Tag: inspirational

Waging War With Emotions

Published on by Kimberly Novak10 Comments

picking-yourself-upWhat happens when you are at war with your feelings, emotions and inner self?  Someone has to win and lately I feel like I am not in the driver’s seat when it comes to my feelings.   As a survivor of a huge loss, I know there will be periods of up and down and even some all around days, but this time I am growing angry because I have found myself in one of those moments.

I know I can’t speed my healing along, however there are times when I really don’t want to be feeling the way I am, this week has been one of those times.  Tomorrow marks an anniversary of a big step that my ex took in his new relationship and it is eating away at me from the inside out.  I have blogged about this topic before in a post I did two years ago on the actual day. ( Sometimes Broken Can Be Beautiful)  I talked about how I had survived a day that I thought was going to be extremely painful but circumstances of MY day led me in a different direction.  So why now?  Why this week a couple of years later am I feeling like it just happened?

I’ve been trying to analyze the circumstance to see why it is so upsetting to me, other than the obvious of course.  I haven’t been much help to myself in thinking about it so I’m trying to rationalize it but I’m not having luck there either.  If I look at the senses that contribute to memory I come up empty.   I do not have a visual memory nor did I actually hear what was going on in the moment; it’s not like I could touch or smell anything from that day either.  I’m still left with the big WHY?

How is this memory, that is not mine in the first place, able to be so haunting?  I have tried and tried to change my focus this week and it all comes back to that impending date.  If it was possible to erase a day from the calendar, out of all the painful days I have had I have to admit I would erase that anniversary.

Here is my logical explanation, however logical it may or may not be.  I spent 20 years married to my childhood sweetheart, my only true love, and on that one day, in possibly a brief hour, my heart was broken.  Yes it was damaged during the divorce and everything that led up to it and even in the days following, but this one event was the icing on the cake so to speak.

So now I am at this point where I can see why I am reacting this way, how do I stop it?  I’m sure someday this month and date will roll in and not be such a big storm for me, but in the meantime how do I embrace it so that it does not tear me up inside?   As I write this tonight,  I am sitting in my lovely pink office, (yes pink with glitter), candles are lit and I’m reminding myself to relax.  I look up and focus on the oil painted butterfly that hangs above my desk and I am reminded of why I love the butterfly.  STRENGTH, COURAGE, TRANSFORMATION and RE-BIRTH.

All of those qualities that I cling to with the butterfly are what I will have to use to get myself through.  I will need the strength to not let myself get so upset; the courage to stand up against my feelings and tell myself that I will be OK; transformation will happen with each year I am faced with this pending date; and re-birth will happen on that day that I no longer remember what it meant.calm

As far as the war goes, I’ve won because I’ve acknowledged that I still need to heal from this.  My inner-self is waving a white flag because it knows that as long as I am honest with myself, and continue the work on my healing, those feelings do not stand a chance.

Have you fought with your inner emotions?  Please comment

Kimberly

Courageous Butterfly

3/19/14

Free To Be Me, Francesca Battistelli

You Transform You, KFMUELLER

Little One, Where The Clouds Talk and The Trees Whisper

Broken;Welcomed, Just Me, No More Or Less

Emotional Glacier

Published on by Kimberly Novak8 Comments

small-iceberg-wFrozen:  It’s the beginning of March and we are still being gifted by mother nature with ice and snow.

Frozen: The Oscar nominated song Let It Go, in 2014, a hit for little girls everywhere.

Frozen:  The Disney Movie which defines Love as: “Love,” the character states, “is putting someone else’s needs before your own.” The definition is not only key to the story’s surprising climax, but also biblically solid. For the Scriptures tell us, “Greater love has no one than this: than he lay down his life for his friends” (John 15:13).

Frozen: Webster defines it as, frigid, very cold, obstructed by ice.

It’s amazing how one word can have so many different meanings.  So why am I stuck on this very cold, sometimes debilitating word?  Because in the last few years I have had many circumstances where I felt, or wanted to be frozen.  There were times during my trial when something would happen and the result would cause me to feel trapped and out of control of my circumstances.  In those moments I was literally frozen, in that I was not able to do anything to change the outcome.  I was physically and emotionally frozen.

Lately, I feel like I am stuck, I”m sitting on a very large piece of ice in the middle of nowhere, an emotional glacier.  It’s strange because for a while now I have not had any issues with releasing my feelings but for some reason I find myself wanting to hold things in again.  We all know that holding in feelings is never a good idea and that came to pass for me last week.  Now that I can see it though I am committed to working through whatever it is that I am holding on to.  From the lips of a very dear woman “It’s OK to not be OK”.

