Day 90: Holding Back - Part 2

This blog is a continuation:
Day 88: Fear of the Past Repeating Itself 
Day 89: Holding Back 

When and as I learn the news that there is a new birdie to be taken care of -- and see myself reacting within excitement -- I stop and I breathe -- I see and realise that I am accessing past memories within myself which share features to the current moment, and where I upload these memories to define/shape/mould the current moment for myself as 'this is going to be fun' and so instead I commit myself to stop, breathe, be here and ground myself as my human physical body and embrace the moment here for what it is rather than placing it and limiting it within a framework of the past

When and as I learn the news that there is a new birdie to be taken care of -- and see myself reacting within gloom/sadness -- I stop and I breathe -- I see and realise that I am accessing past memories within myself which share features to the current moment, and where I upload these memories to define/shape/mould the current moment for myself as 'Is the bird going to make it / fear of the bird dying' and so instead I commit myself to stop, breathe, be here and ground myself as my human physical body and embrace the moment here for what it is rather than placing it and limiting it within a framework of the past

When and as I see myself reacting to the news of a new bird within having pictures flashing in my mind of the past -- I stop and I breathe -- I see and realise that I am accessing the past and projecting it unto the future as 'possible outcomes' -- and make these memories of the past my expectations of the future, wherein I limit myself, my awareness, and expression to 'what I already know' based on past memories/experiences -- where if something would happen which does not 'fit in' with my expectations based on past memories, I will be unable to 'cope' and 'deal' with the situation as I have placed myself in a limited position where I depend on the past to tell me what to do and so instead I commit myself to assess each single moment individually, anew, fresh and trust myself to act within practical common sense based on what is here

When and as I see myself reacting to the presence of a new bird within accessing past memories of past birds -- I stop and I breathe -- I see and realise that if I participate with this 'new' bird from a starting point of my relationship with 'past' birds, I am not actually interacting/participating with the bird I am currently, physically faced with -- but only an idea, projection which I have layered unto the bird which renders me incapable of actually seeing and working the bird as who she/he really is, here, in the moment -- as I am too busy filtering every movement, sound, image of the bird through the past and uploading past experiences which I copy/paste unto the current moment and so I commit myself to stop, breathe, let go of the past as memories and energetic experiences, and move myself to simply be here, with the bird, unconditionally -- stopping any thoughts, pictures, memories, energies as they pop up / get triggered

When and as I see myself accessing an experience/feeling of 'hope' when seeing/interacting the new birdie -- I stop and I breathe -- I see and realise that I am still holding on to my past relationship with TweeTweet and where I wish to reconstruct this relationship -- within that not considering that this is a different bird, and thus will never fit my idea/expectation based on how things were with TweeTweet, and will only cause frustration if I hold on to them -- and so I commit myself to stop, breathe, let go of TweeTweet and work with the new bird (we named her by the way, the name is "Puf" ) moment by moment, breath by breath with no strings attached

When and as I see myself going into a mode of being 'reserved' when seeing / participating with Puf -- I stop and I breathe -- I see and realise that I am operating based on input and output, where I see Puf which is identical in physical appearance to TweeTweet -- and within 'matching' these two pictures, I upload all the information within me as past experiences with TweeTweet -- and where I remember how things ended with TweeTweet and then base my relationship with Puf based on the information as stored memories in relation to TweeTweet within me -- where I want to change/mould my behaviour as being open/expressive to being reserved, within the belief that this will 'protect me' if the bird dies. And so I commit myself to within that moment of catching the 'reservedness', to stop, breathe, ground myself within and as my human physical body within breath and allow myself to unconditionally let go of the past and be here with Puf without hauling in the past

When and as I see myself go into a mode of 'holding back' when seeing / interacting with Puf -- I stop and I breathe -- I see and realise that the possibility of him/her dying soon due to the young age and general uncertainty of physical health and fears of the past repeating itself is not an acceptable reason as to why I should hold back / deny myself openeness -- as these are merely justifications/excuses which I use to hide behind so as to not having to walk beyond my self accepted limitations as living in fear of loss and so I commit myself to not allow these factors to impede my participating/interaction with Puf and move myself to be here within every moment of breath and make the best out of every moment

Related articles

• Day 88: Fear of the Past Repeating Itself
• Day 89: Holding Back
• Day 81: I'm a Lost Cause, Let me Save You
• Day 82: Self-Completion
• Day 63: Keeping the Wheels Turning
• Day 46: Running on Automated Pilot

Day 88: Fear of the Past Repeating Itself

Yesterday another birdie was found on the farm.

I was busy studying while I heard Gian getting a call in the room. He came out and his face had an expression of hesistation, and a slight grin/smile -- as he said that Fidelis found a birdie.

I shared him the same face/expression back -- because each time we find a birdie, we go into that space of uncertainty: What type of Bird is it (as this influences how easy/difficult it is to take care of them)? Is it hurt? Will the bird make it?

