What Makes Me Unique

A Year With Myself Prompt from Karen Caterson on Module 9: Authenticity

WHAT MAKES ME UNIQUE?

It’s been a curious week for me, noticing my uniqueness and simultaneously wanting to gut myself and start fresh. I suppose that’s NOT EVEN unique. Seems to BE a lot of this going around. Perhaps what makes me unique, or what it is that most of all stands out is that I have only recently started to take myself seriously lightly. Oxymoronic though that may BE, that’s my story. At least today.

These past six years I have been in a long and drawn-out transitional period. I have gone from sick and only enJOYing a few days a week without complications from Spina Bifida setting the tone to days and weeks completely uncomplicated, at least by my physical health challenges. I have gone from BEing in a 12-year relationship through its 3-year demise, and Now I am quite content living in relative Solitude in The Wee Cottage with Gracie. I have let go of 99% of the STUFF that I’d accumulated in my Life: books, art, photographs, clothing, tools, all of my writing, and every other odd yet treasured thing, despite spending all of 2007 and 2008 sorting and packing it up and putting it into storage for a “when” that never materialised. And when I moved East in 2009, I figured I’d go back for it, never really wrapping my head or my heart round the idea that “going back” and “stuff” would BE 2 things I would live far far better without. And even that realisation came slowly…

A part of me knows that the above isn’t unique; another part is completely convinced that it is simply BEcause it is MY Story. So, in an effort to keep peace within my Spirit I let those parts of me BE, recognising the objective is NOT at all about choosing one over the other, but instead to love them like you love teenagers, especially the ones who used to think you totally rocked their World. It’s prickly and oftentimes more thorny than rosy, but so goes Life with beautimous blooms.

WHICH AREA OR AREAS OF MY UNIQUENESS ARE EMBARRASSING OR UNCOMFORTABLE FOR ME; WHICH AM I PROUD OF?

Probably there are layers to this response, but I am only going to deal with what’s floating to the top for me Right Now. I’ve lived the past 50 years from the 9 year old me who was told NO, she could NOT participate UNTIL she had learned to write in Cursive. We moved in April of my 4^th grade year. It was the single most awful thing that literally knocked the stuffing out of me. Moreso even than BEing diagnosed with Spina Bifida at the age of 36. I was a ravenous learner, a little girl with the sort of audacity and fearlessness that rivaled Pippi Longstocking! That teacher DOing that literally left me hobbled ever since.

Why is this embarrassing and uncomfortable?! I suppose BEcause I have spent these past 50 years feeling I was on the outside and never welcome in. I’ve been routinely startled by anyone’s warmth or welcoming, unable and unwilling to trust that it’s NOT a ruse, NOT another set-up. As a result I have gone from job to job and BEfore that school to school, relationship to relationship, and only Now, as I am on the eve of turning 59, have I realised this pattern AND where it sprang from. Now, don’t misunderstand, I KNOW I have the track records in all of the above that I have, I know how lumpy and difficult it is for me to love, to BElieve something really is possible, especially for me, but it’s only been in the past 6 months or so that I’ve BEgun to see the puzzle in its entirety.

As for the areas I am proud of… well, I suppose that would BE my courage, my “gumption” to keep on keeping on. While I’m no stranger to serious considerations and a few definite efforts to end it, [it BEing my Life] I clearly did NOT succeed. I think this is pretty remarkable, especially when I consider myself pretty much “out there” and never ever truly “inside” anywhere or any relationship I’ve had. Even as convinced as I can BE that no one would miss me, and in fact my taking myself out would improve the lot of others, I keep breathing in and out and walking upright. I suppose it’s my insatiable curiosity…

                                                                                                                                                    

HOW DO I NURTURE MY UNIQUENESS?

This one is much easier. I nurture it simply by acknowledging it exists. By choosing to BElieve that I had a purpose coming here, meaning to Life, or Something had one for me. There is something MUCH BIGGER than how I feel or where I “fit” [or don’t fit]. And certainly something far more definitive than writing in Cursive. I suppose the biggest thing I DO on a daily basis is that I write. Every day. A LOT. And I keep showing up. And I encourage myself.

HOW DO I SHARE MY UNIQUENESS WITH THE WORLD?

I don’t know. Somedays I think I share it by writing. Other days, well, I guess most days I hope I am sharing something of myself that is of value to the World. Even if that is only picking up Gracie’s poop. I don’t know what people with dogs are [or aren’t] thinking when they leave poop wherever, but I know that for ME, I am responsible. I DO my part. Simple as that. NOT that I am judging anyone, really, just that somehow I think the “right” answer to this question, for ME, just for this day, is that basic.

WHAT GETS IN THE WAY OF SHARING MORE OF MY UNIQUENESS?

Pretty much that thing that I’ve let one horrible teacher DO: Tell Me NO. I’m a compulsive apologiser and a chronic over-explainer. Both of these things keep me keeping myself hiding-out.