Maybe I can get some sleep now!

Good night.

And thank you.

~Moriandra

Whew! Talking in code is making me feellike a master spy. But for what it’s worth I think I understand and hope things make a little more sense in your world come the morrow.

I guess I just wanted a reason to believe again.

Unfortunately, others are so often not what they claim to be. They just aren’t who they convince us they are.

Maybe even after you’ve come to terms with being disappointed by somebody you still need that little bit of time to convince yourself (once and for all) that it’s time to simply walk away.

Quite the night owl you are! Don’t get me wrong,I’ve enjoyed your observations a graet deal. Refreshingly evocative I must say. My minds racing from all you’ve asked, you’ve siad, and I welcome the exhilaration of it. You just seem like a woman on a serious quest for answers?

We may all have courage, we all may even have the power to love, want love; but it can’t be denied that one of the biggest fears in life is finding out that maybe you are incapable (unworthy) of loving…or being loved. Yes, we have choices, but how often does that fear of facing our true selves goad us into choosing wrongly? Choosing to throw away love, hope, joy, and friendship because we fear that they cannot be accepted or trusted without the end result being inevitable pain?

“There is nothing to fear but fear itself?”

Do we really believe that?

Or are we actually convinced “there is nothing to fear but facing myself”?

Hm.

~M. Doland

I have been studying this part tonight. We have all been taught that “fear” is negative and that the opposite of fear is “faith”. It’s almost a cliche’ we hear… isn’t faith a destructive force? I’ve fought it all the way and I THINK in many instances, I’ve succeeded… and I hope that doesn’t sound egoistic. There are some places, people and circumstances that I need to fight fear lest people end up nervous wrecks. For instance, my place is called “the ring of fire” so somehow we HAVE to fight fear of earthquakes which happens often but we’re used to it. YES, something like that (I agree)makes us human because we suddenly shut out the danger thoughts and begin to think of family or neighbors near… so THAT is TRUE… but that is also because of our ego. When we care for people, it’s because we have a very personal connection with them isn’t it? Isn’t that kinda egoistic? If I love my father or friend more than anyone in the world, isn’t that my ego too? How is that “anathema” then?
Was reading a simple book by Exupery today… and he wrote about his rose :

“One couldn’t die for you. Of course, an ordinary passerby would think my rose looked just like you. But my rose, all on her own, is more important than all of you together, since she’s the one I’ve watered. Since she’s the one I put under glass. Since she’s the one I sheltered behind a screen. Since she’s the one for whom I killed the caterpillars (except the two or three for butterflies). Since she’s the one I listened to when she complained, or when she boasted, or even sometimes when she said nothing at all. Since she’s my rose.”

You are right in the sense that fear makes us human. It does teach us to love, even to die but I think one has to have “some ego” to do so.

Maybe I have to comprehend what ego is really…but how can one not try and defy fear without that? How can one CHOOSE to love without that? How can one create music, poetry, art and appreciate THE OTHER without that? Don’t we become “responsible” for those we have tamed? (Exupery again) How can we establish ties without an ego.. and why does it have to sound too bad a word?
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It gives us the power to love. It’s what makes us human. It is not the anathema that our minds/egos and our conditioning would have us believe. It won’t kill us.
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Very true… that part, fear doesn’t kill us. It can make us too tough though which makes us sit down and think of WANTING some sense of balance, which very few people feel, myself included. It makes me eat too much OR too little, attempt to do anything physical ..even physically dangerous stuff all because I know I have no power and I want to prove to myself I have it, even knowing I don’t anyway. All of a sudden I think of climbing the Himalayas or really crazy stuff LIKE that… I even actually manage to survive it. Sometimes, I even see the “love” there too like I am doing this because it would please my father (he was a pilot and jumps planes) or please my friends, neighbors because like.. so that they’d love me more (?) when I perfectly know that they do anyway. Is that the “ego problem”?
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I don’t get the we “all have the courage, we all want love, we all are love” part. I get the courage part and yes, we all want to be loved but I also know that I can be a terribly unlovable human being at times which does not give me the “right” to expect to be loved.. I dunno if anyone gets what I mean. I think that you would be a better teacher though than a celebrity because reading your thoughts you dare show you’re so vulnerable which makes me want to either hug you or break your neck for exposing yourself to a world that can pretty be mean and cruel. Now, I have the feeling of wanting to protect you… and you were supposed to be Starsky remember? (that was a joke.. ) But you are such a good teacher. It’s nice listening to you.

I am not in hid latest blog because this entry sounds good and revealing.

I truly understand what you say and feel by this statement,Sammy…glad that you’re here to join us in “Shared Thoughts with Paul..”

As a teenager living in a country thousands of miles away from US I still had the opportunity to watch you (and David) twenty-some years ago. I watched all episodes… every one of it… until it was all gone.. faded into the past… I came to this country eight years ago and never thought for a minute that I could follow what became of you… that’s until a few months ago. I saw you, a much older Michael, in some show (which I cannot remember because I was not watching the show but was preparing dinner and glanced at the TV for few seconds) .. I saw you and I thought to myself.. well… he looks familiar… and then I knew…. ‘you see the light when you least expect it!’

You think you know who you are .. you think you do not like the same things you loved when you are a kid… and then you realize how wrong you can be and how much you still adore and cherish what you liked as a kid. I am at the moment watching all episodes all over again and enjoying every minute just as much.. or maybe more than I did the first time.

I searched and found…

I have not read all the blogs or all the comments… but this : “We have a choice” struck a chord.

I had considered suicide when I was 12 years old. I can remember each and every minute of events that lead to that moment. I wanted to get away from the pain I was feeling in my heart. The pain my family (with the exception of my father) had caused. I knew exactly what to do to end my life and was going to do it when this person came to me and asked “what are you doing in the garden without getting ready to go to school? Go and get dressed”. I looked at him and was wondering whether he knew what I was up to because he didn’t move from where he was standing. I walked back to the house… and after a few minutes came back to end what I started but he was still there waiting until I walked to our school bus. I couldn’t do what I wanted to when he was watching me. My heart was heavy.. and I felt as if my head was going to burst because I had not thought of living that day and simply didn’t know what to do because I had not thought of living the rest of the day. It scared me… it scared me to think of living.. Today.. I am still shocked as I feel how strong those feelings were at that time.

I made a choice that day. A series of thoughts ran through my mind… in a split second… I knew If I ran from what I have to face now I will have to come back to learn this lesson in another time. I made the choice to face what I wanted to avoid that day and found that it was not as bad as I thought afterall. I had true friends that loved me and understood me better than my family ever did. I confided with my best friend about what had happened and she began to cry. I was ashamed of myself for putting my friend through that agony. I was ashamed of myself of what might have happened to the other people who truly loved me. That day strengthened me but also killed something of me.

When you make a choice, no matter what it is, you still lose something. If I had died I would have lost my life, my soul. I decided to live but lost something which cannot be explained. Still… I am glad I didn’t kill myself.

I am sure I must have wished I was dead many times… that is something I believe all of us wish sometime in our lives. But I never thought of suicide again. And I know I never will. The choice I made was for good. I live a good life …