to the solstice

There are few people in this world who are able to be who they are in all essence: pride for personal accomplishment, recognition of weakness, humbleness with the world, victim of love's storm, and a relentless heart.

Adam Simon is this. A man who I met three weeks before his move from Boulder to New Haven has allowed me to become opened to my truest internal working. He and I have formed a bond that seems almost indescribable in words. I will try my hardest to articulate what he means to me, but sometimes silence says more.

Here I am. At a frisbee tournament, not entirely sure of the impact that meeting Adam would have on me. Through superficial conversation and various social gatherings, Adam's demeanor and individuality stood out. In my first impression he came to me with genuine conversation, eager to understand me and my life. Through our couple of weeks together, the realization of this gem of a man was in front of me.

Music is where we draw a lot of commonality. He puts an incredible amount of energy into his music and appreciates every moment of it. In our last few days in Boulder together, we recorded two songs together. Those two songs I draw on nearly daily for they remind me of synchronicity between two people. There his voice is whenever I need it. And it brings me comfort like little else does.

A beautifully eloquent man in his writings of letters and songs, Adam expresses want and hurt and love through his words. A fellow lover of solstices, he and I share more than just a longing for more sunlight in the day.

This man listens. At 3am when I call crying because I have had my heart divided, he is there for me. No questions asked. No thought in my mind that I am inconveniencing him. He has a power in my life that he doesn't even realize.

He is my sunrise. In the morning, there are people that I think of. People who have expanded me, enlightened me, humored me, taught me, and loved me. Adam is high on this list. He is someone who I will grow old with. I appreciate him every morning when I see the beautiful sun paint its light pink hue on the flatirons in Boulder. He is there with me as I am blinded by the sun glistening in the snow. He is my coming home.

He knows my heart and he understands my love of the day. He knows who he is, and teaches me every day to know myself more. For you Adam, I am grateful. Thank you for your undeniable friendship. You are a light in my life and I love you dearly. Keep your head toward the sun and follow it through the day. As the months pass, the sunlight will shine longer. And...always choose a room facing east.

a time to reflect

So here as promised is my blog a little while later after the heightened state of emotion has returned to baseline. I have thought so much about my experience over the last week and how it is impacting and changing me.

I realize after re-reading my last couple of blogs that I was experiencing such immense shame and doubt over my behavior that my words didn't express much other than that. I apologize for it, because there were other emotions circling in my mind. The morning after I wrote, my mother and I went to a friend's house for breakfast. It was difficult for me participating in all of these functions for the time that my mother was in Boulder because I felt as though our friendship had turned inside out. I felt like I was walking on egg shells but didn't want to be. I felt like I needed to judge myself and then ashamed that I would. I felt like I couldn't be carefree with her and joke around because I was behaving like a toddler. I didn't know who I was, and therefore was having such a difficult time relating to the people around me.

But as we arrived at this breakfast, I was speaking to the hostess as my mother was outside, and she was listening closely to my story and what I had to say. She told me something important initially and that was (not exact quote) "I hear your shame and doubt, and I see that you are going over in your mind how unfathomable it is to be back at square one. But I want you to replace those two emotions with gratefulness. Now is the moment to be truly thankful that you are so young and learning this lesson."

And how right she is. For the first time in my life, I found myself not marinating in the negative of how I was feeling because of my actions. I was finding it all but impossible to separate my behavior from who I was as a person. And all I could see in my view was how horribly I had acted, and how that made me feel. When instead, I feel as though it came at a critical time to examine the behavior, separate it from who Greer Van Dyck is at the core, and be thankful that from that point on, I would bloom into a new kind of flower.

So here I am right now. Able to reflect on those many emotions I was experiencing all at once during the week, speak again to my mother, come to a beautiful place with her, and really appreciate where I am now versus seven days ago. It is truly remarkable how within one shell I can change into so many things. I feel like my transformation and evolution is occurring daily. I said it in my first blog, every day is a lesson. But through that, it is critical to be one thing: grateful.

the new replacement

I have to revise this post because I feel I have done myself a disservice by choosing to share and detail this oh so recent circumstance. My intense emotional state tainted this blog, but instead of deleting it and starting over, I feel as though it is important to communicate how I was feeling at a heightened state. However, I am eager to tell you that in a few days, I will write again on this experience...and then I will feel like I will truly be able to provide a genuine and calmer expression.
Out with the old, in with the revised, and at the moment treading water. I find myself at an interesting crossroads (shocker I know, it seems like I've come to about 2000000 crossroads in the last fifteen minutes). This one feels interestingly different though in the sense that there is familiarity. I left my floral landmark at this one crossroads two years ago, and I am upon it now and recognizing those flowers that I had placed so carefully on the bifurcation.

