230317 Was this the life I really wanted?

The speaker is reflecting on their current life situation, living in a van and feeling uncertain about their choices. They discuss their reluctance to acquire new possessions and their desire for stability and a sense of belonging. They mention considering living with someone else but feel it may not be the right solution. The speaker also mentions feeling depressed and having fleeting thoughts of suicide, but ultimately deciding to continue living and hoping for change. They express a struggle with surrendering and allowing things to happen, but find comfort and excitement when spending time with certain individuals. Despite the challenges, the speaker acknowledges the potential for growth in their current circumstances. I'm trying to live this life because I thought this is the life I have to live. It's the best life I can come up with. It's better than the life I was living. And in order to let go of that life, I had to have a life to move into. I couldn't have no life. I had to be somewhere. I ended up in a van. But it isn't really a life. I mean, I'm sort of okay, or have been okay with it. I've got used to it. I've accepted it. I've dealt with what I need to deal with. And then I got surprised, waylaid, by a thought arising in the van, unexpectedly, in the most inappropriate moment, creating an awful lot of confusion. I must have created it. I must have called this to me by where I was on the emotional scale. How affected, how fearful, how much anxiety. All of this created the experience I'm having. But I thought that I had to find a life. I had to choose a life. And in order to live this life, I have to still keep a level of technology, of materialness going. Yet at the same time, I am reluctant and resistant to replacing and fixing and making it somehow better. Because on some level, I realize that it won't. It might seem lovely, you know, to have a new thing. Oh, look, I've got a new laptop. Great. And then there's a lot of complexity and aggravation in transferring and making that thing, the new thing, into something I can just use effortlessly, that has all my preferences and the way I do it and the way I keep it and how it works. That takes time. So, in part, I'm reluctant to do that and therefore I put up with something that is awkward and difficult and failing because I don't have to do it if I keep going with the original. But then I'm also reluctant to acquire things, to buy stuff I've been trying to let go. I don't have much, but I still have the feeling, the need for immediately to replace, to acquire, to, will this make it easier? Will this make it better? Should I have this or should I have that? I am in a position to, I can make decisions like that. So, and yet, just because I can make decisions like that doesn't mean that I can make decisions like that. I considered renouncing everything, but at the time, we were heavily in the pandemic, the idea to do that would have been to join some monastic situation. I chose Buddhist because it seemed like the most I could relate to, the most in some way, but I'm not sure that I would have been cut out for it. But nevertheless, I couldn't even explore it because everything was shut. Doors were closed. And so, with just a backpack, I left my situation and holed up in some hostel, which provided me with sanctuary and a bed and warmth, although from the very get-go, I had to sort of make things, make it work. I have to intervene, in a sense. I have to do it. Or I feel like I have to do it. When 30 years ago, I discovered that it worked so much better if I didn't have to do it at all, if I just let it happen, if I just went with the flow, if I just trusted the universe. And it worked so amazingly that it was easy for me to continue to do so. Well, certainly for some time, until it changed, and I made certain decisions, I took certain actions that somehow resulted in me having to do it again. So I've, I made this choice, hard as it was, doors closed, obstacles, pushing against the current. I made this choice that I can't stay here, I can't stay in this room, and that there was no other room, although I did make some effort to find another room, there was no other room, even Penzance, I made some effort, but I got put off so easily, so quickly. There was no other possibility of just shifting to a different location, but continuing to live in the same kind of situation. And the only solution, the only possibility I could see was ban. And so I went for it, and I ended up in it, I made it happen, it came to be, and I recognized that, in many ways, it is the answer, it was the answer, but it is not necessarily the right thing. I don't have an alternative solution, absolutely none. The only alternative, in a sense, would be to live with someone who already exists in a situation, as I experienced in America, and just move in, that we're involved in a relationship, and just move in, and hit the ground running and go from there. It seemed like the ideal solution, that I don't have any of the material responsibility, I don't pay the rent, I don't have the bills, I contribute in my own way, but I'm not involved in that side of things, I am the partner, the companion, I do the things I can do, I contribute the way I can be, and that, I thought, was ideal. Well, it didn't turn out to be in America, and I don't feel like I can go down that road again here, but it might seem okay for a few weeks, or even a month or two, but very quickly it will become an issue, because