So here it is, my one year anniversary! I'm gonna celebrate with a single scoop of lemon cream gelato on a sugar cone and a long walk to get it in the warm bright sun!
The road to this point has been long and treacherous! I often say if I had known what I would go through a year ago when I stopped picking, I probably would not have been able to stop! But the one day at a time thing and this guiding comforting hand of God on my back have kept me going.
By no means have I been perfect on this road or on this journey. As recently as a week ago, I had a major breakdown and picked at myself. The craziest thing about it, is that I was sitting there having this internal dialogue with myself as I was doing it. "Butterfly! What are you doing? You can NOT do this to yourself!" But I just couldn't stop myself. The voices of pain and hurt and suffering were just too strong. (I've had one of the most stressful months of this process... I'm in the middle of scanning thousands of old family photos spanning over 6 generations. I've had to look at my own immediate family and all the dark shadows that lurk there, and I've had to see the generations of mental illnesses, abuse and psychological disorders laid out in front of me one photo at a time for an entire month! It has been horrible. And it has been purposeful! I feel it is unleashing some built up and buried emotions from down in the pit of my heart and as they say, "the darkest hour, comes just before the dawn." )
So even as I sat down to write this today, I thought, "Well who are you to say that it's your one year anniversary, when you picked at yourself a week ago?" But I think I'm coming to understand, that I suffer from a disorder that I will have to come face to face with for at least a few more years, hopefully not a lifetime, and conquer time and time again. I am in recovery and it is daily and ongoing. My guru says that it takes 8 years to change a hard engrained habit! 8 YEARS!!!!!!!! And that even a little step in the direction of returning to that habit in that time frame is very damaging to the progress of letting it go forever. I know for myself that when I get stressed, I start to look in the mirror more, I start just casually touching my skin, I start convincing myself, "It's okay, to just pop this one. It needs it. It'll help it." And then before I know it I'm in full on harm inflicting mode! So the most important thing I can do is recognize the early trigger points and step away from them.
There is a beautiful analogy I like to think of in times like these. I heard it from a minister at SRF and it has stuck with me ever since. It's the story of this certain type of monkey. This monkey can only be caught by this special trap. It's a little box and inside the box, the trappers place a desirable object for the monkey to spot and try to grab. The monkey reaches his hand in and grabs the object and when he tries to remove his hand with the object, he finds that it will no longer easily slide from the trap door. All the monkey has to do to escape is let the object go. He just has to put the object down and he will be free.
So I can see now that when I'm standing in front of the mirror I have a choice. I can reach in the trap and grab my addiction and hold on to it, or I can look over to my left and see that God and Guru and my family and my career and my friends, the love of my life that I have not yet met and my whole future are standing right there for me just an arms length from the trap and all I have to do is let go of the thing that is keeping me from them and walk over and embrace my Bliss. So I am consciously working on that every single day and have been doing so for an ENTIRE YEAR!!!!!!!!!! And that is something I believe deserves celebration!
So today, I'm gonna pat myself on my back! I'm gonna go out and give myself some much needed self love and I'm gonna share my love of self, God and Guru with all the people I meet along the way. I hope that you are out there today and that when our eyes meet, we exchange a knowing and loving smile with eachother. I hope we see in one another the beauty of our courageous powerful spirits and acknowledge each other as the gods that we are! Wishing you a bright, love-filled, delicious day! Love, Love, Love, Joy, Joy, Joy!
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