Then, about 15 minutes after Gian had left to get the birdie, he came into the house with his hand closed, with the again the same facial expression as he said: "It's a TweeTweet".

There, my heart skipped a beat, because we had previously taken care of a birdie, TweeTweet, -- which we at that time we thought to be a Fiscal Flycatcher, but now after revision, we found out it's actually a Fiscal Shrike -- where we had a lot of fun/interesting times with the birdie, until it tragically died/drowned two years ago.

Now, this birdie -- looks EXACTLY the same as TweeTweet, and is at the exact same physical development stage as when we found TweeTweet two years ago. This species of bird is the only one we've had so far (well, besides the two Parrots which we still had to feed by hand, and the chick and gosling) that is totally okay with being around Humans and is easy to feed, as it will just cry/scream and open its mouth wide whenever it is hungry.

So whenever there's the point of a new 'birdie', I slightly go into the fear of 'what if' -- as not many birdies have made it so far. And now that the birdie was a TweeTweet, I went into it a bit more as I don't want to go through the same point in the past. When we first had TweeTweet, we were quite 'new' and 'innocent' in relation to the whole taking care of baby birds thing. But now that we've had to deal with many deaths, I am now more fearful when handling/taking care of them. Birds have this thing where their head gets all loose and floppy and it looks like it has lost all of its strength, which usually means a point of 'giving up' on the side of the bird, where the birdie does not see itself surviving and just 'gives up', where the head will start wobbling and flopping to the back or side, and usually soon after the birdie will die within having made that decision of 'giving up'.

So now for instance, with this new birdie, each time I see its head move in a direction that may possible be this 'floppy head' movement, I experience a little shock of "OH NO, what if he/she's going into it!". Which usually only happens for a split of a second as the birdie is moving its head to reach to its chest to for instance preen itself.

So now I have an opportunity to walk through this point again.
Though now there's also some additional points to consider, since last time that we had TweeTweet we only had her, the lizards and a little sparrow -- and she could pretty much roam the room without disturbing anyone.

Now we have the Parrots and they may possible go into a point of conflict with one another if either one perceives the other to be more dominant. So there I saw I had an additional fear of 'how is this going to work out with the Parrots'.

Self Forgiveness and Self Corrective Statements to Follow

Related articles

• Day 81: I'm a Lost Cause, Let me Save You
• Day 82: Self-Completion
• Day 51: Shocking Sounds

Day 81: I'm a Lost Cause, Let me Save You

As I was reading Maite’s blog post on the gosling and taking care of the little baby, I realised how I had been acting with baby birds on the farm in a way of protecting them and taking care of them in a way that I had never been cared for and in a way that I had never cared for myself.

Whenever we would find a baby bird that requires attention, I would place all my focus on it. The first time we had a baby bird, it died after one night because we didn’t know how to take care of it properly. Since then I’ve educated myself and with the second baby bird we found, we successfully raised (although it later died in a drowning accident). Raising the little baby bird took a lot of time and dedication, the parents during the day just fly on and off the nest the whole day long bringing them food . We would then simulate this by giving the baby lots of small feeds in a day, which was basically like every 15 to 20 min. It was a lot of work because the consistency of the food needs to je just right, as well as the temperature – which with each feed almost needs adjusting.

So it was cool to see how this baby bird needed constant attention and care until it was grown up and could pretty much take care of itself – but it took that process, of every day being there for the baby – and where through the process of accumulation of 1 +1 +1 +1 + … you eventually get to a full grown bird which can take care of itself. With this second bird, TweeTweet, we had a lot of fun. She (or he lol) was so innocent and playful – it was just awesome to watch her be herself.

Ever since then and with each baby bird we found, I dedicated myself completely to their care. I was in complete awe of their innocent expression and playful, clumsy way of going about their life.

Looking back at it now, as I mentioned in the beginning of my post – I can see how the birds represent that point of innocence for me, which I believe I have lost. When I am with them and taking care of them, I want to protect them at all cost and be there for them so they can develop into the awesome bird they are meant to be. But within that, I am placing all my focus and attention on them, and in a way trying/attempting to ‘live through them’ where I believe that I am already a lost cause and there’s nothing more to be done for me, but where I can still save this birds and assist them in becoming wholesome. So within that, I am trying to ‘right my wrongs’, where I believe that I’m am unable to express myself like these birds do, and that if I can get them to be able to continue living and do their thing – that I can at least have that.


So this is quite a point to look at, as this whole thing reflects back my relationship with myself, where I have not yet accepted and allowed myself to commit myself to me – in dedicating my every moment of my life to assist and support myself to become the best possible version I can be of myself – so now it is time that I take this point of care I have for the birdies, back to myself and gift myself to time, patient, attention and care to assist myself to grow as a being.

Self-Forgiveness and Self Corrective Statements to Follow…