the furnace within
Observo-a com cuidado. (I observe you with care.)
- Jeferson Tenório, O Avesso da Pele
I’ve been really focused on self-discovery and self-improvement for the last several years, basically as a life-pursuit. Everything from learning about different spiritual paths to getting over eating disorders, career hopping from science into tech and and trying to identify lifestyle habits that actually fulfill me (instead of make me feel like shit) have been on the obsession rotation. Course, the successes of these pursuits are oscillating all the time. Whenever I feel like I’ve absolutely mastered something, I fall back into its pit seconds later. It get’s easier, and the recovery time is faster, to overcome these lapses, but the stickiness of some of the mental monsters fills me with agony.
And, in my case, agony is almost exclusively anger.
I see a lot of people get stuck in healing spirals, myself included. Because what we need to heal from is usually the root of our coping mechanisms; but after we address the root, we still have to replant and build anew. I think that shit is the actual hard part, which is why most people don’t do it.
If you stop in the healing phase, you can still view yourself as a victim. And oh, how sweet and easy the victim perception is. No responsibility for the root cause of the pain, and the appreciation for your ability to create coping mechanisms within a situation you lacked control. All true, depending on the perception, but it hardly carves out a path forward where you pain cycles don’t repeat upon themselves. While I vocally admit that healing is cyclical and there will always be more, I’m channeling my focus and energy into creating that new new because I’m sick of the pain cycles.
There is so much fire within me; it honestly feels like my veins are flowing with magma. And, despite all of the healing work I’ve done, I’ve noticed that whenever I find myself trying to pretend like I don’t have this passionate, emoting, energy within, my mental monsters reappear with force. I think they’re my own internal alarm system, letting me know that something is off and needs immediate adjustment. Rather than believing that this means I have a 100 hours of healing to do, I simply pivot in a new direction.
My mentor created a reference sheet for me related to my Human Design, and how to effectively leverage it for re-empowerment and overall life satisfaction. The two energies, above, are my current fixations.
Whenever I feel out of sync with myself, being a quick temper or I notice my less than desirable coping strategies rearing their ugly head, again, I’m practicing leveraging the these energies to pivot in a new direction. I’ve found that creating these new, uncharted, paths are more mentally challenging because it requires me to act out in perceptions that I hope exist, that I feel exist, but that I have no tangible proof that they exist. I often feel like I’m proceeding forward in life with a fuck ton of delusion….
I will say, though, that it is working out a lot better than I anticipated. Things really do fall in to place when it’s the right path, at the right time, even if it takes a significant amount of work to accomplish a given task. It just feels like the energy and willpower is there behind it.
For instance, me coming to and receiving a visa in Brazil. Ever since I visited Brazil in 2022, it was like this visceral energy chord was attached to my chest, pulling me back. I knew I needed to come back and stay. So, I find it absolutely humbling how the timing of this pull manifested during a time period where an uncountable number of things that had to align for this to be damn-near effortless to accomplish. There had to be government initiatives in Brazil to create a Nomad Visa. There had to be law firms set up to advertise to Americans for full end-to-end support. Hell, the company I work for had to have the infrastructure to support remote engineers from anywhere in the world, which they only created after a global pandemic occurred. There were so many things outside of my control, and years prior to my own desire to go, that lead to this even being a feasible path to begin with. It’s humbling to me to reflect on things like this.
Which is what brings me back to my fire…
My fire is my power, even if it burns others. It’s actually supposed to burn others (into awareness), and I just need to accept that fact. But I have hope that the right people will stay, and have a bit of fire repellent of their own so my presence isn’t too “cruel” or “violent” for them (and, yes, evidently my stillness and silence is just as violent as when I act out my discontent). A lot of people have not liked it, and a lot of people will continue to not like it. It’s not personal; it’s just energy. The more I learn to really lean into that, despite not fully understanding how that perception will play out (or how to personally benefit from it….), the more I can allow my confrontational energy to flow.
And, honestly, how can the right people for me find me if I’m not allowing the disruption within out?