Let me share this with you:
I've been traveling on this road too long. I'm just trying to find my way back home. The old me's dead and gone, dead and gone. I turn my head to the east; I don't see nobody by my side. I turn my head to the west, still nobody in sight. So I turn my head to the north, swallow that pill that they call pride. That old me's dead and gone but the new me will be alright.
T.I. is on the mark here with what it feels like to be in Square Two. These feelings of-Who am I now? and Where is everybody that used to be in my life? are very common. Martha Beck calls this "The Empty Elevator" syndrome but at times I like to think of it as a blank slate. It's a scary, lonely part of the cycle, but it can also be a perceived as quality time you get to spend with your new self. You want to know this new person, don't you, since you'll be living her life?
Sometimes I get excited knowing that I have the freedom to create whatever I'd like, but sometimes I get sad because the only people I socialize with these days are my husband and our new neighbors. It's a little unsettling for a social butterfly such as myself to realize that so many of her former social networks no longer feel right.
I've tried, for quite some time, to deny that the old me is really dead and gone. I continue to hang out with the same people I've hung out with for years, I continue to attend functions that I used to like to attend, I continue to volunteer for the same organizations that I've always volunteered for. What I'm learning is that the more I grow, the louder my body compass speaks to me. I can't deny any more that the evening get-togethers, party invitations and volunteer requests feel so, well, shackles on. Just to be sure that I'm not in a bad mood or that it's not my hormones speaking, I've recently gone to several gatherings and parties just to make sure that my compass is telling the truth. And it is. The old me really is dead and gone. The old life, and many people in that life, no longer fit.
Take, for example, the guy I've hung out with for years who invited me out for coffee only to spend the whole time bragging about himself and his accomplishments. Or the woman I was with the other day who rolls her eyes anytime I talk about the mind-body connection and dismisses me as hippy-dippy. Then of course there is the one girl who is so uncomfortable that I've married someone not American that she squirms anytime I talk about my new Indian husband.
Of course these people can't be your friends! my essential self says. Look at the way they treat you! And of course my essential self is right.
I have to admit, the hardest part about all of this is not neccessarily that I've got more alone time now than I've had in the past. (Like many creative people, I enjoy solitude and time experimenting with my new ideas). What's bothering me the most is that when the new me is hanging out with the people that the old me used to, she's absolutley horrified. Not only does it feel foreign to be in my old life but is feels downright insulting.
Why would I ever put up with being treated this way? I keep wondering. Why does so-and-so think it's okay to spend 90 minutes talking about himself in his slimy way? Why does so-and-so think it's okay to roll her eyes at me? Why would I hang out with someone who can't accept the person I love? The answers I come up with are never very fun to hear. It comes back to the age old adage of wisdom: You teach people how to treat you. And from the looks of it, I haven't been teaching people very well that I deserve to be treated with respect.
When I dive into the reasons behind this, I don't think it has to do with low self-esteem or low self-worth. It seems more like I suffer from something many kind, spiritual people do, a complex Buddhist teacher Pema Chodron calls IDIOT COMPASSION.
I was raised to be very kind to everyone, unfortunately even those who treated me like crap. You know, the whole "turn-the-other-cheek" thing. But allowing people to treat me badly no longer jives with my new self. When I found Chodron's article on Idiot Compassion, suddenly it all made sense. I had confused being kind to others with being a doormat (which, if you've ever suffered from this pyschosis yourself know that it means, ironically, that you are not being kind to everyone because you are not being kind to yourself).
Because Idiot Compassion is a complex topic, I'm going to write my next post on how to identify it, how to set healthy emotional boundaries with others and how to break ties with people who don't respect those boundaries. That's coming up.
For now, though, if you've gone through Square One, if you've jumped through the Ring of Fire (hopefully without too many burns) and are finding your elevator empty and lonely, here are some helpful next steps you can take (ones, I might add, that I am taking now myself):
1. Make a list of everyone who is in your life and with whom you interact.
2. Take a deep breath and start to focus on the sensations of your body. (Remember the shackles on, shackles off test? If you don't, see this post.)
3. Go through each name on your list, focusing on how your body reacts to the memory of this person. If you get a shackles on feeling (a negative feeling), put a - sign next to this person's name. If you get a shackles off feeling (a positive feeling), put a + sign next to this person's name. (Some people may register neutral. Put a 0 next to neutral people).
4. Find a way to spend more time with + people and less time (if any) with 0 and - people. I understand that there may be people on your list with whom you cannot avoid interacting. You may hate your boss and yet she may be someone with whom you have to interact with while you are at work. Keep your interactions to the bare minimum then. Remember that although you have to talk to her in meetings, you do not have to sit next to her during the office holiday party and pretend like you enjoy talking to her because she is your boss. See the difference?
5. Once you stop spending so much time with - people, you will start having more free time. At first this may feel like being lonely, especially if a lot of the people you used to hang out with get a negative reading on your body compass. You can use this time to:
a) Get to know yourself better (Julia Cameron's book The Artist's Way is a great book even if you don't think of yourself as an artist)
b) Spend more time with your + people
c) Find more + people to hang out with. (Meetup.com has a lot of interesting groups, some of which you may be interested in joining).
When you start treating yourself kindly, you will decide that you want to be surrounded by others who also treat you kindly. And that, my friends, is true kindness.
RECAP-5 Minute Life Coach
If you're finding yourself feeling a bit lonely after you've made some positive changes, or not sure if the people you've surrounded yourself with in the past will fit your new life, conduct this simple test:
1. Make a list of everyone who is currently in your life and with whom you interact.
2. Go through each name on your list, focusing on how your body reacts to the memory of this person. If you get a shackles on feeling (a negative feeling), put a - sign next to this person's name. If you get a shackles off feeling (a positive feeling), put a + sign next to this person's name. (Some people may register neutral. Put a 0 next to neutral people).
3. Find a way to spend more time with + people and less time (if any) with 0 and - people. Use the extra time you've now freed up to learn more about yourself or to meet more + people.
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