Courage

Today is the 15th, and it has been 8 months.  The past week has been tough.  In one of my classes, this week we're talking about systems models.  A system is defined as a whole which cannot be divided into separate parts.  Each part can (and does) affect others, and the way in which it affects the whole depends on the other parts.  The properties of a system are a product of the interaction of its parts and subsystems.

Alright, I know this isn't the most concise or eloquent paraphrase of the concept, but it's late and I've had a crappy week.

Lately I have just been feeling overwhelmed and down.  There wasn't one thing I could point to and say, "that is the thing that is making me feel horrible."  Any one of the things wasn't so awful in and of itself.  But when they were added up, and the suckiness of one interacted with the suckiness of another, I was left with just a black hole sucking away my ability to stay positive and focused.

I'm trying to claw my way out of the hole.  It's not easy!  Every time I think I've made some progress, something happens that pushes me back.  I'm so tempted to write a big long woe-is-me list of all the things that have made me sad and frustrated this week.  But instead, I'm going to try and be positive.

I watched a video of a TED talk by Dr. Brene Brown that was posted by one of my Crossfit coaches (here is the link if you want to watch the whole thing):
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=X4Qm9cGRub0

There were a couple things that hit home when I watched it.

One was her finding that people who have a strong sense of love and belonging believe they're worthy of love and belonging.  I mean, it makes perfect sense, right?  Someone who doesn't feel worthy of that type of esteem probably won't have a strong sense of being loved and of belonging to/with another person (or people).  Despite what I have been through, I maintain the belief that I am worthy of love.  I feel very loved by my friends and family.  Losing JP, and the love that defined us in relation to one another and to the world, was devastating.  My sense of love and being loved - in a romantic sense, at least - was possible only because of him.  And to top it all off, he gave me the one being whom I love even more than I loved him.  I miss our love terribly.  I miss that feeling of belonging, not from a fitting in and being connected perspective, but the sensation of having my heart and soul being in the possession of my best friend.  That connection had become such an integral part of how I defined myself and interpreted myself in relation to my environment.  And honestly, I don't know that I will ever find that again.  I don't know that I want to.  Do I expect to fall in love again?  Yes.  Do I hope to build a life with someone as a partner?  I think so.  Do I expect to feel the same as I did about JP?  Absolutely not.  With JP, love and belonging were simple.  Our love was pure joy.  Love for me, from now on, is always going to be tinged with sorrow and loss.  Even if it's just a whisper, the slightest hint.

Didn't I say I was going to be positive?  Hmm.

So the second thing I really liked was Dr. Brown's description of courage.  The word courage derives from the Latin word "cor" which means "heart."  The original English definition of "courage" was: to tell the story of who you are with your whole heart.  And that, my friends, is exactly what I am aiming to do here.