Day 107: Showing my True Colours

This blog is a continuation to:
Day 106: Regret 

I forgive myself that I have accepted and allowed myself to react within fear upon seeing the pups in the box, where I saw that it was not cool that these pups are here in a box with no food, no water – and that this situation obviously requires direction, where upon looking at what to do next and how things might possibly play out – I went into fear of what my parents will say about me taking the pups home to show them and see what we can do for them and feared it being a problem on the train where I didn’t want to get into trouble

I forgive myself that I have accepted and allowed myself to have gone into a point of stuckness when seeing that the train and my parents could be a possible problem/obstacle – where I looked at the intensity of the fear and the intensity of wanting to help the pups – and then decided that the fear had ‘more weight’ than me wanting to help the pups, and so I decided to walk away

I forgive myself that I have accepted and allowed myself, to when I was looking at how to ‘take it from here’, have reacted to the possible point of the train and my parents being a problem – where I reacted to the person who checks the people on the train as being ‘authoritative’, and my parents as being ‘authoritative’ where their decision is the ‘final one’ where I did not trust myself to give a common sensical explanation to either one of them and then based on that decided for myself that it was ‘not worth it’ and ‘I shouldn’t bother’ because I did not want to place myself in a position faced with authority figures and ‘going against them’ and not being confident

I forgive myself that I have accepted and allowed myself to have decided that it was not worth for me to walk through and face my fears in order to be certain that the pups had been given direction and went to a safe place – where instead I decided to hold on to fear as self-limitation and walk away from the pups, walk away from the certainty that they will be okay

I forgive myself that I have accepted and allowed myself to have within that moment have chosen self-interest as holding on to fear as fear of self-change – where I did not want to move out of my comfort zone for the sake of others' wellbeing, but instead chose to not change, and take the chance of the pups being worse off than what they already were

I forgive myself that I have accepted and allowed myself to have attempted to sooth the shame within, where I would ‘build my case’ inside myself as thoughts/backchat, where I would think things like “Someone else will probably find them and take care of them”, so that I could justify my decision of walking away and distracting myself from the point of not wanting to change

I forgive myself that I have accepted and allowed myself to only afterwards change my mind, where I was feeling bad and based on the ‘feeling bad’ decided that I should check up on them – where I went to check where they had previously been and they were gone – where I first went “Oh shit” but then told myself, “Naaah, you see, someone took care of them, they’ll be alright” – while I actually did not have a clue what happened but just gave myself the answer that would make me feel the best about myself and make me forget about the event all together – where everything was seemingly ‘okay’

I forgive myself that I have accepted and allowed myself to let the fear of facing authority override common sense practicality and care – where I rather jeopardized the lives of other rather than having to face myself

I forgive myself that I haven’t accepted and allowed myself to see and realise that within that moment, my true face was shown – where I cared more about fear and maintaining self-limitation than Life

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Day 106: Regret

While we were walking back from putting the horses in the neighbour’s field this morning, we saw that there was a random cardboard box standing next to the fence of the neighbour’s field in which the cows were grazing.

Gian went to check it out saying “Let’s make sure there’s no puppies in there” – and as he said that, a memory popped up of when I found a box with puppies in it.

I was in high school, maybe 16 years old. It was walking away from school down the station but decided to first go to the public library before catching a train home. As I was walking past the station, I saw a cardboard box next to one of the bins. I went to check it out and there was a whole bunch of golden puppies in it.

At first I was shocked, because I had heard of these type of things happening but I had never seen it before ‘in my face’ type of thing. My school was in a red light district, in a kind of poor part of the city and I wasn’t sure if anyone would walk by here that would be able to help these pups.

I was looking at what I should do. I wanted to grab the box and go home, show my parents and make a plan. But then I remember how my mom would always moan about dogs, as they used to have a dog and he started destroying furniture and doors, and then gave him away. Not that I was planning on keeping these pups per se, I just wanted to get them out off the street and to a place where they could be taken care of.

So then fear kicked in, because I didn’t want to upset my parents and I didn’t want to get into trouble. I was also scared that I might run in trouble on the train, as I didn’t know for sure what the regulations were concerning pets – and again: I didn’t want to get in trouble.

So in the end I decided that it was ‘not worth it’, that I was ‘too scared’ and so I walked away and went to the library. All the way walking to the library and then walking from the library back to the station, I was worried about the pups and what might happen or have already happened to them.

Just as I was about to get to the entrance of the station, I take a turn to get to the other side where I had initially seen the box. When I got there the box was gone.

On my way home I kept telling myself that ‘someone else probably sorted it out / took care of them’ -- but how could I be sure? That neighbourhood was a bit dodge, who knows what could have happened to them. And I’ve since then always regretted not having picked up the box and make sure that they went somewhere safe.

As I walked through the memory on our walk back to the farm, I looked at how I would have handled the situation now, and looking at it now, the ridiculousness of my behaviour is very evident. If I had to be faced with the same situation now, I would have picked up the box without hesitation, take it home and make a plan – and if it turned out to be a problem on the train I would have just dealt with it because it really shouldn’t be that big of a deal. But who I was at that point, even though what I did was ridiculous and stupid – the fear was so intense and so real, that I felt like I had no other choice but to obey it – fear was my reality and not common sense practical consideration.

The particular point that sticks out for me in this memory, is the point of ‘authority’. Where both my parents and the train person in his uniform represent points of ‘authority’ – and where even if these authority figures did not make sense, I would not want to go against it out of fear of getting into trouble. So what’s always bugged me about this memory, is that I chose fear as self-interest in terms of not wanting to get into trouble over the certainty that those pups had been taken care of – where I rather allowed the possibility of them dying or being abused to exist over me stepping up within myself and do what I see needs to be done regardless of how particular authority figures may have reacted to that.

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