It is an odd reality feeling that I are now back where I had been once, with the intention of never being back. It doesn't feel like I am taking one step forward and two steps back, because even though it is the same demon, it has a different face. And for that, I am easy on myself.

Lying, cheating, manipulating, plotting, scaming...they all reside under a big veil of fear. To me it is almost a fear of not being okay in my own skin. It is a clear avoidance of being truly who I am, because there is a shell of disquietude. I broke through my shell of anxiety around cheating because that is the face my fear chose.

This time around, it seeped into my monetary livelihood. After being detached financially from my father (well for the most part), I took my relationship with money to a damaging extreme. I was so inclined to SAVE SAVE SAVE just because of being witness to poor behavior of excessive spending. I saw what debt did to people I loved. And in an attempt to never let that happen to me, I drove myself to the far other end of the continuum.

I was so far at the other end, that I would do ANYTHING (manipulate my loving family, lie to my mother's face whom I cherish to my last breath) to "keep a handle on my own war chest." I justified my behavior and took it as a survival mechanism, and that "if I was saving in the end, then it was good."

Well here I am now, coming to this oh so familiar crossroads and thinking...I am ashamed. I am guilty. I am a liar. So many emotions that I had marinated in during nursing school with my cheating loomed above me like a threatening storm. And instead of spending my precious time here on earth to relive that cycle, I am turning my shame and guilt into gratefulness. I am utterly grateful that I am 23 and learning this lesson for good. I am slowly beginning my journey to becoming genuinely selfless, but in order to be that...I had to have learned this lesson. I want to give what I have and more without concern. So I am embarking now, choosing again the high road at this oh so familiar turning point.

an hour of shame

AT this one moment in time, I feel like a monster. I don't feel like a human in a way. An issue that I have really made an attempt to patch up in my life has really made its way back into my world and is standing at the forefront of my attention. I thought for two years that I had reached a point in my life where I was not in need any longer of lying to get "where I needed to go." I thought that there would never be another opportunity in my life where I would have to question my actions, feel that same sense of guilt that encompassed my being for so long.

And here I am. I feel like I am standing again at the lowest level of the staircase after having climbed and climbed for so long, only to look around me and see that I had made no progress at all. That I may as well have only just begun. That is how I feel at at least. Now I know in the depth of my heart that I'm not there. I know that what has happened is that I have come to the top of a very important staircase, and I know that upon completion of that flight I came to the footing of another very important flight of steps. And that is where I stand. If I look at my immediate surroundings, of course it appears as though I am at the bottom. It looks like I haven't even begun my journey when in fact I have jumped through the biggest loophole.

This next loophole may not be as big, but it is surrounded by fire. And its ability to burn and sting is much greater, and I feel much more intimidated.

Today I lied to my mother. I used my cunning abilities to avoid paying for my Christmas gifts. I pulled out the same tricks in my bag to avoid a fear. I was deviant and looking behind my shoulder, with anxiety and superstition looming above me. I took her for granted, I took advantage of her generous bounty. I took the good names of my mother and father and used them for my own selfish reasons. And here I stand on the edge of the cliff, looking down on the layers that I continuously shed from my shell.

After a conversation and a complete surrender, I find myself right now having learned such an ultimate lesson. That no matter who we think we are, and no matter how far we think we've come, we are able to trip and fall. We are able to surrender to the forces of the world. We are able to hurt those people in our world who are closest to us. I would give my life for my mother, I would take a bullet for her, and yet I am still able to hurt her in such a profound way. These realities are shocking and above all else intensifying very familiar feelings of shame and guilt.

However, the lesson is learned. And this will never happen again. So while I feel broken and a bit like I must relearn how to fly, I find myself afraid to step outside of my house and live as the newest version of myself. With that fear though I will step, and with those steps I will not hang my head.

to each bag his own

Everyone has their own grocery bag of issues which can manifest as a paper bag without handles, a paper bag with handles, a plastic bag, or the new and ever so trendy re-usable version. They come in many forms and in many displays. There isn't one person who doesn't have them. I feel like the only opportunity one would take in saying they don't exist on an internal level is due to lack of self awareness.

And interestingly enough, I see these sometimes as faults in other people. I think of them negatively and when they are manifested in other people, I turn my nose up at them. And usually what will happen is I will see these things, and really internalize them. I will let them build and at that one moment where I feel the water is about to boil over the top of the pot, I will release it. But this is where I think that the problem arises: when I do feel the need to release it, it is very seldom to that person. It is usually to a confidant, someone else that I can trust with that information. But what am I really saying when I am releasing it?

