07: Ahead to the Past

CHAPTER 7

Ahead to the Past

As a kid, I never thought to stretch the perimeter of my professional potential nor increase my money making possibilities as a barter to procure power in our home.

Somehow I knew, toying with a ploy like that would not bring me the love or sense of family I craved. I could not buy the love I longed for; nor accrue the perfect lucre to transform the carpeting in our place from egg shells into a cushion of calm serenity.

BOTTOM LINE:

I simply wanted to come off the razor edge into the safety of a genuinely loving hug and dependable tranquility. I wanted to be loved for just being me.

Instead, I lived in a constant dread of my mother's temper and threats when I wasn't working hard enough. When I was getting in her way. When I just was.

The Flexibility Shuffle became a main defense. As did, ironically, obscurity. An oddball goal to shoot for when working in the Business of Show & Sell.

Blending in with the baseboards and disappearing into the shadowy wings became my primo strategy to prevent the outside world from discovering our in-house firing range.

The Hummingbird became my Survival Symbol.

During my spins into the regular working world, I had the choice of remaining the Hummingbird or swinging the pendulum to the opposite mode of Bully Bird, what with the internal high boil that required constant covering.

To create a private illusion of continuity, I remained the Hummingbird, resisting involvement with anyone or any social situation, be it terrific or traumatic. Nancy Drew became my solitary girl friend throughout my kidhood.

Hovering and darting groomed me into a pro observer.

Life became a panoramic movie I also played in, though I never craved to be the star nor critic. There was a phantom comfort in remaining behind the scenes. It became so comforting, whenever a major role was available, I consciously botched it.

I suspected that fame might spotlight me, and thus my home life, and I was investing consummate energy in keeping it a secret while simultaneously striving to stay detached from it.

As may be obvious, tap dancing had also become one of my primo specialties — personally as well as professionally. Aha! Tap Dancing is a descriptive that now makes me wonder why people categorize those who avoid the truth as "tap dancers" considering a tap dancer's main asset is clarity. Oh well, another planetary puzzlement.

In my effort not to make waves in the familial downpour, I wouldn't even admit I was one of life's droplets. That I might possibly matter to life. Not even to me.

I sank so deeply into believing my only form of safe expression was through my undercover paint brush, confidential typewriter and the scripts telling me exactly what to say, that ad-libbing skits or voicing my thoughts to those I met in everyday life became a venue I consistently struggled to avoid.

Whatever private issue got on the line for my response, I hung up. If anyone showed the slightest hesitancy regarding some idea I had begun to reveal, I walked. I then ran it down my invisible flagpole and played taps.

I so dreaded hearing more arbitrary disregard for my thoughts that I came to voice that disregard first. Somehow, I felt an obscure degree of security in being the first to tell the world: "Hey, don't worry. I'm outta here."

In my effort to block any bad news I imagined might be lurking in the wings eager to pour onto my solo parade, I didn't see that I was concurrently shutting out whatever good news may have been posted for delivery.

I forged the entry into my heart with soundproof steel to barricade myself from any pain the world might dump on me, perpetually side-stepping chamber pots from nameless windows.

The enormous dread I dragged throughout my kidhood of the world finding out what my home was like, how my mom acted and felt (or didn't feel) toward me, had so quietly crept into my personality, that I lost touch with who I actually was.

I unwittingly smothered my own joy and zest for life by assuming that to be a "good" daughter, I better crawl under the same wet blanket my mother wove for her journey.

I doubted myself, wondering if I was just faking it as a happy kid (which I genuinely was) from a happy home (which it wasn't) to the outside world.

I became so terrified of discovery over that which I had no control (my mother's persona) that at some point, this confusion of La Grande Fakery carried over to me. To my worth on this planet.

By believing my fated role in life was to shield my home from exposure, by not taking the time to see I was drafting myself on a deadend mission with no long or short term benefits, I ceased playing the Masquerade. I became it.

Though the results of my creativity were highly visible as a kid — Heck! I earned a bountiful buck when paid to act — the show business venue enhanced my disorientation. I began to speculate: Life in general is nothing more than a masquerade!

As with the Emperor's New Clothes, I thought: What if somebody finds out the truth about me? What if they discover I don't know what the heck I'm doing? Who I am? And why I'm here?

What if my social mask falls off and there's just another mask? Then another? And another? And when the last one drops, what if there's nothing but an empty void?

Obviously, many years of my life had unfolded on the illusionary Camp Earth grounds of: Everybody else has it made. Has it together. Is happy. Comes from an idyllic family. And, feels they have nothing and no one to cover for.

Wow! What Poppycock-N-Progress!

Apparently, the Masquerade I adopted not only distorted what the world knew about me, but my view of the world.

As a timely twist, a friend spoke to me the other day of her newly launched jewelry design business and how hard it was for her to actually admit she really was an artist.

Though her work is fantastic and the public demand for it is soaring, she's resisting self-acceptance of her new status. She scores her life with judgmental echoes from her kid-hood, such as: "You can't draw a straight line if you had a ruler." And, "The only real security in life is a 9 to 5 job."

