Sometimes It's strange to me how differently I can act around certain people. Different comfort levels and interest similarities as well as situations and all kinds of variables interact to influence which side of MJ people get to see. (note that I have about 10 different names that I've been know to go by--it's a reflection of this. Including the diverse rainbow of different kinds of people I have been known to spend time with when in face I was chosing to be social) But ALWAYS people have discribed me as reserved and introspective. I favored that discription, and I was very comfortable with who I was. However recently (over the past few months) my world had been put through a wood chipper, and I'm just now able to really pick up the many many pieces left as the aftermath.

In the hell that I'm now finding the stability to reflect over I noticed something about how I behaved in the darker times of my "survival".

If I'm not careful I fall into a rut and let the people I'm around influence my actions. It's like I get preoccupied with my own stress and whatever else and it just becomes easier to let certain tendencies drift to influence. I've never considered myself a follower--it's just that in some ways I feel like I catch myself acting in ways that are not really "me" when I'm stressed and distracted from my own strength.

It's depressing to me that when I'm not at my best, emotionally and mentally, I can slip into some dark place that sends me into a perpetual weakness. I catch myself acting in ways that I would find irrotating or hurtful if other people were doing it to or around me. I become a sort of social zombie, too tired to man the strengh I generally possess in regards to my principals and high standards. I slip into a sort of default--one that I do not like very much (a habbit I'd like to change). When I'm me I am very fond of myself...but lately, it seems that it doesn't take as much for my "creature" inside to slip into my skin and control it without my sayso.

I was talking to a friend about this not too long ago and he said that I am most likely sick--that I need to find some sort of treatment because I must have wires that are crossed somewhere. Perhaps....but I also thought about how much time I used to invest in being the person I wanted to be--since I've moved to Texas I havn't had time to really sink into my own skin...I'm too busy trying to survive. So much has happened to drive me away from the comfort of my own well explored mind. There are cobwebs and dusty corners. Of course the creature finds the boldness to sift to the surface. It seems that my sould could do with a good cleaning.

I am going to have to make a concious decision to bring myself back into my own mind. I was always so much healthier and better minded--stronger and happier--in all ways better adjusted when I was taking the time each day to get grounded and centered. I was almost in a concious state of meditation then--always pushing through my own mind, always involved with my every thought. I didn't realize how much we humans left to automatic until I let my Manual setting fade and I was just another human. My true self lost somewhere deep inside the squishy innards of disfunction.

The Puma I am has almost faded into my humanity and I hate it. I don't even see her when I look into the mirror any more. I had almost pushed past this shell, almost made it a mere vessel and then nothing. A void...A huge part of me is lost within myself and I can't even remember how I found her in the first place.

There was a lot of damage done to my spirit in the past 8 or so months. Too many life changes to process, too many disappointments, too much heartache. It's time for me to take a likeness of the pheonix and rise from my own ashes. It will be a hard lengthy process to get to where I was, much less progress from the state I should have been in. So many changes to make within myself, I pray I will not get lost and overwhelmed along the way...but I am determined to find myself...I know she is waiting somewhere for me, cold and alone, longing for her strength to be restored. She had the power of a goddess once within her own vessel. It's time to restore her to her thrown. I have betrayed her, I must atone.