Day of Feeling 5

I have edited out the (Part I) from my previous post, because I did not end up writing any more that evening. Just a little bit of honesty here.

So once again I have waited until way late to do this, to do so very much of what I had set out to do. This whole phenomenon of setting out things to do and then not doing them, wasting time, has led me to believe that I am creature capable of neither doing what is good for me or what I want. What is it that I do, then? Am I dominated by a kind of fear of certain things that causes me to go around and around in circles?

It is frustrating to write that, because it seems like there is no real object for my fear. What a waste, being afraid of nothing! If it were something, I could find a way to not be afraid of it. But if it's nothing, if it's repressed, if it's unconscious, then it's out of my control, so what can I do about it?

But I think the important thing might be that there is no real object; it is my job to accept the fear itself. This is what I am not doing very well. I don't have to look at the fear itself as something alien. I can look at the fear itself as I myself. Incorporate it; realize it; identify with it; take responsibility for it.

That is a huge step I do not want to take: to take responsibility for the way I feel. I have spent so much of my life convincing myself that my feelings are the result of circumstances I have no control over. In fact, how I feel is the result of how I decide to live my life. Perhaps feelings cannot materialize out of thin air; they take time and work to occur. Maybe there is always going to be a certain amount of delay; feelings are not like my private bathroom that I can just walk into at any time. They are a part of my sense of self but they are not myself. What is important is to remember that they do not occur randomly; they reciprocate my conscious activities and choices.

Again, a frightening concept: I have relied so much on the notion that I feel a certain way because things have led me to feel that way. To acknowledge that I am responsible: well, then I have chosen to waste myself in a lot of ways. I could choose to care about myself rather than neglect myself. I don't neglect myself; I just take care of myself more for a fear of falling apart than for genuine Self-Respect. I capitalized that phrase, because it deserves extra attention and focus. It is a key idea here. The lack of Self-Respect is a key problem in my life. I would do well to understand it better.

So I have a glimmer of understanding here: Self-Respect; reciprocity of feeling in life; responsibility of feeling.

I would like, if I could, to take up the topic of resistance feelings; resistance of doing things, for tomorrow's post. Let's see if I can stick with it.

Good night.