sharing a space is very difficult with somebody where you're actually in the same process trying to learn who they are and how to be with them. I recognise, I realise, I have to do all of those things first. It takes a long time to get to know somebody, to feel comfortable with them, to feel okay with them, then to feel like, okay, I think we could make some kind of a go together and so on. No, I tend to just jump straight in and then think I'll figure it out as I go. Maybe it's misplaced confidence or complete stupidity, I don't know. But that's what it felt like, I felt like I could do it, and that it would work itself out one way or the other. That's the only alternative to shift into the reality of another person's life and just go with it. But it isn't the answer. I have to be, I think I have to be alone. I can't rent, I can't afford to buy, the van is the only solution. I suppose I did consider, again, pandemic interfered with that as a possibility, not having anything, just going, moving, not having stability or a base, not being able to stop, just moving, kind of like a pilgrimage. Just keep moving, staying in places and in cheap hotels or guest houses, bed and breakfast, whatever, I had plenty of money, I didn't have any material responsibility, just the clothes on my back, and yet I couldn't, I couldn't do it, I didn't want that, I needed to be still, I wanted to have something that was mine, some space, my bed, my place. The van answers that as well. That's why I don't have to drive it anywhere, that's why it's so ironic that the first time I really drive it, and after just keeping it moving round the block every so often, it shows itself having some fault that isn't straightforward. So that I can't just bring it back and park it and forget, basically forget about it for a year. But I don't have any desire to move anywhere. I have to go to the garage and then immediately come straight back. I don't have to come straight back, the cones will keep my space alive for a longer period. I could go to the shop and buy things without having to carry them back. I can go to the countryside and just park in nature where there's no traffic and no people and be there for a while, knowing that my space awaits me when I'm ready to come back. No, I come straight back, there's no thought of anything else. None. I just want to be still. And as soon as I pull back in and I move the cones so that I can be where I need to be, I close all the curtains up, I put the blinds up so that I'm creating the isolation again, and I can sort of breathe out, or at least I would have done if I didn't have this hanging over my head issue. It's changed me, it's made me feel different. I'm different as a result of going through this experience. I never expected to be different. I thought it would simply be over and I would return to my previous state, but that's not turned out to be the case. So what now? I suppose on some level I've felt depressed. I've had moments, and I only mean moments, of suicidal ideations. I should go, I need to go. But I know that I'm not going to follow that. And go where? Do what? I have to accept that life is continuous and I am in it. And even if I feel out of sorts, this too shall pass. And so, come back into the present and keep doing, keep going, until it changes. And it always does, because everything changes. It always does. But that's, in a sense, creating a future. Everything changes, it always does. But it hasn't changed yet. In this moment, which is all there is, it is still this. Yes, there may be a future moment where it won't be like this, but I can't imagine that future moment because it doesn't exist. I have to be here and now, which is all there is. Which does exist. And yet I'm not, I'm not feeling good about myself. I'm, again, struggling with the idea of how to make it work, and I've got to do it, and I'm doing it, and I've got to keep on it, and slowly but surely. And yet, maybe I've just completely got the wrong end of the stick. I'm just doing it wrong. I don't seem to know how to surrender, to allow. I don't seem to be humble. That I am avoiding. I'm good at, sort of, separating, isolating. But I feel better when I'm with Kay and Eliza, and especially with Eliza, there is a feeling of wanting to be close to her that is, on one level, exciting, and on another level, terrifying. But, it is the only thing that creates excitement, and excitement is something that I must follow, and at least explore, in some way, because it wouldn't be exciting otherwise. Excitement is my higher self, my soul's way of communicating with me. So even though, yes, there are times when I feel that I don't know what I'm doing, that I can't go down this road. This road leads to complexity, difficulty, struggle, and yet, there is growth in that. What's the alternative? Magnation, saneness, nothing really, nothing, there is nothing going on. But once I get to the library, and I'm there at nine o'clock as it opens, and I take my seat at that table, which is kind of like, has become my office, and I'll even leave my computer and stuff there and leave the building entirely and go and have breakfast at the charity or go down to the shop whenever I feel like it, so that, unlike before when I used to pack everything up and then obviously someone might choose to be there, just like I do with the van and the cones, I have my space and I want to control it. And it's that controlling that I think is, maybe, my problem. And I've always had this need to control. I have