Spending time alone in your own company reinforces your self-worth and is often the number-one way to replenish your resilience reserves.
― Sam Owen
ME time
Category: Yelly Writes
My life is extraordinarily ordinary and this is celebrating and writing about my beautifully ordinary moments.
Just because you can, doesn’t mean you should…
Reading between the lines is a lost art form these days, and to be able to read between the lines you need to hear what isn’t being said. I feel that you can’t hear what’s being said if you’re only listening to find out how to position your response for maximum impact.
It makes me wonder, if you’re listening to react, is that a trauma response?
I’ve always been told to think before you speak. To count to 10 before you say something. I know first-hand that expressing opinions or saying the first thing that comes out of your mouth is a slippery slope and once you say the words, you can’t take it back. You can try a retraction, but it never actually really works. It’s like trying to recall an email – it never properly works, especially if the email you’re trying to recall was sent to someone outside your next work. I’ve been guilty of running off at the mouth and I guess this is why it is a pet peeve. Because, don’t they say that what you dislike about yourself, you see in others more microscopically?
Also, just because you have something to say doesn’t mean you have to say it.
I NOW know you couldn’t
An open letter…to someone who probably won’t ever have the opportunity, or, if I’m honest, the desire, to read anything I write. But I just to say this.
Dear You,
Whatever I expected of you, I expected because I did give you what I could and probably more than I should’ve. Because I hoped that what I gave w0uld be returned, not like a transaction but because it was how relationships should be – there is give and there is take, there is push and there is pull, and we fill the gaps because we’re a team and we help each other. We’re weak when the other is strong.
What I didn’t take into consideration was that it probably wasn’t what you were capable of or willing to give. And that’s okay. What you put me through, I’m taking as a learning experience. And boy, have I learned.
Once, a long time ago, I read the passage below from Elizabeth Gilbert’s Eat, Pray, Love. I fully believed that you would be the one who loved me enough to be my person this way. Imagine how much my heart broke when I was going through a difficult time and I asked you to be with me and you said you didn’t want to. I learned a lot that day. What I refused to consider at the time was that you didn’t have it in you to provide the support I needed. I know that now. And belatedly, I realise that I probably knew it then. They say hindsight is 20/20. And it is.
I hope you are well. I hope you are whole. I hope you are happy.
I’m here. I love you. I don’t care if you need to stay up crying all night long, I will stay with you. If you need the medication again, go ahead and take it—I will love you through that, as well. If you don’t need the medication, I will love you, too. There’s nothing you can ever do to lose my love. I will protect you until you die, and after your death I will still protect you. I am stronger than Depression and I am braver than Loneliness and nothing will ever exhaust me.
― Elizabeth Gilbert
My Tita Migen
She was Maria Ignacia Generosa Libre Osorio. But to me, she was simply Tita Gengen.
She taught us about colours and art. She shared with us her precious tempera paints and oils and allowed us to discover our own art and colours. She taught us how to sharpen a lead pencil carefully with a Stanley knife. She shared her piano with us and started our love affair with music and taught us to respect the instrument. She wrote poetry and beautiful prose and shared with us her love of literature. On my Facebook post, I forgot to mention that she introduced me to gin rummy and solitaire and she said that as long as I knew how to play cards, I would never be bored in my own company.
She had clarity of mind and strength of will to achieve what she wanted to achieve, and nothing stopped her. Not even her own personal limitations.
She loved us, her family – her brothers and sisters, her nieces and nephews. She loved us as fiercely as only she could.
I know that you are now healthy and whole and happy with Lolo, Lola, Unce Magni, Tita Margie, Uncle Franklin and Uncle Wawell. But I will miss you Tita Migen. More than I can ever put into words.
I love you Tita Gengen.
Word Of The Year
Flourish to grow or develop in a healthy or vigorous way, especially as the result of a particularly congenial environment…because now that I’m growing where I’ve been transplanted, it’s time to grow into health
I think I’d decided on my word for the year for 2024 in 2022 but I hadn’t realised how appropriate it was for where I am right now.. I know I’ve still got lessons to learn, changes to make and ways to travel. I can recognise the face in the mirror..and it’s time to get back to growing into the person I was meant to be.
My word for 2024 is FLOURISH. To flourish is to grow or develop in a healthy or vigorous way, especially as the result of a particularly congenial environment. This year I’m going to work on growing where I’ve been transplanted. It’s time for ME to flourish.
Unpacking Christmas
It’s Boxing Day!
I’ve been cocooning since Saturday and it’s been an eye-opening experience. I’ve been able to indulge in introspection and retrospection, which, lately, has been a luxury because I’ve been so busy with the adulting side of life. I’ve been so focused on other things that I’ve actually not had time to think properly — something which I do like to do. I’m an overthinker and it’s a part of me that I actually value, it makes up a large part of my me-ness.
Christmas has always been a season of frantic busy-ness, filled with activities and things to do. I was part of a large Filipino family network and when you’re Filipino, the holiday season goes into hyperdrive in September! But I was always happy and revelled in the frenzy, because I was happy doing things for people I loved — okay, to be fair, I was always happy doing things for other people, whether I had relationships with them or whether they were strangers.
