I Want the One I Can't Have

For a while now I've been asking for something that I wasn't sure I'd ever get -- more clarity around why The New Englander is in New England instead of here with us.

Today I received what I've been asking for in the form of a letter from him. I'm not sure he said anything new, but I was able to hear him and accept what he said in a way I've never been able to do before.

Part of that shift came this week while listening to Hardwiring Happiness in the car. The author said something that really changed the game for me, which was all about the difference between wanting and liking, and how they are two totally different neural circuits, and how the wanting is associated with craving, clinging and compulsivity in a way that liking never is.

And suddenly I knew that what I have been struggling with for so long -- the intensity of the want that I have felt for the New Englander that makes me believe we must be right for each other and we should be together -- is actually just incredibly intense wanting. It isn't all the things that I need or want in a loving partnership. I've known that it wasn't, but I kept coming back to the want as evidence. Turns out, the want isn't evidence of anything healthy, so now I can just notice it, be with it, but not choose to get carried away by it as I have in the past.

Phew! What a relief! And to mark this day I leave you with The Smiths' treatise on wanting:

On the day that your mentality
catches up with your biology

I want the one I can't have
and it's driving me mad
it's written all over my face

A double-bed
and a stalwart lover, for sure
these are the riches of the poor

A double-bed
and a stalwart lover, for sure
these are the riches of the poor

A tough kid who sometimes swallows nails
raised on Prisoner's Aid
he killed a policeman when he was
thirteen
and someone that really impressed
me
it's written all over my face

On the day that your mentality
catches up with your biology

And if you ever need self-validation
just meet me in the alley by the
railway-station
it's written all over my face

How Soon Is Now

It's a Smiths' kind of day today, sayeth the inner jukebox, and this is the particular number it selected:

You shut your mouth
how can you say
I go about things the wrong way
I am human and I need to be loved
just like everybody else does

Uh-huh. And I think the combo of being away and alone this weekend, not seeing my kids for five days, and missing their first days of school is really exacerbating the Smithsness I've been dealing with in general lately:

There's a club if you'd like to go
you could meet somebody who really loves you
so you go, and you stand on your own
and you leave on your own
and you go home, and you cry
and you want to die

Ok so it's not that bad, but it sure would be nice to be excited about living again. I've been thinking that I need to do some volunteering so I can get some perspective, but I'm not sure where exactly to focus my energy. One of my former yoga students sent me a FB message a couple of days ago saying she'd remembered me saying I'd like to teach yoga in a mental health setting and was I still thinking about doing that and if so, she'd love to help. So that could turn into something cool -- something that adds a dimension of rightness and goodness to my life -- because I'm sick of feeling sorry for myself or feeling so low or however you want to describe the current state of affairs:

When you say it's gonna happen "now"
well, when exactly do you mean?
see I've already waited too long
and all my hope is gone

Ok, not all my hope is gone, just a big chunk of it. See that? Got a little perspective just by blogging about a Smiths' song!

You shut your mouth
how can you say
I go about things the wrong way
I am human and I need to be loved
just like everybody else does

Yes I do. And I am. I was. I will be.

Now will be just as soon as it needs to be, even if it isn't as soon as I'd like it to be...

Asleep

Asleep I ain't. Again. These early morning wake-ups are not a good sign, but they seem to be my body's way of dealing with what's happening, or maybe my body's way of telling me I need to come to a greater level of peace about what's happening. I'm not quite sure, but having The Smiths as a soundtrack at this hour is making it a little easier to be awake:

Sing me to sleep 

Sing me to sleep 

I'm tired and I 

I want to go to bed 

Turns out, I may not just have been hearing I'm free the other day because I was happy to be on my bike. It seems I'm now free in another sense, too, because my love has decided he doesn't have what it takes to be in this relationship all the way, which is what I've been asking of him, particularly lately.

Ouch.

Yesterday morning when I was up early, I read a chapter of a book by one of my favorite teachers, Pema Chodron. The book is called The Places that Scare You, and the first chapter talks about the rawness of heartbreak, and how being cracked open as we are in heartbreak always comes with a choice: are we going to allow this experience to harden us, or let it soften us instead? And even though there's no small part of me that's angry about this circumstance, I know that I'll work through that, and let it go, and I know I'll use it to soften, but goddamn it hurts to have to give up a dream.

But I've done it before, and I landed on my feet that time; I'm sure I will this time too. It's not like I can stop loving him overnight, but it feels important to acknowledge what's before me and make some space for all that I want and need to come into my life, in whatever shape it takes.

Looking at these lyrics, I can't help but think about what it might be like to have my love move away, as he is talking about doing this summer:

Sing me to sleep 

Sing me to sleep 

And then leave me alone 

Don't try to wake me in the morning 

'Cause I will be gone 

Don't feel bad for me 

I want you to know 

Deep in the cell of my heart 

I will feel so glad to go

Will he? I've been asking him to see if he can determine what his heart really wants, but at the moment it seems to want things that are in conflict with each other. I've been there, and I know how hard it can be to deal with that. But I did deal with it, and although I can be (and have been) supportive of his process, ultimately, I need to release him and let him do what he'll do on his own.

My request to the Universe, borrowing from the lyrics of The Smiths, is for someone to:

Sing me to sleep 

Sing me to sleep 

I don't want to wake up 

On my own anymore 

Sing to me 

Sing to me 

I don't want to wake up 

On my own anymore

That's what I want.

This beautiful, sad song is appropriate for marking this day for one more reason than those I've written about above. Mostly when I hear it, I think about someone dying, and someone very dear was born five years ago today and died five years ago tomorrow. Talk about having to give up a dream; the dreams that are woven while a baby is in one's womb are some of the sweetest and most tenacious.

And although I don't know that this true of my friend's baby:

Don't feel bad for me 

I want you to know 

Deep in the cell of my heart 

I really want to go

I guess I do believe that it's hardest on those that are left behind, in this world, when those we love depart for another:

There is another world 

There is a better world

Well, there must be 

Well, there must be

Well, there must be

Well, there must be

Well ... 

Bye bye 

Bye bye 

Bye ...

Rest in peace, sweet babe.