sometimes in the past effectively controlled others, but really, I am only best at controlling myself and even then, I'm not sure that I'm doing the best job as a result. I make poor choices. I notice that my choices aren't as good as they once were, that I'm actually not on it. I don't know what else to do. I don't know how to do anything different, how to surrender, how to let go and let God. I don't know if I have any belief or connection that allows me to, there's nothing, there's no faith, there's no, there's none of that, it just doesn't exist, no thoughts, no beliefs, nothing. So, I just do it day by day by day, same thing, same thing, because it works and it's familiar and familiarity makes me feel comfortable and I'm faced with the mundanity of choices of ridiculousness. Am I having this for breakfast or that? Am I having that for supper or this? Shall I go and get, shall I eat this, shall I walk here, shall I sit there? Just like someone who's retired but doesn't really have anything to do. But yeah, I'm not aimless and wandering and constantly feeling lonely. I'm OK or I was OK. My little world is small and in that smallness it's easy for me to control, to keep it, to just do the things I like to do. I read a lot, I watch whatever I want, I access, connect to, download, get hold of, I indulge my pirate, my ability to pirate and to be a pirate and still take what essentially isn't mine. I just do it. I've always done it. I get away with it. I don't know. Who am I? I bet that were you to ask those who are aware of me or interact with me, have a conversation with me, you know, semi-know me, to describe me, who is he, they would come up with something that wasn't really me. It was a version of me that that's what they see because that's what I show them. Not as an intentional defeat but just because that's how it comes across. I don't know who I am. I'm different in different situations. I feel like I just am the mask sometimes. I mean, this is the real me. I'm speaking honestly from my heart. No agenda, no censorship, just honest. But only one person might listen to this. No one else will. No one else will have the chance to listen to it. No one else will have any idea that they could. Does that change what I say? Not at all. But at the same time, isn't it strange that when I actually do interact with those I interact with, I don't come across like this. I come across as somebody else. That I defer, that I listen, that I don't really speak much, that I don't really offer opinion or preference. I'm okay. I'm open. I'm willing to go this way or that way. It doesn't matter. I'm just happy to be here. Happy to be having this experience because it's so different to the experience I have in my solitude that the contrast actually means that I am happy to do anything. I'll do everything. Can you come in ten minutes? Yep, I'm on my way. Can you come tomorrow? Sure, I'll be there. I never say no. It's not that, okay, it earns me a little bit of money. I'm not short of a bob or two. But I never say no. I'm always up for it. I'm always open to it because it's interesting. It's unexpected. I feel like I surrender. I let go. I let it flow. And I just go with it. And that makes the most sense to me. And I come back to the van. I take control. I decide everything. I am the master of my little life. And it feels different. And it's not as nice. Yes, it's nice to have aloneness and solitude and autonomy and make the decisions and I decide what I do and when I do it. And I don't have to account for myself or compromise or attempt to. And yet, I am arranging in my mind and calling and eventually probably experiencing bringing the potential for chaos into my life by bringing Eliza into my life in a way that connects us even deeper. I feel like I want to be closer to her. And that excites me and scares me. But, what else can I do? Yes, I might feel like this is where I should go in this direction and then as I've done before come to feel like, oh God what a decision I've made and now I've got to live with the consequences and for a while I'm essentially in hell. And hard as it is to get out of hell eventually, somehow I'd manage to but I am affected damaged maybe, but certainly different as a result and regret, sort of maybe have learned something and yet still do it still feel like I can just do it because what else is there? If I don't do that if I don't take that chance if I don't go down that road even though it might lead to somewhere that I am so affected by negatively and regret deeply as if somehow I could have avoided it and should have avoided it and long for the space and the aloneness and the solitude that I gave up thinking that I would like the journey that this road will take me on and then discover I don't What's wrong with me? Is there something wrong with me that I just am destined to just continue to go round and round the same circle? I can be honest and say that I am maybe more than I was more compassionate, more empathetic some of that may be just to do with not altering consciousness with plant medicine and that if I ever alter consciousness with plant medicine again I might see things very differently and yet somehow I'm reluctant, I could do it at any time, right now even maybe not right now, it's a bit late I'll be going to sleep soon but at any time during the day yeah let's just alter consciousness like I used to, in a free way and then let the chips fall where they may see what I see, feel what I feel I don't do that anymore I'm not exactly sure