About Bottling up

I have to write something on the subject because three of the closest people around me have lately been doing exactly this 'Bottling Up' Pain and many other feelings in the process.

Why? 

What do they say about it? ... 

1) I don't want people to see me like that

2) I think that ultimately, I am the only one who will be able to fix what causes the pain

3) Nothing, one said nothing.

As I was sensing all that ---- because they WON'T say anything themselves, so you have to SENSE!!!! (sigh), I realised that this is exactly what I had just been doing to a lesser extend since my daughter had been unwell (last year): bottle up as well 

Looking after someone who needs close and constant care is already isolating, but I think I have made it worse by not talking and deleting half of my Facebook friends 'so that they don't ask me questions', so that we can 'keep our worlds apart', partly to avoid being hurt myself, and partly in order not to hurt them. 

With pain, feelings do sharpen, and if someone says something wrong, it hurts ten times more than when all is well, and you don't want to risk saying something hurting to them either.

What I learned this week is that when one of them 'kind of' reached out eventually, it had a very positive effect on me. I felt joy at eventually getting a little joke from this person and after that, I self reflected about what I had been doing myself to myself and others. I realised how much you can hurt others by shutting them out, by making your friends feel inadequate, as this person had, as I had. 

This unexpected wave of warmth coming out of mutual trust reached out my sharpened feelings, but this time, the 'sharpening' was not against me, it was working FOR me. It opened up my OTHER feelings, the positive ones, I was opening to the world, and I managed to sleep better that night. 

I felt so positive that it is the first time I write again this year, which for me, is a healthy sign. 

So, if this was good for me, surely, it must be good for them. Please my friends, open up, let the bats come out, let the steam come out as it comes in, you don't want to end up like a pressure cooker, because the steam will be much harder to contain then. 

There is a world out there waiting, life reality is harsh from time to time, our world is chaotic, unpredictable. Let's not be hard on ourselves: it is no one's fault.
Harshness to self or others is a form of violence. 

It is an illusion to think that we can control everything - we can control a bit but less than we think. Thinking we can control things is an IDEA (not far from the word 'ideal'). An idea or 'how things should be' is a very human thing about trying to make sense of the world, to create a simplified 'order' when, in reality, the FACTS of life cannot be ordered so easily, if at all.
We cling to our ideas so badly that we often fail to admit reality, even to ourselves ...
we create our own delusional inner world.

There is no order about what is in store for us, and no, we don't necessarily deserve what happens to us:
IT IS IN BIG PART RANDOM,
often motivated by facts that we cannot control.

Thank you for being there, for being my friends, and remember that you will be loved by me, not for your great worldly achievements,
but for being a truthful and sincere person.