I am judging it and labeling it. I am really expressing frustration for someone being nothing more than different from me. And the thing is I know I have these discrepencies, or grocery bags of issues too, so where do I find the right to act as though I am above it?

In this last instance, I have seen that I feel an enormous amount of perspective is really critical here. For we cannot judge something in someone else that we have within us as well. It isn't fair to be hypocritical. So here I am right now, having the opportunity to find the best balance for myself in handling my own and others' "bag of individuality."

I see myself here thinking about what is at the heart of human interaction. Each involvement that I have with someone allows me more and more insight into who they are at the core. And with that comes knowledge and wonder and excitement. And I come to the conclusion that: at the end of the day, everybody has their own bag. In my opinion, they are what make someone unique, so instead of judging and labeling them, I will take that negativity and transform it into something more beneficial. For me it isn't a matter of whether or not those elements are going to exist in someone else, for me it is about how I use them in my daily life that will be of benefit. And see these faults more of as treasures, for without them...there would be no adventure in interaction.

my confirmation #

Life it isn't the same as going to the check in gate at the airport, typing in your confirmation number and having that security of knowing that all details related to your flight are going to fall into place. I feel like that one moment when my boarding ticket gets printed, there are no more fears related to me having actually scheduled my trip for a different day, a different time, or a different city.

Relationships, both romantic and friendly are more complex and dynamic like that. It is interesting because romantically speaking, I don't find myself necessarily needing that validation that the other person is there for me. I have felt this sense of calm relating to romance that what will happen will happen, and that my desire to control and understand all facets is a waste of energy. But I think so much of that is due to the fact that I have never truly had my heart broken. I have been side swiped (read two blogs ago), many times...but I don't think those emotions really come close to the feelings of having your heart truly split down the middle. That disbelief that your heart all of a sudden doesn't seem like part of your body.

With friendships though things are different for me now. And they have been different since the beginning of this year. I have realized why as well. I know that because of my experiences, I have understood and lived what it feels like to have friends taken from me in one fell swoop without me having an opportunity to say goodbye or question why. I feel like with my friendships and lives lost, I have been completely victim to the unpredictability of life and its beneficial but also detrimental power.

I have met incredible women and men through school and around my life in Boulder. And every day I feel privileged to be in the company of individuals who enlighten and expand me, make me break down with laughter, make me feel connected, make me ask those unanswerable questions, and make me feel human. And I am scared that one day they will be taken from me too.

But I cannot live this way, my mom used to reverberate this phrase "don't live afraid, just live smart." So here we go: this is one of the brilliant turning point moments where I can take those valuable sprouts of wisdom and incorporate them into my behavior. So I will cherish my friendship but not be paranoid that I will lose them, not be eager for confirmation of their authenticity. I know that I have nothing to be insecure about, and so I don't need a confirmation number here.

its not what you're like, but what you like that counts

A phrase that sums up relationships right? There is a friend of mine lives in NY. And we have been emailing back and forth for a few months, and the topic of relationships came up.

And through his emailing me, he and I had been discussing this premise that in relationship, that connection is the desire. And that is true for me, I feel like I am picking my companion based on these feelings of synchronicity. But it is also something to be wary of, because presence of that connection doesn't necessarily lead to romance. Therefore, it is vital that the connection be examined for what it is. There are friendly soul mates and romantic soul mates.

But more importantly back to the title of the blog, its not what you're like, but what you like that counts. My friend in particular is really hard on himself regarding his own life's choices relating to past relationships. He isn't proud of who he is on the inside, which is so much what makes it difficult for him to open up and be vulnerable to women. He is afraid that when they finally see who he is on the inside, they will lose interest. And for me, I feel as though it is both important to see and understand what you're like and what you like in relationship.

In order for you to really understand what you want in this life, and specifically in relationship, you must see your inner working working. You must be able to respect your inner complexity and your neuroses. It is essential in order for us as humans to understand what we appreciate and value in our companion.

I feel like I am slowly learning to be opened to what I like in others that counts. What it is that I long for out of relationship. Is that connection that important to me or is it something that I have placed on this un-necessary throne? Is it something that has been pumped into me as being the ultimate goal in relationship? I feel like now is the time when I am searching the validity of the word "connection." Is it stimulated by an event between two people, is it a product of shared experience, is it simply there from the very beginning with no words spoken, or does it develop over years of shared time?

