Let's take a moment, shall we?

I woke up this morning confused and frustrated from a conversation last night with my parents over some long-standing theological and psychological disagreements.  They distrust psychology; I distrust church.  Where does that leave us?  I have no idea.  It ended well, and we are all still laughing and loving each other, but I needed a moment this morning to reconnect with myself and understand my own process. My therapist calls it "self-soothing."

Any one else out there struggle with an adult relationship with your folks? I doubt I'm the only one. The point of relationships isn't to always be at peace and in agreement.  The point is to be IN the relationship - tears, yelling, hugs, and all.  Just like the point of life isn't to ARRIVE at conclusions as much as it is to continue the journey.

Joel took my parents to church this morning, and I've spent the last two hours with my latte and journal, reentering my soul, assuring myself to trust the work I've done to arrive where I am (which I believe to have been directed by an all-knowing other), and remembering my core values.  It may not be my parents values, but they still love me and I am proud of myself for articulating that to them with courage.  I've tried it their way and now I need to try it my way.  Isn't that the nature of a child relating to its parents?  We must make our own way and at the end of our lives, they will not be around to answer to.  It's just you and the universe, kid.

Solitude is sacred.  The words we say to ourselves in solitude are perhaps the most important words we will utter in the entire day.  How we feel about ourselves directly impacts how we feel about others.  We cannot intrinsically distrust ourselves and expect others to find us trustworthy.

You may have noticed a theme around these parts lately. I've been somewhat obsessed with the idea of becoming a "real woman." In the last year, I sewed my own my own dress, learned to make jam and pies, and shot guns. Though I've joked about these things being the crux of my coming of age, I realize that I've treated something rather intentional and meaningful in a cavalier manner.

Lemme s'plain.

One of the ways I've learned to be kinder to myself in the last few years is in self-definition.

In a home where there is X amount of love and Y amount of kids fighting for X amount, a child will do anything to stand out, to form her own identity. A child becomes the "smart" or the "athletic" one; she'll be named the "outgoing" one or the "stubborn" one. These labels are not put there maliciously, but they do indeed stick. We are taught from an early age to focus on one goal, to decide who we will be well before our soul's reveal their essence, be this one person so that we are easy to figure out, easy to handle, easy to love.

I looked at my soul carefully, turning over the rocks, inspecting the bugs. Turns out I had a concrete box poured around the garden of my identity. This box was suffocating my roots and killing off the new growth. For example, I used to hate pink just to hate pink, I used to be so serious because immature behavior was irritating. I never wanted to fit into any status-quo of womanhood so I decided that I don't wear short skirts, I don't draw hearts, and I'd never be caught dead doing something as boring as staring at a flower or using my imagination. Granted, I also didn't do some of these things because they simply did not interest me at the time, but I realize that if I had continued on a path that did not allow for my interests to change, my soul would be stuck. Hell, I was so cut off from my natural desires that I wouldn't even know which new things I would want to try. My opinion about them would have been formed well before I had experienced it.

And that's my point. Why do we form opinions about things we know very little about? Perhaps it's fear that breeds the desire to squelch that which we do not understand with petty definitions and wounded resentment for an identity we couldn't have because someone else already claimed that label.


I hated pink, so as an experiment, I wore pink fingernail polish for months. It made me laugh all month because of the frivolous joy of being a little girl. Turns out that I actually don't like pink after all, but at least I know that it's because of my natural taste, not bull-shit labeling.

I thought I found sewing and baking boring. So, I decided to delve into it...break some needles, get my prissy hands dirty with dough! Turns out that I love to create, but was SO PARALYZED that I would look stupid in the attempt or that the product would dash my hopes and leave me with a big pill of disappointment to swallow, that I had convinced myself that I was in no way an artist. But I am an artist. I never thought that a pie would show me that more clearly than my writing or my photographs.

I was scared to shoot a gun at first...which is totally typically girly I guess. But because I was in touch with how I felt on the subject ("Hello, anxiety and nerves. Hmmm, you must be scared to shoot off your big toe. This makes perfect sense! Let's be scared"), I was able to stop using every little thing to define myself. Here's the way it sounded in my head,

"Am I the kind of girl that enjoys shooting guns because I want to appear bad-ass to the men in my life? If that is the case, why should it be about how they perceive me rather than what I actually enjoy doing? And what the hell do I actually enjoy doing, after all? Will the other females think I am doing this to just get attention? Am I doing this to get attention? Is that bad? Why is that bad?"

OR

OR DING DING DING

"I'd like to explore shooting more. I think I started liking because it's a natural curiosity born from being a cop's daughter. Also, I am a voracious learner and enjoy the intimacy of sharing else's hobbies. I'll spend time with this person who can educate me on how to shoot AND enjoy myself in the process. I will be concerned only with what I think of myself and not drown that voice out with the PERCEIVED opinions that others have about me. Also, I like guns because I DO feel empowered, bad-ass, and sexy."

Yes. I vote for the third option.

But let me tell you, all of this filtering takes an awful lot of work. Many find it an exhausting trait in me; many find it an inspiration. This is not important, and truthfully, I wish I didn't know either way, for everyone is easily-influenced to some degree...and I don't want to be doing it for anyone else but me.

And there you have it. CRM version 9.15.09. This is by no means an exhaustive definition of Candace. Perhaps tomorrow she'll will learn to love brussel sprouts and all of a sudden despise Prada (GOD FORBID!).