We probably missed a once in a lifetime opportunity last evening. As an alumni of Bellevue University, an event was held last night at our Holland Performing Arts Center in Omaha. Gary Sinise was the speaker. I sent in reservations for two, printed out the info sheet, and promptly forgot to write it down on the daily calendar. I’m sure it was a very good talk and I wouldn’t be surprised if he had the Lieutenant Dan Band with him. That hasn’t been confirmed yet, but it would have been way cool.
And I missed it because I trusted my faulty memory again. Yeah, that wasn’t one of my better moves. But you know what? It’s not the first mistake I’ve made and certainly won’t be my last. That’s what being human gets you. Accepting it is what soul seeking does for you. Once we accept our shortcomings, things are easier. Unless someone else decides to Lord them over you as a “joke”. Then you can become angry or worse. And why? You know you’re not perfect. Why get angry?
Again, we can’t escape being human. It is something that never changes until after we die and enter eternity. Hopefully, that’s a long time away. Until then, I’ll get mad if you give me too much crap and push me beyond, “I’m just joking.” Sometimes you really aren’t. Sometimes it’s a poke at something you may not like about me, and usually it’s true. It’s part of my humanness and imperfection. Would you like a litany of your imperfections? I didn’t think you’d like it. Even if I were “just joking.” I wouldn’t be. I’d be trying to hurt you back.
And doing that is a knee-jerk reaction of protection. It’s learned, I think. Is it from being bullied as a kid? Could be. A long, long time ago, I’d pounce, unloading on the person who committed the “crossing the line,” or I’d just keep quiet and feel lousy about myself, thinking, “Yeah, they’re right.” That’s also a learned behavior. Your spirit is beaten down so you can’t react or stick up for yourself. Takes time to unlearn that. Why hurt someone simply because they hurt you? Tempting as it is, at the very least, it’s not how I’d want to be treated.
Breaking the curse of dysfunction takes many, many years. A lot of self-analysis. And you can feel proud when you are in a situation and think of how NOT to handle it. How you can draw a boundary between what’s a “joke,” and what isn’t. And how you’d react if you hadn’t learned how damaging that lashing out behavior can be. You feel better about showing the anger but not the “getting even” behavior that is so destructive. You have established a line you won’t cross. And that’s a good thing.
It’s not easy living with other humans, no matter your ages or longevity of your relationship. Loving someone isn’t simply enough. You have to have understanding of each other and where they come from sometimes. That is the hardest thing of all. Especially when your other person may have had a bad day, or bad moments from their own rubbish in their brain. It happens. We all have it. Let’s all take out the rubbish, the garbage of bad self-esteem. Let’s clean house of those bad memories that trigger things in ourselves we don’t like. It’s about getting through things, not over or around them.
Personal improvement is not easy. Recovering from traumas isn’t either. Anything worthwhile in this life is hard! The driving force behind my love for the Babe is, “Someday, one of us won’t be around. It doesn’t matter when the 1% sneaks in and rears it’s ugly head. It’s the 99% of contentment and love that matters.” That thought has been forefront since two close friends have lost their husbands this year alone. I don’t want to have any regrets as my grandmother did. We might not get our tomorrows.
That said, I hope to be here to write tomorrow. I hope you’re here to read. And I hope to become a better person. Work on that today with me. The world will become kinder, and we can all use that.
Kathy Raabe 