A setup which sure illustrates a common truism: When we reach adulthood from not being approved of as kids nor getting emotional support for our individuality and creativity, it takes great guts to cancel old cassettes and tell the world: "Hey! I DO matter!"

It took guts for her to say: "Hey! I AM an artist!"

I oddly related. Having kept the creativity flowing through me so effortlessly as my kidhood secret, I took it for granted. Ergo! My thought to the world for many years had been: "Yeah, sure I'm an artist... but am I a person?"

Though my mother and I split when I was a teen, I still stood guard over my private life. Habits are a bitch to break, especially when they become so encoded within us that we are too close to recognize them as elected barnacles.

No longer protecting her from exposure, I branched out to imprison all my personal opinions and persuasions. I denied myself from accepting outside recognition of my work and worth. I avoided the most well intended praise.

Though I may have seemed humble, it was my way of avoiding the Hurt Hounds. I figured, if I never allow anyone to put me on a pedestal, then — Tah! Dah! — no one could ever topple me.

No matter who raved regarding my projects, no matter how many awards I received in later years, no matter how many celebrities commissioned my portraits, no matter how successful the promo campaigns I launched for major corporations, I feared one day when I wasn't looking, my circus of careers would skip town in the dead of night and I'd be left out in the cold. Again.

I creatively imagined: One day, someone would peek over the wall to discover the person-impersonator I must be. Then I'd be at the mercy of the Anonymous Lynch Mob of Earthian Anger.

The WHYs for this were very dichotomous. Though I was absolutely sure I was a spiritually born-Happy Camper and very aware of the professional skill within my creative work, I gave little credit to the world-at-large for sharing my certainty, while simultaneously giving them the power to be the Judge over my Earthian reality.

I transferred to Society the same quirky traits of my mother: being unpredictable, unreliable and capricious when it came to consistent love and validation. Ergo! Not to be trusted nor relied upon. Never to be expected to love me.

For years, I missed two valuable messages my alliance with my mother had served me in disguise:

Since Life is a spiritual growth experience, then no one can graduate nor grade me but me, and God.
We get from the world what we give to it and ourselves. Whatever level we don't approve of within ourselves, we assume the world agrees.

MEANING:

How much I CAN believe you love me =
How much I DO love me.

Because I felt I didn't fit in with how talent ought to evolve (formal training in accord with social rules) I grew to fear my imminent exposure and exile.

The You're-not-one-of-us! Exposure and the Get-off-this-planet! Mandate never happened, of course, because no one can effectively cast that call except our personal Fear Fleas.

I've now freed me to accept: I am creative and talented. And in the venue of the arts or entrepreneuring, there are no absolute rules; no criteria other than results. So too, world praise holds no worth unless we appreciate our personal victories.

My turning point came when I accepted one simple fact:

The work came through me from my spiritual source. It was a visible expression of me and my connection with the Godian Force. Ergo! It mattered. Double ergo! I mattered.

This illuminated another thought:

How we're labeled by others, be it as a golden master or greenhorn, is irrelevant to our inner-personal vote. If we like ourselves, we credit our supporters as honest folks and our critics as people with different views. Nothing more or less.

If we don't like ourselves, we view critics and their put-downs as carved-in-granite votes from the truth gods. Thus, we view whoever seeks to support and befriend us as frauds.

MEANING:

We only buy what we have already bought.

There was even a time when if someone failed to return my phone call I took it as an omen to pack up my life, pull the global breaks and leap off into spacial oblivion.

I was failing to see the survival mode that got me through kidhood had become obsolete. It was a cumbersome fire extinguisher on my adult passion for life.

Incredible, isn't it?, how abusive memories are like an annoying wad of lint. We keep assuming we've shed it only to find it's clung to another area of our emotional garb.

Sure. NOW I can easily see how I allowed my future to overpay for the garbage bills of my past. How I covered for so long for what I never needed to conceal. But who knows? Maybe that's why I'm such an open book today. Why I've done a 180 turnaround and given up all concern for how others rate me.

Blackmail can be a hideous crime. Especially, when we become our own blackmailers by letting our potential happiness pay for past familial secrets and fears in no need of keeping.

How much needless energy we can apply to protecting our past and those in it who do not morally rate protection.

How unmercifully we can ransom our joy by assuming we must cover for how others treated us as kids. For how we reacted according to the emotions we then energized.

How easy it is to mark our worth down to wholesale when we don't pause to assess the inventory of our growth.

Now THAT's the Primo Masquerade! Hiding our potential beauty from ourselves. Denying our own graduation to new levels of life based on what we've experienced, rather than what we've learned and overcome.

Denying ourselves credit for how we have evolved by over-crediting other people's score cards. Others who may benefit by holding tight to their past image of us, as do some families and associates who cling to a past we participated in as their way to avoid their futures. Those who don't want to cling alone.

Though I have no cosmic measuring cup to illustrate my growth, I do know: If someone doesn't return a phone call these days, I don't take it personally. I figure they have their own agendas. And, who knows? Possibly Fate's keeping the line free for a call that's more advantageous for my spirit.

I internally let go and let God work the switchboard. Simple. Effective. Then again, Truth is always so darn simple. It's us mortals who complexicate it with fear.