In the recent past, however, I was constantly told that I should stop doing things for people, stop being so open, stop being so giving, stop being too kind, stop working so hard, stop demanding perfection of myself. I was told, essentially, to stop being so ME. The advice was well-meaning but misguided. It came from someone who felt the constant need to protect themselves and close themselves off from people. It was learned protective conditioning because of their childhood trauma. Because I loved this person, and I knew they were only trying to protect me the best way they could, I tried it their way, did what I was told I should do, behave how I should behave. Instead of staying true to myself and finding a way to show them that there was another way to live, I changed how I was because I thought compromise was the best way to show how much I loved them. I thought that I would have the opportunity to teach them that life was best lived opening yourself up to people. Instead I lived in misalignment and the lack of authenticity infected who I was. For a time I didn’t recognise who was looking back at me in the mirror and I lost sight of the goal, to share with them that there was another way.
I realise this isn’t necessarily as cheerful a post as is probably requisite for the season, but bear with me! I’m getting there.
I’ve decided to spend a cosy and completely solo Christmas this year. I wanted to spend time with family, friends and community online, and be on hand to take calls, reply to messages and group chats — thankful for the connectivity that the interweb allows us! I wanted to recharge my peopling reserves because I felt like I was running on fumes. I also wanted to have the time, space and silence to think. And realign. And rediscover the person I was and acquaint myself with the person I was becoming.
I know that the past should never be discounted and my recent past is littered with recriminations and, if I’m honest, a lot of shoulda-woulda-couldas. But while I am desperately sorry for the time I didn’t use to stay true to myself, I have forgiven myself for the decisions made, because while flawed and the decision-making was ultimately deficient, they were made, and there was genuine love involved in making the decisions. Yes, I will have to deal with the consequences of those decisions, maybe for years to come, but I am grateful for the lessons. Because what I’ve learned will make me stronger and it will guide my steps in this ongoing journey. Someone wise said to me recently what burnt you also built you. And that is so true.
There is beauty and perfection in life’s imperfections. It certainly is the negatives that allow us to appreciate the positives more! I am thankful that I am able to have the opportunity to unpack this, and for the gift of luxurious time to think about my life so far.
Turning the page
I think in typical Yelly fashion, I’m going to write about it!
Watch this space!
Year 2
To lose someone you love is the very worst thing in the world. It creates an invisible hole that you feel you are falling down and will never end. People you love make the world real and solid and when they suddenly go away forever, nothing feels solid any more.
Matt Haig
Today is my Abba’s second-year death anniversary, and yet this morning, I woke up and felt absolutely heartbroken again. I think the pain was different this year because this was the first year I was completely alone in remembering him. I’m sure his siblings thought about him today, and I’m sure Mama and my siblings touched his urn and lit a candle, but this year, I was completely alone with my thoughts without a memorial service to organise and wake up for.
I know my mom thinks about him every day – I mean how could she not – they were together for more than 50 years, and solidly together for 7 years when my father fell ill because she was his primary carer. I cannot imagine the depths of her pain and how much she misses him. But this morning, I felt absolutely heartsick and I cried like a child because I missed my father so much.
I know the void that my father’s passing has created in my life will never be filled. I need to remember to give myself time – time to come to terms with my father’s death (because I don’t think I’ve properly grieved), time to heal, time to allow the pain to shift. I know the pain will always be there but it will feel differently eventually.
Abbadabbadoo
Selective mutism
It is a real thing. It is an anxiety disorder where the person is unable to speak in certain social situations.
This is going to be a snarky post.
Loquaciousness is an admirable trait, but not everyone is blessed with it. Because there are people who seem to have something to say in every situation. EVERY bloody situation. Even when the situation calls for, oh, I don”t know, sensitivity and reflection, they always have something to say – most of the time something off the cuff and inappropriately insensitive.
I understand that it is all about them and the insecurity they feel. It is a defense mechanism. Silence can be uncomfortable and it takes a relatively mature and secure person to sit in silence, to not have to voice an opinion. It might be that they learned that they wouldn’t be overlooked or taken for granted if they said something. It also takes a relatively sensitive person to know what is appropriate and inappropriate to say. But really, if you just say something for the sake of saying something, aren’t you just an empty clanging bell, or an annoyingly noisy cymbal?
I am fully aware that these feelings may just be unique to me and how I feel about certain situations. These are probably just my idiosyncrasies. I’ve been in situations where I’ve opened my mouth and promptly inserted my foot in it. I’ve been in environments where you’ve had to learn when you should or shouldn’t say something. I’ve been in circumstances when your ability to convey information was important for understanding. Not everyone has the opportunity to be in those teaching environments.
I think I need to follow my own advice. Not every situation that makes me want to shout “Can you just shut up?” requires it. You can teach people vocabulary, but you can’t necessarily teach people eloquence and utterance. Sensitivity is learned through experience. Also, it takes a certain humility and openness to want to know.
Okay, feelings expressed. I’m getting off my soapbox now.
Yellywelly 