My fifth-step meeting is in two days, and I have been working on my ‘fearless moral inventory’ for the past week. This is ‘go to your room and have a good hard look at yourself’ time.
The areas of self assessment to focus on and write about are: tolerance/intolerance; humility/false pride; perfectionist/admitting mistakes; being yourself/being phoney; sharing/selfishness; being honest/alibis; honest thinking/dishonest thinking; getting the job done/putting things off; freedom from guilt/guilt feelings; acceptance/fear; being grateful/taking things for granted; patience/impatience; trust/abandonment; feeling good about yourself/self pity; forgiveness and understanding/resentment.
I’ve put a good many hours into it, as you can imagine a perfectionist would, and unsurprisingly to me, there was a great deal of anger and resentment flowing on to the pages of the novella. The point, at the end of all the writing is to look back and see if you can find a common thread. The ‘fatal flaw’ they call it. The consistent element influencing your behaviour. I thought mine was bound to be anger and resentment, and I said so to the counsellor in my fourth step meeting last week, before I began this work. She smiled and said “you might be surprised to find it is something different than what you expect”.
I was.
Can you guess?
It was worthlessness (with trust issues running a close second!)
This is the crux of it all, what the rest of my belief system seems to hang upon, and it begins thus:
- I was abandoned because I am not worthy
- I was left unprotected from emotional abuse as a child because I am not worthy
- I was betrayed by my lovers, my teachers, my peers, because I am not worthy
- I have to justify my existence constantly, because I am not worthy
- I must always seek to attain perfection, because I am not unconditionally worthy.
As I am, without perfection, I am not worthy of:
- belonging
- safety
- love
- acceptance
- attention
- interest
- admiration
- praise
- acknowledgement
- peace/happiness/joy
And so now I can see where this belief has led me – to wonder that deep down, if this is why I am failing to become a mother.
I am not worthy.
I guess this is the nadir of all my soul searching. Here I am, with a wealth of experience that tells me if you open up sufficiently to let a person in, inevitably they will betray you with a dagger through the heart, tear you to shreds or leave you forsaken. Beware! Beware! Shouts my inner child. ‘They’ CANNOT BE TRUSTED!!!
And so. It would be nice not to dwell much longer down here, cold and lonely as it is. The next step, then, is finding the way out, back up, into a solid inner sense of self worth. One that can withstand the barrage of daily life, the comments from thoughtless unsuspecting passersby, the potential triggers unleashed in any social encounter. One that can cope with making a few mistakes, being late now and again, maybe even failing to bear children. One that doesn’t need the wall of criticism, judgement and intolerance to constantly defend herself against the ‘enemy’. One that feels comfortable and safe in opening up, reaching out, being vulnerable.
Any tips?
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