A good night. Bed at 11, lights off soon after, no radio or laptop (left it downstairs).
I'm noticing a slight creeping in of magical thinking and OCD type behaviour. I've been so manic since Day 1 (in a nice but oh so familiar BPD type way from a long time back) and I think it's beginning to wear off, so I'm noticing these old responses coming back. So I give up smoking (bad idea I think, as B suggested it might be) as a sort of propitiation / preparation for my date with non smoking Annie; and also because giving up drinking made me feel so high, so maybe giving up smoking will have the same effect. Get antsy about doing meditation (which one does not DO) because me doing meditation is keeping me off drinking, keeping me high; ditto exercise; ditto Metanoia - they all start becoming means to ends instead of ends in themselves. And supremely, not drinking becomes a means to an end (what end? see yesterday's blog for suggestions) instead of an end in itself.
And when things become means, that implies that I am doing something, I am in control (little ego I that is, mad I) I am making things happen, which really is magical thinking. As opposed to being mindful, going with the flow, one moment at a time, and each moment sufficient and entire unto itself.
Sunday 12.xi.2017
F got my present, but no sign as yet of Simpson Morfey minor number 3.
So this morning, I thought I might go to church (again! that's the third time in a row, not having been for months) but suspect today I would be going not for fun, because I'd like to, but because I think this is keeping me sober and high.
Or, again, is the problem this way of thinking (for which drinking seemed one very effective way of shutting it up)? In other words, there's nothing wrong with going to church, or smoking for that matter, but there is a lot wrong with my thinking about these things in this magical, OCD, I'm doing this and I'm in charge kind of way.
Good piece today by LM Sacasas on Loneliness and Solitude ( https://thefrailestthing.com/2017/11/11/connection-is-drug/ ) that in fleeing from loneliness we lose solitude. And we try to flee loneliness through our connections to media.
Felicity's 35th birthday today. May be some new little person's Year Zero too. Makes me feel very senior (F being 35) but in a good way. How have I managed to survive?
I thought last night I should get back in touch with Sara Maitland (who wrote about Silence) and her little retreat on the west coast of Scotland. I worried that I'd simply go there and drink. Maybe now is a good time. Via Liverpool Cathedral, Gangotri, Rishikesh, Hardwar, Patna and Kolkata. (Sue Perkins travelling down the Ganges - brilliant, beautiful, and very moving)
At bottom I suspect my fundamental problem is I have an internalised idealised picture of my perfect self. Built up from early on by my ego / elder brother. When I get manic, I think I'm approaching it, and I get low when I realise I never will, and it / my elder brother becomes a reproach to little me. So giving up drinking is a step on the road towards this perfection (as is meditation, or being loved back when I fall in love, or making something good) and then mad ego me thinks, let's give up smoking and be really good, or you stupid little shit, you haven't meditated, eaten your greens, done anything, finished Metanoia, you're a total loser and this will never work (so let's have a drink to shut the fucking voice up). That's the problem with B's wolfie analogy / figure (in a way) - he's not an other, he's part of the way I've put myself together. And if I hate / reject him, I am hating and rejecting a part of myself. Time for a bit of 3-2-1 à la Ken Wilber. I did it once with Gollum and it worked quite well. Didn't stop me drinking though.
Probably best not to go there - that way madness and darkness lies. Just stick to the plan - whatever else, no fucking drinking.
And all this is possibly the real reason why Metanoia has taken me so long to finish (and I still haven't). Because whenever it started to feel like a project, to prove something about me to myself, or to others, I dropped it like the proverbial hot potato. Or is that potatoe? I'm never quite sure.
J Corbyn on Googlebox getting it wrong about the Punic Wars. Was it deliberate (so the Speccy could get its knickers in a knot about it and go on about Corbyn for a column and a half)? And who cares? Jezza appeared not to give a shit, apart from being surprised at himself for getting it so wrong. Good old humble self deprecating not clever clogs Jezza (unlike BoJo who would never have made such a silly blunder).
Got to Belle's get together a bit late. Google forecast 2:05 but it was actually 2:45, the backwash from Remembrance Sunday I think. Jolly lot (Chris, American, now UK citizen, teacher, Egham; Kesia, 3 small children, Maidstone; Tom, young beard, no chat; Sarah, Belle's femme d'affaires in London, and another woman who left early. Belle a delightful surprise, doesn't look a bit like a cake eater. We all left after 4 (nice asparagus, poached eggs and prosciutto on fried bread, and not killingly expensive. Service appalling, the Italian from Padova fucked off after delivering a third of our order!) Drove home via parts of London not actually the A10, but muddled through to the M11, and then home via Newmarket and Stowupland. Had the rest of my chicken and noodles for supper - improved by two days in the fridge - and watched Howard's End Episode 1. It won me over despite the random black maid, Bast's black wife, Hedelberg as pronounced by a supposed German, sunny summer weather (it's supposed to be winter!) and London far too clean. Margaret and Helen Schlegel and their aunt and Mrs Wilcox all very good. Funny thinking back to the last time I watched the film version, at the Lodge nearly 17 years ago, in front of a wretched little coal fire on a cold February night.
Started my poem about the moon over Sizewell. Can one describe it as a Lurpak moon?
Got back too late to meditate. Smoking my head off all day.
Very jealous of Stuart. Christos got him to canoe round to Moutsouna (came back by car) and then posted a load of photographs of a walk they did down below Danakos. Feeling more confident I could actually manage Naxos sober, which would be different, and interesting.
