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I got my car stuck in my own driveway this morning. lol. It was definitely an “are you kidding me” moment. I tried to dig it out. Actively spun my wheels for awhile. Assessed the situation and then I was like “yeah I should probably use that road side assistance part of my insurance that would come in really handy at a moment like this”. I had to walk a ways to get some reception in order to put in the request, but yeah, yada yada yada and here we go. I ended up waiting for awhile to get the service. (not to long, like a little over an hour) I made some coffee and did my morning physical care routine. It feels different to have one of those. Even though it’s a simple one. It’s nice.

It’s so lovely here. It’s been raining a lot the last couple days, but the sun was coming out and I’m up in the mountains, so it’s like this whole like chilly but almost warm fresh smelling situation that feels really really good. It’s so strange to be like, okay, we have a new challenge. This isn’t what I was planning to do with the first part of my day. Okay. Let’s figure it out. Haha. It feels really good. Problem solving and just handling my shit. I think I’m enjoying being an adult for the first time in my life or for the first time in a long time I’m not sure. It’s been scary for a long time. Also, just anyone who tries really hard to make something work, invests a lot of time and energy, makes plans and dreams about the future, and it doesn’t work out the recovery from that takes awhile. Oof, I see you. I hope you are doing okay in the process. That shit hurts and is hard.

I just think I’m feeling more capable than I have in a long time. Like I finally like being me. Like I’m like dude that’s rad that you get to wake up and figure out what it means to be Joel today. There’s a kindness here towards myself that hasn’t been there before. I think a big part of that is just letting go of all the external anxiety I’ve felt from people who are worried about “making it” in whatever the fuck we decided was acceptable to do here as a society and call it America. (In turn, worried about me making it and so on and so forth) we could go down a whole anxiety rabbit hole into a nightmarish wonderland of horrible things that might happen in the next thirty years to this planet we inhabit due to greed and pride and people caring more about image than genuine connection. It’s weird. It’s weird.

Anyways, I’m doing great. It’s been nice to be on my own. To feel into that process of becoming a person outside of what has shaped a lot of me before now. To be truly out and doing my own thing and loving it. It’s like realizing that I don’t have the same ideas as a lot of people about what I want my life to be. Like I like not having a lot of stuff. I like getting into interesting situations and vibing it out. I liked moving into my car and camping in the beautiful western half of the United States for an extended period of time. I liked that.

It’s freeing to finally be getting a sense of where I end and other people begin. We call those boundaries. They are powerful because it’s like I don’t have to make sure everyone else is okay for me to be okay. I just get to be okay and show up with curiosity to the people I engage with and offer compassion when it make sense and not become enmeshed in whatever things they have going on that are causing them to struggle. This may seem obvious to anyone not formed by a codependent framework. A framework where loving well meant not showing up for yourself and often times operating from a negative energy balance. When that’s what love looks like to you it can take quite awhile to untangle that mess and a lot of hurting other people and being hurt and a myriad of other things that happen between then and getting clear enough to be able to say, woah, that’s not love.

Also it’s disorienting when someone is actually loving you well in that kind of a setting because it feels scary and bad since they aren’t enmeshed with you. It’s wild. When someone is giving you boundaries to run up against and doing it in an empathetic way that isn’t enabling you to abuse them or be abused by them it feels strange. I think it’s exciting when folks start to realize that they have been choosing abusive relationships, because I think that is one of the first steps on the healing journey. It’s like “shit, what do I do now?” I have been gravitating towards folks that don’t have good boundaries and take advantage of my lack of boundaries. It’s hard. It’s really hard. I don’t know, just be gentle with yourself in that process if that’s you. We are incredibly resilient beings.