why I can't really ask for advice or turn to anyone in particular because no one can really give me advice no one really no matter what I might say understands what I'm experiencing I understand that now I used to reveal my thing myself very clearly and then receive a reflection that would be based on their understanding of what I'd said and I used to attempt to open to it but ultimately there was no point it's all an illusion that the only one who can understand and change things is me and I can't really understand I can't really change and maybe that's the problem I can't change not enough or not quickly enough I may have changed but it's hard to say because I'm living this life in the present as the change I am I have become I'm not aware of the difference between me and him but I dare say there was tremendous difference if I could see him in the present as he was it would be obvious that there is difference but it's not important actually the fact is that I just am what I am in this moment and am I happy? no but that's ok I don't expect to always be happy do I experience joy? yes sometimes so who can say that life isn't supposed to be ups and downs that there isn't a way or of it always being up maybe it would be boring to always be up everything is positive nothing is a problem just as it would be bad if it was always down everything is a problem nothing you can do negative it's got to be a middle way and that's what life is ups and downs challenges and tests how do we deal with what's happening because if it's happening then it must be happening for a reason and while I can't control what is happening I can control how I deal with what is happening at least I have the greatest opportunity to do that even if there are compulsions and and comorbidities in some ways that interfere with my ability to deal with what is happening essentially I can make choices that allow me to deal with things in a different way what else can you do what else is life for some it's the acquisition of money and possessions fuels and fires them and they get excited about it and they go that way for others service caring for those who can't care for themselves I came across somebody recently who said that the highest honour for him was to serve those who serve others I like that I've struggled to serve others but to serve those who serve others that I can get I can relate to more easily I don't really get to serve others I don't try to serve anyone I struggle to be in anyone's life because there is easily a tendency to offer suggestions to make changes to think that I see clearer about how they see life not realising or forgetting when I used to be like this that I haven't walked in their shoes I don't know what it is they actually see I'm only seeing it through my own eyes while creating a version of them and thinking that I'm seeing them as they actually are when the reality was that I wasn't that's why I got it wrong when I thought I got it right I've learnt enough not to do that to allow to not judge to give space to so that I can see that when I say something when I offer an opinion or reveal some aspect of my understanding it doesn't come out clear it doesn't come out like this it feels forced it feels like it's not really needed it's not really being listened to that really I'm just there to listen and I like that I am able to hold space to give space to the one who's talking to feel like they're really being heard and that's the gift I can give to serve them by being someone who can hear them but I'm not heard I don't feel like I'm heard except when I make these recordings and yet it's not listened to except by maybe one person does that matter? No but I feel like I've said things clear and so I could technically be heard were someone actually listening the feeling of saying something that can be heard that I would be okay with anyone hearing this because they're hearing my truth spoken honestly, clearly articulately I can't ask for more than that I can't express myself clearer than this if there are words I haven't said that they're not needed yeah so that's where I am this is Friday night the world is doing it's usual people are going out and enjoying themselves, they've worked all week they're going to get drunk eat food be with friends, whatever I don't do that it can change of course but I don't do that I don't even really think about doing that it's not that I feel like I'm missing out on anything because I wouldn't really do that I'm happier to just be on my own once the weather warms up and the evenings are light and bright I'll be out walking enjoying the sunset somewhere maybe well not all the time but I can do that then I know I can return then I can watch something or listen to something or read or go to sleep now or get up in the middle of the night and have peaches which I did last night just because I can is that freedom? yeah maybe but I used to feel like freedom wasn't freedom unless I was sharing it it didn't matter that I could have these wonderful experiences, if I wasn't sharing it what was the point? that may still be true to some degree but I don't have that longing, that yearning I must share it I had an experience not too long ago where I got to watch a film with Eliza it happened spontaneously in a spontaneous moment of looking after her and I spontaneously had the idea just because I happened to have my laptop with me I normally wouldn't and we watched a musical together in the hype it was something that I happened to like and I thought she