As of right now, I stand here. I want connection in my romantic companion. I want my partner to be someone that I would be elated to spend the rest of my life with. I feel this way because I have experienced it. I have felt those indescribable moments where there is nothing to say, but I know with confidence that it is felt for me too. So here I am.

I disagree with this statement, I don't feel like one part of it is more important than the other, I feel like they both work hand in hand in making our "relationship with relationship" as expansive as possible.

a divided heart

My heart was divided yesterday. Divided by a man that I hardly even know. This division of the heart wasn't a crushing of it, but it was more than anything a separation of two halves. I met him a couple of weeks ago, quite a chance encounter. And through our initial meeting, I felt a connection. But I even mentioned this to friends of mine and communicated to them that no matter what...even if this spans no further than a friendship in the end, there is a bond. Something that I feel and I know he did too. And I was genuine in saying that I wouldn't be saddened if it didn't happen romantically for the two of us, because I am content in the fact that those unspoken kindred attachments are beyond sexual. They are a partnership for me. A counterpart.

This is an unexplainable feeling inside when you feel this soul connecting bond. There are no words, and to me I know in my heart that this feeling is too good for words. It blows words out of the water in that it permeates every inch of the soul and body. It gets into your bloodstream, you inhale it, it is felt beyond every sense. And before this point, I had only felt it once before in my life. Truly felt it. I was a junior in high school, and it was an unraveling of my heart. I felt as though I was a tight knit ball of yarn that was slowly being just pulled apart. In a beautifully wonderful and terrifying way.

Those connections to me stimulate the butterflies in my stomach to take full flight. They illuminate my mind and body in a giddy sense of being almost to where I am not walking, I am floating. And the more beautiful part of all of this isn't necessarily what I feel inside alone, but it is that acknowledgment from that other person who feels the same way and is floating with you. And for those periods of time of true connection with one another, nothing else exists.

Between two people, there are those silent expressions of affection. Words don't do it justice. There are the forehead to forehead silences, intensely tight hugs, brushes of cheek to cheek, a harmonious song played through the two minds. A simple eye glance expresses a world of feeling. Racing hearts and internal implosion. This song is what it feels like for me: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BYlHA2J0Bho.

These chance encounters are beautiful. They are intense in their processes and are so passionate and filled with beauty. This is what love is to me. That connection. It is beyond physical or needing to be physical. It isn't even that you and this other person are living in parallel, it is more like they are living in you. And you in them. The need for sexual intimacy almost doesn't exist in the beginning, because there is too much else to be preoccupied by. You are so infatuated by that feeling of energy.

It is glorious when those connections are discovered. It is difficult when the other person acknowledges them, but behaves in a "practical" manner, doing what is honorable to a previous ingrained relationship. I am respectful, but yet my heart is still divided. So I have hope that those connections exist and will continue on my path of exploration of this world. I wouldn't take that experience back for anything in this world.

synchronicity

I have made a great new friend and is he in my program at school, but we have always kind of existed on the periphery of each other's lives, without really diving deeply into each others worlds. It has been interesting, and I love these kinds of friendships. For months, the two of us would kind of observe and admire one another, always deeply interested in what the other was thinking or doing at any given moment, or wondering what the other person's life consisted of outside of school.

Anyway, finally we decided to take the plunge and actually have a real full on conversation outside of school. It was huge. And it became confirmed why I am so intrigued by this person. He really is fantastic.

But we started getting on the topic of synchronistic experiences. And I really didn't understand what he meant by them, but after us dissecting what they were, I realized that so much of my life in the past few years has been filled with them.

Most profoundly have been the events after nursing school and before naropa university and everything in between. I realize that the string of processes that I went through in order to get to where I am today are touching for me because I feel like there were so many stepping stones.

Because I didn't pass my nursing board each time, I was forced after that last and arduous time of it to really take an opportunity to look inward. I was exhausted and truly disinterested in "overwhelming this one with hard work." It just was beginning to feel like there were things in my life for me other than nursing. All of a sudden, my contribution to society wasn't going to be at the bedside. And I was terrified of that. But this was my opportunity to do one of two things: I could have allowed myself to be terrified and feel it, or I could have tried with all of my might to avoid feeling it and make my place at the beside. I chose the former. So there was my first part in this synchronistic experience. I let life lead me.

And then I had my two roommates last year who did their undergrad at Naropa. And these are two of the most fantastic women I've ever met. So full of heart and spirit. And they introduced me to what Naropa taught them. And I didn't realize it at the time, but I was hooked. Hooked on the opportunity there for me to be expanded.