The value of ceasing to judge against me based on kid-hood echoes, is demonstrated via a deal I worked years ago.

There was a project I wanted to promote. I called some one to join me in the deal. Yet, after his initial enthusiasm, he never returned my calls.

Yikes! Mommy Echoes of the Past?!?

A couple days later, a large organization with great clout and distribution called. They heard what I was up to and wanted to get involved. The door opened by the first fellow's lack of response, and by my not prematurely shoving myself off the edge of Hope due to an erroneous assumption.

I later heard from the first fellow. He apologized for not getting back, and explained it was nothing personal, as he was a born procrastinator and got swamped by his deadlines. He said he was overloaded and had to pull out and hoped I'd let him. Not wanting to let me down, he asked me to not hold his admitted irresponsibility against him.

Wow! Hold it against him!?! He never knew how much easier it once would have been to have held it against ME!

HANDY-DANDY TIP FOR THE DAY

I'd like to share a little questionnaire I concocted. It helped me discover whether I was truly humble or motivated by fear illustrated by how stubbornly I protected myself from possible pain. It helped me ascertain whether or not I was giving others the power to hurt or heal.

I forced myself to listen to my response to compliments.

SOCIAL EXAMPLE:

Setup: Friends come by who I cooked dinner for and they say: "Hey! This is fantastic. Absolutely delicious."

Questions: Do I respond with: "Oh, it's nothing." And, is that what I honestly feel? Or, did I work all afternoon to create a scrumptious feast? If so, why did I deny my efforts?

Am I afraid they would trick me into a false sense of accomplishment and I better not fall into that trap?

Am I reacting from kidhood frustration when I never did anything good enough to get the appreciation I desired?

I knew I grew when I answered:

Thanks. I'm glad you enjoy it.

I grew when I ceased running old reaction echoes. When I stopped racing to the worst conclusion so as not to risk getting hurt. Or fooled. I grew when I knew in my heart that I cooked a great meal and could accept another's acknowledgement as a nice bonus.

BUSINESS EXAMPLE:

Setup: I worked long, hard hours on a project and my client says: "Great job! You must've really burned the mid-night oil on this one."

Questions: Do I respond by depreciating all the time I worked, and thinking I should have redone it one more time to really get it perfect? If so, why? Do I feel nothing I could do will ever be perfect enough, as I felt in kidhood? Am I discounting my efforts because I'm falsely assuming anyone else would have got it perfect the first time? Am I trying to deaden my anxiety toward re-evaluating my bill for fear the client might voice my greatest fear of all: "You're not worth that much money. In fact, I could've gotten someone else with better work for less."

Experience forced me to admit: No one ever spoke that killer quote. It was the Fear Fleas speaking.

I knew I grew when I answered:

"Thanks. I feel good about it too. Now, I think we need to discuss my bill and your budget. The project was more extensive than you initially described."

Sure. At times my bill got amended. At times not. But, I always won because I valued my work, worth and my ability to calmly state it.

PERSONAL EXAMPLE 1:
(Hah! As if they all aren't personal!)

Setup: I spend scads of time getting it together to feel like a real knockout. Someone says: "Hey! You look fantastic!"

Questions: Do I respond by depreciating the compliment by saying: "I do? Well, yeah, maybe if I lost 10 pounds, or got a perm, or..." Again, the Fear Fleas were biting.

I knew I grew when I answered:

Thanks!

Another angle that served many insights came when I listened to my reactions to other's criticisms or putdowns.

PERSONAL EXAMPLE 2:

Setup: Someone belittles my creativity, my new dress, my lasagna, how I water my plants, my music — whatever.

Questions: Do I respond by accepting the belittlement and ask myself: Was I doing something wrong? If I was unsure, I leaped into my defense trench and dug into apologies.

That reaction was a primo sign that I was still giving the vote power for my worth to others. I was still traveling as the little girl I once was, tripping on a One Way ticket to Malice in Blunderland.

I knew I grew when I answered:

"Oh, you think so? Well, thanks for sharing your views. But, I feel good about (fill in the blank)."

At first, I consciously forced myself to voice that reply in order to reprogram my reactionary disc. Ergo! I really grew when I meant what I said. Fake It 'Til You Make It sure came in handy.

The permanent cure for my Reactionary Blues arrived when I quit giving undue weight to either compliments or criticism. When I felt neutral to being either lionized or lanced. When I felt neither the need to defend nor attack. Rather, to simply BE.

Today, if someone knocks what I do, I thank them for their opinion and realize that's all it is. Simply their point of view. Not a carved-in-granite judgment from God.

I was amazed that by consciously tuning into my verbal and emotional responses, I gave myself endless insights into how I was blazing ahead via the past.

I unwittingly continued to define my life, my relationships, and others' reactions — complimentary or contemptuous — by the same defenses which made up my kidhood survival kit. Defenses no longer appropriate to the woman I am.

It's an interesting challenge to eavesdrop on our own reactions; to clear a future path by consciously ridding it of discouraging dogma; to see how much of now is still controlled by past dictations.

And, if all else fails: Fake It 'Til You Make It Into Love. Though, that's just my point of view.