would and she did and I began to remember that feeling I used to have when I would watch it with my ex girlfriends or you know friends, that lovely feeling of sharing something that I am enjoying if it's a good film if it's a good thing if somebody is watching it with me I feel connected, it's a lovely feeling for me I miss it I used to watch things in bed with my ex and that feeling of closeness that came from it was something I loved and I got a sort of a slight feeling a remembrance of that with Eliza which is why I'd like to do it again but in a sense it's like pulling back something from the past if I start to get attached to these ideas, these feelings I'll want more of them and that sort of sucks me in to a world that I'm not really able to navigate well, I get connected, attached even though with Eliza it might be different because she needs she wants she I can't really describe it I can't put it into words but I've been around her for a long time now and I'm getting to know her certainly in a way that her parents just don't see her like that they just don't see her properly anymore they're too close, they're too affected they're too they just can't deal with her so they can't see her properly but I can see her better and I can give her something that no one else can give her I don't think I can give her love that she can feel and I think she does but she's cold, she still has issues and yet there is something there and I'm not rushing, I'm not insisting, I'm not forcing I'm not pulling I'm just allowing it to flow with the feeling of that feeling and it is happening whatever it is slowly, slowly because it's not straightforward she also needs to become better weller older, there's no rush I'm here no one else is doing this no one else can come anywhere near doing this I'm learning to love her I'm learning to know her and she's responding to me in a way she doesn't with anyone else the others actually can say to me she's not making any sense when she speaks it means I can't get and yet I can talk to her and I understand her and she sometimes says to me can I just check, am I making sense do you understand, is everything ok and I said yeah, I understand you fine because she's also told by others that she's not making sense and sometimes sometimes she's a bit off a bit out there but that's ok she's just different the way she thinks her brain is quite diverse but yet I see her and I'm learning to love her when I'm in her company I feel something real there may be a sexual attraction element in there too well maybe I feel like there is but I don't know how much that fuels that because the experience is still real nevertheless for there to be any kind of connection that part has to be present too but it's yeah it's not straightforward so I'm not I know anything I had the same experience many years ago with my first wife where I felt that something was happening that it was inevitable and that she was going to be the mother of my child and that turned out to be true and yet there were and I did my best not to pull not to insist and yet there was a moment when I did and when I did that it kind of changed everything I became attached to her I needed her I was affected by her and it would bother me for the whole time we were together going from desire to aversion so I know that it's perfectly possible for me to think that something is real and then discover that it's something I can't even process that this is not something I want I shouldn't be anywhere near this and yet not only am I near it, I'm in it it challenges me and maybe that's the point maybe it's supposed to, it's the only thing that can relationships other people are an enigma but with Eliza there's something so different about her I've never come across anybody like her, she is so unique so special that it could be that that is where it lies my focus, because when I'm with her, I am just aware of her I'm able to be with her in a way that sometimes I feel like I can't even let her mum especially see because it feels like it would be seen differently to how it is I take opportunities we take opportunities to hug each other but it has to be done generally where it's not seen sometimes it is, it doesn't matter but there are other times when the hug feels more sensual because of this sexual element and I don't want to be seen I wouldn't want to be seen I'm private it's not that it's secret it's just private but Eliza is understands a little bit but then can forget depending on sort of where she is seizure scenario or how much she has become affected by being only with her parents for the most part and then getting sometimes quite angry and aggressive with them she's so emotional she's so she's all heart that that can happen and then at the same time she can just be with me and there's love between us it's quite remarkable really so I don't know what's going on the van consumes me in all of this issue right now but she's there she's always in the periphery and today we had a few conversations on the phone she called me I called her it's not that we're talking about a great deal but it's that feeling of connection and I know she really needs it because she's also quite alone even though she's never lonely she's always surrounded by her mum especially, her mum is so careful to keep her safe and make her and take her and give her and yet she still feels alone because nobody sees her properly and yet I see her and I make her know that I see her and I think that that's maybe something real we shall see