I'm noticing a slight creeping in of magical thinking and OCD type behaviour. I've been so manic since Day 1 (in a nice but oh so familiar BPD type way from a long time back) and I think it's beginning to wear off, so I'm noticing these old responses coming back. So I give up smoking (bad idea I think, as B suggested it might be) as a sort of propitiation / preparation for my date with non smoking Annie; and also because giving up drinking made me feel so high, so maybe giving up smoking will have the same effect. Get antsy about doing meditation (which one does not DO) because me doing meditation is keeping me off drinking, keeping me high; ditto exercise; ditto Metanoia - they all start becoming means to ends instead of ends in themselves. And supremely, not drinking becomes a means to an end (what end? see yesterday's blog for suggestions) instead of an end in itself.
And when things become means, that implies that I am doing something, I am in control (little ego I that is, mad I) I am making things happen, which really is magical thinking. As opposed to being mindful, going with the flow, one moment at a time, and each moment sufficient and entire unto itself.
Sunday 12.xi.2017
F got my present, but no sign as yet of Simpson Morfey minor number 3.
So this morning, I thought I might go to church (again! that's the third time in a row, not having been for months) but suspect today I would be going not for fun, because I'd like to, but because I think this is keeping me sober and high.
Or, again, is the problem this way of thinking (for which drinking seemed one very effective way of shutting it up)? In other words, there's nothing wrong with going to church, or smoking for that matter, but there is a lot wrong with my thinking about these things in this magical, OCD, I'm doing this and I'm in charge kind of way.
Good piece today by LM Sacasas on Loneliness and Solitude ( https://thefrailestthing.com/2017/11/11/connection-is-drug/ ) that in fleeing from loneliness we lose solitude. And we try to flee loneliness through our connections to media.
Felicity's 35th birthday today. May be some new little person's Year Zero too. Makes me feel very senior (F being 35) but in a good way. How have I managed to survive?
I thought last night I should get back in touch with Sara Maitland (who wrote about Silence) and her little retreat on the west coast of Scotland. I worried that I'd simply go there and drink. Maybe now is a good time. Via Liverpool Cathedral, Gangotri, Rishikesh, Hardwar, Patna and Kolkata. (Sue Perkins travelling down the Ganges - brilliant, beautiful, and very moving)
At bottom I suspect my fundamental problem is I have an internalised idealised picture of my perfect self. Built up from early on by my ego / elder brother. When I get manic, I think I'm approaching it, and I get low when I realise I never will, and it / my elder brother becomes a reproach to little me. So giving up drinking is a step on the road towards this perfection (as is meditation, or being loved back when I fall in love, or making something good) and then mad ego me thinks, let's give up smoking and be really good, or you stupid little shit, you haven't meditated, eaten your greens, done anything, finished Metanoia, you're a total loser and this will never work (so let's have a drink to shut the fucking voice up). That's the problem with B's wolfie analogy / figure (in a way) - he's not an other, he's part of the way I've put myself together. And if I hate / reject him, I am hating and rejecting a part of myself. Time for a bit of 3-2-1 à la Ken Wilber. I did it once with Gollum and it worked quite well. Didn't stop me drinking though.
Probably best not to go there - that way madness and darkness lies. Just stick to the plan - whatever else, no fucking drinking.
And all this is possibly the real reason why Metanoia has taken me so long to finish (and I still haven't). Because whenever it started to feel like a project, to prove something about me to myself, or to others, I dropped it like the proverbial hot potato. Or is that potatoe? I'm never quite sure.
J Corbyn on Googlebox getting it wrong about the Punic Wars. Was it deliberate (so the Speccy could get its knickers in a knot about it and go on about Corbyn for a column and a half)? And who cares? Jezza appeared not to give a shit, apart from being surprised at himself for getting it so wrong. Good old humble self deprecating not clever clogs Jezza (unlike BoJo who would never have made such a silly blunder).
Got to Belle's get together a bit late. Google forecast 2:05 but it was actually 2:45, the backwash from Remembrance Sunday I think. Jolly lot (Chris, American, now UK citizen, teacher, Egham; Kesia, 3 small children, Maidstone; Tom, young beard, no chat; Sarah, Belle's femme d'affaires in London, and another woman who left early. Belle a delightful surprise, doesn't look a bit like a cake eater. We all left after 4 (nice asparagus, poached eggs and prosciutto on fried bread, and not killingly expensive. Service appalling, the Italian from Padova fucked off after delivering a third of our order!) Drove home via parts of London not actually the A10, but muddled through to the M11, and then home via Newmarket and Stowupland. Had the rest of my chicken and noodles for supper - improved by two days in the fridge - and watched Howard's End Episode 1. It won me over despite the random black maid, Bast's black wife, Hedelberg as pronounced by a supposed German, sunny summer weather (it's supposed to be winter!) and London far too clean. Margaret and Helen Schlegel and their aunt and Mrs Wilcox all very good. Funny thinking back to the last time I watched the film version, at the Lodge nearly 17 years ago, in front of a wretched little coal fire on a cold February night.
Started my poem about the moon over Sizewell. Can one describe it as a Lurpak moon?
Got back too late to meditate. Smoking my head off all day.
Very jealous of Stuart. Christos got him to canoe round to Moutsouna (came back by car) and then posted a load of photographs of a walk they did down below Danakos. Feeling more confident I could actually manage Naxos sober, which would be different, and interesting.
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