure, it's not adequate to communicate the numinous.

And what is the numinous?  Is it something above us and unreachable?  Or is it so deep below language that it's expression cannot be articulated in words but only in deeds?  What could I do that would express what this tragedy really is?  What besides suicide?  That is the definitive expression, but such a cliche.  Is there anything more creative?  Novel?

This is Nine Inch Nails territory.


This world rejects me
This world threw me away
This world never gave me a chance
This world gonna have to pay

Well I don't believe in your institutions
I did what you wanted me to
And like the cancer in your system
I've got a little surprise for you

Something inside of me
Has opened up its eyes
Why did you put it there?
Did you not realise?
This thing inside of me
It screams the loudest sound
Sometimes I think I could

Burn

I look down at where you're standing
Flock of sheep all on display
With all your lies piled up around you
I can take it all away

Something inside of me
Has opened up its eyes
Why did you put it there?
Did you not realise?
This thing inside of me
It screams the loudest sound
Sometimes I think I could

I'm gonna burn this whole world down

I never was a part of you

I am your savior
I am corruption
I am the angel
Of your destruction
I am perversion
Secret desire
I am your future
Swallowed up in fire

I rented the movie "The Cell" last week because over the last year, I have kept thinking about certain bits.  Over and over.  Finally, I just rented the freakin' thing.  I should buy it.  There is a hollywood rumor that the amazing and touched Vincent D'nofrio completely lost his marbles while researching for that film.

need you
dream you
find you
taste you
fuck you
use you
scar you
break you
lose me
hate me
smash me
erase me

I don't know if it's a hardware issue or a software issue, but something happened in our nervous system to separate the animal impulses to fuck and kill from the human impulses to love and nurture.  Depending on our developmental levels, some of us can tear down the wall and still survive the contradictions, objectification and subjectification together.

you let me violate you, you let me desecrate you
you let me penetrate you, you let me complicate you
help me I broke apart my insides, help me I’ve got no soul to sell
help me the only thing that works for me, help me get away from myself
I want to fuck you like an animal
I want to feel you from the inside
I want to fuck you like an animal
my whole existence is flawed
you get me closer to god

you can have my isolation, you can have the hate that it brings
you can have my absence of faith, you can have my everything
help me tear down my reason, help me its' your sex I can smell
help me you make me perfect, help me become somebody else
I want to fuck you like an animal
I want to feel you from the inside
I want to fuck you like an animal
my whole existence is flawed
you get me closer to god

through every forest, above the trees
within my stomach, scraped off my knees
I drink the honey inside your hive
you are the reason I stay alive

But the transition was not one of gentle evolution.  I was looking at some artwork last night from the Toscano site and the Pre-raphaelite stuff really documents the transition.  The difference between The Accolade by Leighton and The Ledgend of Sir Percival by Cowper is the difference between our impulse to merely deny the fuck and the impulse to grow into honor.  Same woman, same man, two totally different impulses.  Killing the Dragon is a pretty consistent image too.

she spread herself wide open to let the insects in
she leaves a trail of honey to show me where she's been
she has the blood of reptile just underneath her skin
seeds from a thousand others drip down from within

oh my beautiful liar
oh my precious whore
my disease my infection
I am so impure

devils speak of the ways in which she'll manifest
angels bleed from the tainted touch of my caress
need to contaminate to alleviate this loneliness
I now know the depths I reach are limitless

oh my beautiful liar
oh my precious whore
my disease my infection
I am so impure

Reznor really encapsulates the male side.  No doubt there are women out there who really articulate the female side.  I find it nearly impossible to listen to them.  It's nauseating.  But that's what it is to be a woman.  In order to survive we identify with the man.  Identifying with ourselves = starvation.  Our hunger is to disappear.  Ironic how it's the same for Reznor.

His poetry soothes me.

I guess the numbness and indifference is part of what it is to be pre-conscious.  It's comforting because it aleviates the sense of contradiction and ambivalence.  And in that mindset, sex and death are all we can feel.  Okay.  So, rather than descend into that nihilistic situation - because we really can't go home again - we take Valium.  It's an amnesiac.  Did you know that?

Here's more wonderful reptilian bliss from Opeth:

Heal myself-a feather on my heart
Look inside-there never was a start
Peel myself-dispose of severed skin
All subsides-around me and within

There's nothing painful in this
There's no upheaval
Redemption for my pathos
All sins undone

Awaiting word on what's to come
In helpless prayers a hope lives on
As I've come clean I've forgotten what I promised
In the rays of the sun I am longing for the darkness





Descend and be hunted down and restrained.
Ascend and go mad.
Integrate or die.
Open.
Open.
Open.
...




In order to act, you must be somewhat insane.
A reasonably sensible man is satisfied with thinking.

~George Clemenceau



We have a new Participant at work right now who probably has what most would call schizophrenia.  He is more sane than I am at the moment...

Sunday afternoon, I was helping my b/f get some stuff out of Storage and I hit my head on the roll-up door.  It was a pretty hard "BANG!"  Since then I have been experiencing emotional fluctuations that can only be attributed to PTSD flashbacks.  Out of nowhere, I will suddenly experience an overwhelming feeling/belief that no one cares and no one will take care of me if I go down.  These were the experiences I had when I had been hit in the head from behind when I was a small child.  In the past I have projected this out onto the Universe without question. 

Now I'm questioning it. 