The last few days I have been trying to figure out what it is that has me trapped on this current glacier.  Other than the obvious, there is an anniversary (not mine) that does seem to be at the forefront of my mind.  It’s something that  I knew I would never be “OK” with, but something I thought I had moved past.  Divorce is truly the death of a relationship and unfortunately for me, I am still in mourning.

 

I know I have made a lot of progress in my healing but then I have these surprises creep up on me and throw me right back onto that glacier where I have an emotional explosion!  The hard part is not to feel like I’m right back at the beginning.  I need to put all those other explosions behind me and just focus on the one that has me on this current block of ice.  Also hard, is to let it all out; finding someone to confide in and tell all of this too.  I have been through three counselors since my divorce; they keep leaving, maybe I need to look into that! (ha ha)  Most importantly though is recognizing when you are feeling isolated on the glacier before it’s too late and you are piled up high one on top the other before the damn breaks.  let it go

In the words of Disney’s Frozen….LET IT GO!  Let it all in and then let it all out.  We have to remember that tears are healing and it’s OK.  Keeping in mind also not to be angry with yourself when you get to these moments.  My first reaction was how angry I was at  because I am still holding on to some of these issues, but then I realized its because I haven’t let them go from my heart.  They are still there because they still cause hurt, and I need to face them in order to release them.

I have been living in the biggest storm of my life, there may be nothing harder than this.  It is going to take time, patience, understanding, love, faith, and hope to guide me towards being healed.  I have no idea how long it will take, or if I ever will be completely over everything that I went through.  For now I know that it’s OK for me not to be OK, and I need to let other’s around me know when I am feeling that way.  It’s not healthy to be alone on that block of ice, the more people I let in and the more I talk about it, the quicker that ice will melt and I will be free of it.   I have to admit when I first pictured myself sitting on a glacier and it was melting away, I felt panic!  What if I”m not ready?  What if it melts and I drown?  Well, the people around, us, those helping us, will be our life jackets.  They will make sure that we are safe to swim and they will lead us safely to the shore.

Do you feel trapped on your own emotional glacier?  Respond in the comments.

Kimberly

Courageous Butterfly

3/2/14

Related topics/blogs

Let It Go, Frozen

Dream Glacier, Tony Crisp

Let It Go, momofthreelivinginbfe

Seeing Emotions, Enchanted Heart

 

Just Pull

Published on by Kimberly Novak8 Comments

pushHow many times have we tried to go through a door the wrong way?  And I’m speaking literally here.  When it happens we look around to make sure that no one has seen it happen.  Your walking with a purpose headed into your favorite store, your list in hand you approach the door and push, push, push.  Why isn’t the door opening?  It is then that directly in your line of vision, you see the rather large  sign that says PULL.  I’m three years post divorce and I feel like I have been living life pushing on doors that should have been pulled and pulling on doors that should have been pushed and I am getting nowhere.

I feel like things I am trying to accomplish in my new life are not going as I had planned.  God laughs at our plans I know, but these are things that I thought would have been easier for me to do as time passes on.  Deep down I know I am over my ex, but am I over the circumstances that led to our divorce?  I have been very focused on my healing for the last few years and I was confident that I was doing everything I needed to in order to get past everything and get on with my life.  Today I wonder if I ‘ll ever get there.

I’ve been pushing and pushing on a door that just won’t open, and that is the door that leads to my heart.  Unfortunately for me my last two therapists have moved on and today I was forced to let loose on my hair stylist.  I thought I was doing OK, since I recently committed to dating again, until my head was tilted back and into that bowl. It was like as she was rising my hair I was letting go of everything that has been cooped up in my heart.  I’ve  had my heart under lock and key since the divorce and I don’t know how to make it useful again.  I have visions of breathing into a paper bag as I”m trying to push my way through this blockage and let myself feel again.  pull

When you lose a family member it is a death that is extremely hard to recover from, but sometimes I think recovering from a divorce is worse.  You are mourning a death that you eventually want to put behind you so you can find someone new and begin again.  Putting behind you the emotion’s, the heart ache, the circumstances, the anger, the hurt and letting yourself go to let someone else in has got to be one of the hardest things I’ve ever tried to do.  Don’t get me wrong it is something I want to do and I am going to try.  My door of divorce was one that I pushed on for a very long time, it is time that I start pulling and letting doors open.

Every day of my healing is a learning experience and I recently learned that  I am still recovering and I am not over the circumstances of my divorce.  But instead of taking quick shallow breaths and breathing into the paper bag, I want to be able to take one nice cleansing breath and pull on that door and have it open with ease.

Have you been pushing on pull doors?  Please comment and share.

Kimberly

Courageous Butterfly

2/22/14

Related links:

Pushing on a pull door, For King And Country

Meditations on Love

Open Heart Open Book

An Open Heart