Seeing the Mountains

I believe that I am trying to be something that I am not, or at least not anymore, and this may be the source of some of my anxiety.  There was a time when I was laid back and relaxed when it came to the people in my life.  I don’t know for sure why that has changed.  Perhaps it is because I have absorbed some negative experiences that have affected my ability to trust.  It could also be that these experiences and the ones surrounding them have left me with a hole in my confidence and self -esteem.  

I have a feeling that this hole may be a key ingredient in this recipe for a fucked up mental state.  

For a while, I was using someone to fill the hole as it grew.  I was relying on an individual to help me stand and keep me strong.  They were my crutch for stability and the drug that kept the pain away.  This is not healthy.  (no kidding, right?)  Since then, I have been stumbling around like an addict searching for my next high; searching for something to help me stand straight again.  The one place I have been dodging around is inside myself.   I suppose it is a relief, then, that I don’t have to look too far to find what I need.  

I am not the person I used to be.  No one is.  We change and grow and mutate as the world around us changes.  We choose what will be allowed to wear us down and what will pass us by.  I made some poor choices and allowed things to knock me down that I should not have.  I know that I can’t change it, that I can’t undo what has been done.  The struggle now is to grow from it and move on.  I think it a mistake to say that I will work to go back to the person I was.  I can’t.  No one can go back to an earlier self any more than a stone can undo the changes made by the water.  The stone changes, grows smooth and is more beautiful after.  

I look at my newly born jealousy and it makes me a bit sick.  I don’t like being this way, but it is the way that I am….for now.  Can we look at things like this and make it into something else?  I don’t know.  By meditating on the mountains in our mind, we can see them for what they are.  They are often little more than pebbles that trip us up.  I have yet to tackle any of my mountains, but my experiences have helped me keep them in perspective.  I see them now.  There they are in front of me, clearer than before and though they are formidable, they are apparent.  I know the obstacles that I have to overcome, at least.  Now it is a matter of finding the right guide, the gear, the plan, and the patience to climb the mountains to make them pebbles once again.


I am big on this mountain/pebble thing.  Not sure why, it just seems to fit.