It's been a rough few days here on the homestead. I'm a break it down for y'all.

Way I see it, I've got two Big Things that I need to work on. One Thing: I get angry about money stuff. Which I don't like and which I'm all too aware comes directly from how my folks dealt with money when we were kids. My dad got (and gets) angry about money. It's fear and feeling out of control that fuels the rage fire. I know it. I got the exact same relationship with money honey. I could be feeling really good, really great, but then some money thing comes up and I completely and totally LOSE IT.

Three years ago (was it? Or four?) I made myself physically ill with the panic attacks over money. I went to urgentcare for my scary heart that felt as if it were beating right out of my chest (which it most definitely was not--I was just freaked the fuck out). I bent my body so far out of shape that I had my period for six weeks straight. So this week, when I realized all of our accounts, including savings, were completely wiped clean and that I didn't even have the cash to pay for a lunch that I was required to go to (for which I will be reimbursed, but that doesn't help if you ain't got it upfront, you know?), I got mad. But it's been shortlived and luckily, no one except the car door has felt my wrath. I call that personal growth. Excellent.

That's my number one first priority with my anger--recognizing it as MINE. Finding ways to release it, deal with it, wallow in it, whatever, but without inflicting it on anyone else. My parents had terrible fights about this and I don't want that in my life. I'm a peaceloving punk, after all.

We've got a tight month here but we'll get through. Here's my goal: to not let my self get wrapped up in the whole money thing. Having no money does not have to remind me (as it does, every time) that I am not writing, that I miss the dogs, that I'm worried about how the next year will go, that I think I'm a bit of a failure on the whole being a grownup front. I have to stop hating money. I think: I HATE MONEY and that's not it either. Money is neither good nor bad. If I hate it, that's giving it too much power over me.

I'm sorry to sound so psychobabbly. Sometimes I just can't help meself. Oh dear. I just can't stop! I'm going in for more! I'm swimming in psychobabble! Come join me! The weather is so fine!

Big Thing Numero Dos: Smoking. I read that Allen Carr book. I want to be free of this thing. But it's the same with money--cigarettes (unlit) are neither good nor bad. It's my relationship to them that's the problem. The constant struggle against them and the constant thinking about them and the hate and the love and all the ritual I've attached to them=giving some thing else, other than me, power, that is all out of proportion, over me. I mean, sure, we all know why people should not smoke. Smoking Is Bad. But that's not helpful. And it's not going to make me stop. What I need is to retrain me brain--just like I need to do with money--so that I don't attach all these other needs and desires to cigarettes. I am not a smoker. That's what I need to start remembering, to stop equating myself with cigarettes.

I want this because I want to be FREE, not just for all the health/financial/social benefits. It's letting the darkness in to live in such painful dependence, to worry myself stupid like this.

I tried stopping just before Melissa came for her visit and I wasn't ready in my head yet and I fell so low when I lit up. It's shame, pure and simple. Shame is about the most crippling of all the nasty demons. I don't want it. I was ashamed too, when I didn't have the $20 for lunch on Tuesday. That's not who I want to be.

Oh friends. It's not about will power. It's all about love and redemption. I ain't good at struggling against things--I could never stop something simply by saying: And Now I Will Stop Smoking eventhoughtIrillyrillylovesmoking. Because then it becomes this colossal struggle against something which gives the something way too much power. And also, remember? I'm a peaceloving punk, after all. I'm not fit for struggles.

I find life and happiness so easy when I let it be easy. So so easy and joyful. It's simple, really. It's not struggling against desire or longing, it's feeling that desire all the way through into its center and there you find the ancient wisdom. Struggling against my own life, which I did for years believe oh believe me, makes me deeply unhappy. Waiting for the good parts, wishing for it to begin already, dreading and hoping and fighting, I've got to let it go. The good parts are now, are always. I get to choose. I'm scared, too. Scared of the failing (which is all wrong-headed and yousee? I've still got a lot of work to do on this so I'm a shut up now because I just can't take it anymore! No!).

In sum: I don't hate money and I am not a smoker!

P.S. I'm sorry if you hate me after reading this. I know it was very very very selfhelpy. I love you. Bye.