You know...this week's
...let's just get on with it, shall we?
Week 10
"What we have once enjoyed we can never lose.
All that we love deeply becomes part of us."
~ Helen Keller
Who is a part of your joyful memories?
How did they inspire you?
As a few people close to me can attest...I'm not likely to be winning the Brightest Smile Award, this week. I have actually tried to post twice this past week, after the Monday post, though clearly that didn't happen. But that is the life I lead...being bipolar, for me, as well as some of my other mental health issues, can be such a continual shifting of highs and lows due to rapid cycling and anxiety, it's difficult to accept that some days(/weeks/months) are going to be hard, especially when physical illness and chronic pain come into play. It can seem such a mirage of shifting thoughts, feelings, images and even abilities, that it's hard to trust my own perceptions, sometimes. Welcome to Mental Health Survival 101, class.
Anyway, that paragraph did actually have relevance beyond my whining and making excuses. It kind of sets the stage for my answer for this week, believe it or not. Because someone I used to know, who was a social worker, once taught me something about depression that completely took me by surprise. We were chatting about memories, and basically, the questions Christine asked here, are the very kind of questions that we were discussing. I happened to mention that I had a really hard time thinking back through my life to find memories that I could identify as being "happy". Her answer to that surprised me.
She told me that it is rather common for people who grew up with depression, or who have experienced it for long periods of time, to have a difficult time remembering anything from that period of time with any recollection of positive memories. This is likely because when we view the world through the eyes of depression, it's like taking a video of our lives with a darkened lens; any "playback" will be viewed as it was "recorded"...dim and darkened, lacking energy and enjoyment.
This was a rather illuminating revelation, to me. Unfortunately, it doesn't change the way I view much of my life, but it does explain why it often feels like I have had very little enjoyment over the course of it, and why it is such a challenge to recall positive experiences.
As I've been composing this post, in the back of my mind I've been searching the catacombs of it to search out positive memories. One of the first I can think of, way back when, is spending time with my best friend as a child, with whom I would trade off birthday parties; we had only a few choices given to us of where to have them, so one year I would choose one place, and he the other, and then the next year we would switch. :) He and I adored each other back then, and if I refuse to allow my mind to naturally make its way to the time he and I were separated by his being forced to move away, then those memories retain the golden light of happiness we experienced together.
Later, as a young teen, I recall a night running around my grandparents' neighborhood with my cousin, and one night in particular. It was late evening in the Fall, and a storm was coming in, so as we ran up and down our grandparents' street, the wind blew against us so strongly that it felt like if we jumped high enough, we could fly! I wasn't particularly athletic, but she was, and for the first time in my life I felt like we were equals, simply enjoying the exhilaration of such a shared, childhood moment.
Sadly, the next memory I can recall, actually didn't happen til about 5 years ago. I was participating in an online community, and one of the activities we enjoyed together was spending time listening to a close friend of mine playing DJ, while we bantered and teased via text chat. I remember laughing so hard I couldn't breathe, every night as our group of friends chatted so fast we all laughed at how we could barely follow along, because the lines of text were scrolling up the screen so fast! Within that group, though I never really felt like I fit in with those amazingly intelligent, witty people I so admired, when we were practically glued together by the energy and concentration required to participate in these moments, I felt like I belonged.
Over the past, few years I've also had a chance to know a friend whom I've been able to visit both in my own home, and in hers across both the continent and a national border. Through her, I have had the opportunity to see a variety of cultural differences I had never realized in my little world, as her family was actually from across an ocean, originally. What a beautiful opportunity to see and feel colors I'd never imagined! We had never thought I'd make the journey, for a variety of reasons, and yet I did so more than once! And those memories burn bright in my heart; I hope to be able to return, someday.
For what has been - let's just say, "many" - years now, I've had the opportunity to be married to someone who has loved me through it all. With only what you have in this blog to view the situation...you can see how loving patience, understanding, strength and friendship would be vital! And that has given me an opportunity to know what love can be, despite all the crazy chaos of life and the challenges it presents from/to both sides. The memories we have shared together all these years may not all be perfectly pleasant, but they are real, and with each, new one that comes along, I learn more about what and who I want to be. I can't exactly do a post on things about life that have inspired me, and not mention that one!
You know, I have to admit, though I was originally intimidated by this week's personal challenge, at this point I am smiling at the recollections of these positive, even happy moments! So my thanks go to Christine and her inspired, little book. I've now begun the week with a positive moment of reflection, and maybe that can mean that this week will go a little brighter than this last. Even if my tulips and daffodils are presently being dusted with a surprise layer of snow. Good thing they're resilient, little things, hmm?
Better days ahead, my friends.
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