Let’s (Not) Talk About Help
Dear Unconditional Love — What would you have me know today about asking for help?
Deep breath babe. I’m here. I know this isn’t something you really want to talk with me about but you feel like you should, like maybe it would help… see that? Interesting that you’re looking for help in what asking for help might mean or might add to your life in a way only a different dimension can. We absolutely do not have to talk about asking for help. I’m here if you want to talk about the weather, the gray you see.
Do you remember talking with your fellow loss mom, Christina, and her sharing how angry the sun would make her when she lost Addi? I know you feel that way sometimes too. The sun being representative of life moving on, life being beautiful even if you feel gray inside. Those paradoxes are infuriating for you, and I believe you. Your conditioning taught you that you can only feel one way - happy. Or that you only should feel happy. When hard things happen, you can brightside them to fix them and make them go away. But that always infuriated you, confused you. You didn’t understand when you brought hard things to the forefront why the responses you received were lined with silver. That’s not what you needed, not what you asked for. But everywhere you turned that’s what you got. So you believed that’s what you needed to be too, a positive, bright, sunshiney person - that’s what you learned would bring you closeness.
Until one day in a leadership training, the instructor saw beneath your sunshine mask and told you that you had self confidence, but not self esteem. You hated her for calling you out, you cried in front of the group. Trying to keep it together. But the sunshine mask was melting off. Everyone could see the gray layers underneath. The ones you’d tried to show forever but that were shut down.
What this beautiful teacher was sharing with you is that your esteem is tied to your comfort in all the dimensions of yourself. And she was right, babe. You had no comfort in the dimensionality of your humanity because you were told it made OTHER people feel uncomfortable. Just like asking for help. Ah, see, we got there, didn’t we?
When you asked for help, you were told, “you can do it yourself” and that, coupled with your parents being self sufficient and never modeling asking for help, of course you would feel discomfort in asking for help, in the dimensionality of being self sufficient AND needing help.
I know you’ve learned a new way now, sister. That having all the dimensions is what brings you comfort. You swung from no dimensions over to ALL the dimensions and now you’re trying to settle down somewhere in the middle. You had no boundaries, then all you were was boundaried. And you’re trying to swing in the middle too.
This is all cyclical my love. You start somewhere, authentic, true. You go out into the world and spend survival time with your family of origin and you’re told and you mold. Mold to survive. And then you reach a new world where your own survival only depends on you. And you learn more about yourself, things that were always there, but that were invisible with the covering of other people’s perspectives and your affinity for survival.
Wanting to survive is not a bad thing, honey. You’ve always done what you had to do. But in order to go from surviving to living to BEING, your pendulum has to swing and find its place.
I’ve been there with you through all of this. From the beginning. That’s why now is when you’ve re-discovered me because you’re moving closer to who you’re meant to be. You ARE unconditional love, everything about you. You always have been. And now that you’re discovering that, it’s no coincidence that you’ve reached inside yourself to find me and let me love you like you know you deserve.
You didn’t know you deserved to be loved unconditionally because you were always being told to change. “I must not be lovable the way I am, then” you thought. But that wasn’t true. Only you and I know what’s true for you. And that’s that you’re loveable when you’re open, boundaried, asking for help, or not. And that’s all you need to know about asking for help, for now. We can try again another time my love, or not.
See how constant that refrain is? That I love you either way? No need to be annoyed, my love. Unless you need to be. I’ll be here either way. Damnit! Ok babe, we’re done. I love you.
But toddler help, we’re ok with =P