And while the Universe contains everything from good to evil intention, it may not be true that the impression I'm getting is the actual case in the moment I'm getting it.  Right now, I'm extremely triggered about something that my b/f said and did this morning, but he too feels poisoned and immediately brought his conscious awareness to it and reported it like the Good Sport that he is.  I feel compelled to get angry at him.  Really pushed.  It seems as though it is he who doesn't care and won't take care of me if I go down.  But I actually know better.  He proved to me the night before last that he wants to learn to take care of me if I'm hurting. 

Since getting hit, I have been reading about the neurotransmitters and brain functions involved in all this, and trying to put together a comprehensive picture of what is going on.  But it's difficult.  It is difficult for me to learn right now while I'm in"toxic"ated. 

I have found out a few interesting things: animals learn "better" when they're scared.  That doesn't necessarily translate to humans because they're really only learning animal things such as, where the threat is, what options they have for protecting themselves, and that's about it.  They're not learning about Hierarchy Structures for Non-Profits or how to craft a Policy statement that doesn't put people on the defensive.  Right now, I simply cannot concentrate on the work I'm supposed to get done.  I am only alerted to my cell-phone making a noise that tells me a certain threat to my sanity has left a message and the impulse to flush the phone down the toilet. 

I don't know how to solve this problem. 

I also found out that sugars and stress are deeply connected, but I can't quite grasp how.  I think it works like this: an event triggers the release of epinephrine (adrenaline), which triggers the release of norepinephrine, which triggers the cells in the body to wring all their sugars out into the bloodstream.  This superabundance of sugar is used up by the fight or flight actions such as thinking and actions.  The brain is the biggest consumer of sugars in the body.  Soon, the body achieves low-blood sugar after using all this supply up, and there has to be a resupply or the brain ceases to function in it's higher thinking portions.  Yes, that's right.  The Higher Thinking is dependent upon the Lower Brain Functions in order to solve problems.  So, the idea of leaving the Lizard Brain behind in preference for the Avatar Brain has gone right out the window. 

Histamine is also deeply involved somehow.  I take anti-histamines every day, so I know I'm somehow doing a number on myself with that.  But I also take a decongestant which is related to dopamine and this twists it around even more.  I am Thyroid dependent - I have to take Thyroid hormone every day to replace what my body fails to manufacture.  I have been trying to eat better and so the decrease in sugars may have left me in withdrawals. 

Yesterday, at a Staff Meeting, I let everyone know what happened and what's going on with me.  One of my comrades said that trauma was a hell of a difficult way to develop "The Observer".  I hadn't realized this.  I thought this was how it was done.  I can't imagine doing it any other way.  Without something intense to move inside and outside of, how would you even sense the movement?  Hm...

And for those with PTSD, there seems to be a low level of Cortisol to counteract the Norepinephrine, which also contributes to the fast sugar burnout, which contributes to a lower ability to think which contributes to the feeling of stress, which keeps the whole thing in a constant state of agitation. 

I think I have that somewhat right.  Please forgive me if I've missed some steps or got the names wrong.  It's all very confusing when all I've found to learn about this stuff is separate wikipedia articles.  In order to learn from "real" science journals I have to be either educated or rich or they won't let me read them. 

So, why does this matter to me? 

I've seen "What the Bleep..." and it was only helpful to me insofar as it encouraged me to learn for myself.  It is not helpful if all I get out of it is I try and focus my intention and my life will get better.  There are too many ways to interpret that.  Watching the brain chemicals move around are pretty self-explanatory - and except for the absurd argument of which came first; the chemical or the emotion - it's pretty easy to see what it all means. 

It means that unless I find a way to be Bigger than my neurotransmitters, they will engulf me and life will suck and then I'll die.  Misery has a beauty to it.  No doubt.  And thank GOD!  If it didn't, those who are stuck in it would not survive it.  But there are other beauties. 

I've learned this last weekend that for those with BPD, it seems that our impulses are Holy and Sacred.  Rejecting them or denouncing them or denying them in any way is Blasphemous.  It's not that they must be obeyed, but that their existence signals something that should not be missed.  It's like basic pain.  If we could not feel pain, we would bleed to death or die of infections before we ever had the chance to reproduce.  Emotional Leprosy is not really an option, no matter how bad it hurts. 

Love me.
Love my neurotransmitters.

I realize this is going to put me on the search list.  So be it.  I've perused some of the other posts on NVC and they're great.  I can't compete with those who are being informative.  But no one else can offer my particular damaged pov.  What does NVC look like to people who can't make it work?  What do people who can't make it work look like from the pov of those who can? 

I'm taking a class in NVC.  It's really important to me.  But it's reinforcing an old pattern for me: that I'm not crazy and the world is messed up.  Knowing that I'm not crazy for wanting and needing this to be real, makes me crazy.  This is really a mindfuck for me:

"We all pay dearly when people respond to our values and needs, not out of a desire to give from the heart, but out of fear, guilt or shame.  Sooner or later, we will experience the consequences of diminished goodwill on the part of those who comply with our values out of a sense of either external or internal coercion.  They, too, pay emotionally, for they are likely to feel resentment and decreased self-esteem when they respond to us out of fear, guilt or shame.  Furthermore, each time others associate us in their minds with any of those feelings, we decrease the likelihood of their responding compassionately to our needs and values in the future."

I am labeled violent (not to mention crazy!) for being angry that I have to keep paying for the violence of others.  If I were to repress my anger, then I'm still paying the price for their violence. 

Transcending is a Bitch. 

There is literally no higher place to go.  The higher you make the ideals, the more distance you put between the ideal and the reality and the more extreme the hypocrisy when the ideal is frustrated.  The tension is giving humanity a communal heart attack.