So I was looking on the internet a few months back, and stumbled on the program that I am now in. And in the description of what the Transpersonal Counseling Psychology degree, I felt that it was right. It was exactly what I was looking for. It found me. So a month or so after that I was having lunch with a friend, who was helping me sort out the dilemma of applying or not. It was a matter of having to potentially hae to take three prerequisites over the summer. Not enthusiastic about that. But she told me to try it, what was the worst that could happen? I listened. Two weeks later, I was in.

Synchronistic experiences are doubled sided. They are those developments in our lives that place experiences, people, etc in our path and it is just a question of what we do with those opportunities. I don't see it as coincidence, I see it as an element of fate. Not necessarily that someone of a higher power was leading me to Naropa, but through life...Naropa found me. And he I am, in a position that I never thought I would be in. So we must listen to what is placed in front of us, see and understand it, be open and willing to it, embrace it. I am thankful every day now that I was these things, because without it, I may still be trying to force a path on myself for someone else's sake.

projections

There are so many things that I am learning around the idea of projections. I am discovering how much of my (and our) behavior is really controlled by projections. I am seeing how they limit my own interaction with others and myself. I am really finding which are truest to me and which are merely a result of external influence. And lastly, I am really being humbled by their presence and curious of their complexity.

I am seeing right now that from the moment we are born, there are influences that are coming from society, parents, friends, etc. And those influences are stimulating humans to form "interjections" which are otherwise known as internalized stories, tapes, whatever you want to call them. But these stories are internalized messages that we take with us everywhere, these impressions of how we believe certain types of people are, what experiences are going to be, what the world is comprised of. And I have seen that throughout my childhood and adulthood, my behavior has been...in part due to these internalized messages that I have carried along with me. And so much of what these projections stem off of is experience. So for example say that I have a really bad experience at Starbucks (why would I be in Starbucks in the first place? GO LOCAL!). My internalized message then would be that all Starbucks will produce a negative experience, so I will just avoid them on the general.

This is an example where my projections on people, environments, and experiences can prove to be limiting. Unfortunately, I know that I have surrendered to my projections but now feel as though I am at an advantage because there is now an awareness of how pervasive they are, and more importantly that they don't need to be.

I reflect though and I see that so much negativity that I had projected onto other people, or kinds of people I should say would therefore prevent me from having an enriched experience, because my own manifestation of surrendering to my projections is avoidance. In the past, if I feel negatively about a certain environment, I would have avoided it completely.

So here is where an interesting juncture comes in my development. Since my awareness of these projections and their strength is in the forefront of my mind, now is the time to really discriminate between what is exclusively a product of influence, and what is at the heart of me. And for me that deserves introspection and an opportunity to allow moments arise where projections surface. And then from there determine how to behave in a manner that is truest for Greer. I feel as though these projections are worth engaging. I feel as though the pulling apart genuine versus enforced will really allow an individual to reach a deeper level of authenticity.

loosening the reigns

I have been struggling with this control issue for a little while, and I feel as though I've talked about it throughout some of my blogs. And there are two main areas in which my need for control is the most profound: exercise and money.

There it is. Something that I have been so afraid to admit to for so long, but there it is staring at me in the face. Well it is staring at me through cyber space. But never the less, here are two areas where I feel pressured. Pressured by structure that I place on myself, I make rules for myself...it is interesting how it has gotten to the point that it has without me having such an awareness of it.

Well it isn't so much that I didn't have an awareness of it, but it was more of I didn't have an awareness of how much it was impacting me. It was almost as if the water level had reached to my nose and I didn't even know the water was rising. Not really that exaggerated because I can still breathe :-) but interestingly enough, the metaphor fits.

But here I am now, and I am so deeply aware of how these habitual patterns of mine have gotten me to this point. And that is really where it is rooted. We are influenced by so many factors: parents, friends, society, institutions that all plant these seeds in our mind of what it means to live a structured life.

And since my life before these cycles started wasn't necessarily as structured other than the influence of my parents and the rules they placed on me, I was a little bit lost as to where I should start. And then it isn't a few years down the road that I realize my life is a big pattern.

A pattern of structure and pressure that I put on myself (mainly in just the two areas listed above). But in those two areas, it is pervasive enough that I want to change this behavior in all areas. I want my life to be structured of course, but I want there to be the opportunity to let my wings fly. For me to live. And really live.

The structure I feel is good and bad. It allows me to know my limitations and understand my boundaries, but then again I feel as though it places un necessary boundaries around me and my abilities. It places stress on my body and mind that isn't deserved. I long to feel a more vivid sense of freedom in these two areas. And I know that with awareness comes opportunity for change.

So I will be patient with the process, and know that with time my wings will span and I will soar.