Finding Connection

This is hard to admit, because admitting you like things leaves both you, and the thing you like subject to ridicule when you are dealing with Cluster B personalities, and then well you know the cycle it triggers your PTSD reaction, you shut down. Which is exactly the reaction your cluster b person was hoping for, because only their opinion matters, and only they can like a new thing. Remember it is always about them, or their self esteem is so badly damaged they need to destroy someone else.

So here it is, OK GO is one of my favorite bands ever. I love the pop music dancefest style. I love the lyrics. And I LOVE LOVE LOVE, the nerdiness of their onetake style of music videos. Even if they aren't actually done in one take.  A great example, and the song that turned me onto the band is right here.

However it should be noted that it wasn't actually all done in one camera, because robots aren't fast enough to pull that off yet. So they used a series of robots and cameras, and made it a single simultaneous series of actions and explosions with three robots and cameras connected together to look like one camera, one take. Well I suppose it is one take, but not one camera. Here is a link to the making of, because almost every video they do has a behind the scenes video.

So as you know I like using video and recipes in my "Cookbook", and I like a good setup. So that's clearly the setup for today. And lately I have been pulling "friendship" and "intimacy" from some of the people on YouTube that I follow, from Facebook, and from other social media connections. However, (and I won't say I am done with that, because progress is not a straight upward line, it's a journey), I have found them hollow.  I have learned the less money I have in the bank, the more anxiety I have, it doesn't matter if my bills are paid or not, it's just a massive anxiety trigger for me. So as much as becoming a real person and not a business scares me, I am starting a new account for my business in January. Why wait til January, taxes silly, why else?

That way I have a distance between me, and my real life, and my business. Maybe build in a padding so I don't get so anxious. I also started looking to work for someone else. Who knows if it will work, or if I will find a good fit in a firm, but I need more connection than I have.

I have also started being intentional about connection. I built a huge skillset as a survival mechanism. Of course I planned the skillset so that I wouldn't need people anymore. Yeah that was a failure. It seems that with my current career, leaving behind all of civilization and walking into the woods forever isn't a real thing I can do.  Life Sucks, what can you do.

Where was I? Oh yeah OK Go so here is how all this comes together. Does Ok Go create all of their amazing nerdy mathtastic, precision, accurate one take videos by themselves? Nope, the video above was sponsored by Morton Salt. They do it by reaching outside of themselves and finding other with different skillsets.

I've been involved in a few movies, and audio projects since I got back to doing this. And these are massive collaborative projects. The business plan is done in connection with me, and a team of about 5-6 people, a couple of producers, the money, the project creator, the script writer, the script editor, etc. The budget same thing, a whole team of people is involved. This is a simple business project.

People fail when they try to do everything themselves. And sure after enough failure you become good at things. (If you don't believe me, just ask any good saxophone players mom or dad.) I still wish I had taken the clarinet and not the trumpet, no forward thinking at eight years old, oh well. I digress.

So at this point I have put people in my life whose job it is to tell me no. I am consciously developing mentors, I may never have had a real dad, and I may never have one. I do have people who are more experienced than me in areas who can help me with things. I need to invest in them, and allow them to invest in me. And the first step in that involves sometimes asking them for help. Sometimes it works, sometimes it doesn't. And I have to be ok with that.

So you start by asking someone you trust, for me it was my pastor. And start connecting with that person, text if they are into that, (sometimes older people can be dodgey when it comes to text, accommodate their needs), email if needed, definitely meet in person, meet their needs. Find ways to be with them, even if you help them move. (Speaking of got a weird call today from someone I am going to consider a friend, I mentioned that I was moving my stuff into my unit and out of storage. She offered to help me move. Yeah that is definitely a friend.) {Meghann you are awesome girl, don't let anyone tell you otherwise, of course you're moving too next month, and I have less stuff... Wait, IT'S A TRAP!!!!}

Where was I? Yeah so find ways to be with mentors. And also find ways to connect with people who maybe can't help you, but whom you can help. {Yeah that's right I said whom, I know when to use it. ;-P} It's not a one way connection. You have to give it away. Yes it's scary. It's downright horrifying, when all you know is betrayal. When everyone you love is looking for the opportunity, and blam, backstab. However it is necessary, we were made for connection. I don't know where you are in the cycle of recovery. Maybe you need the safety of relying on yourself for a while. That's ok.

Don't stay there. There is a Jewish Proverb that says "He who goes too far alone, goes mad." And that has certainly been true for me. In fact this post was going to be about "Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them," and why I don't think you should watch that movie. #triggered Ok not seriously, but seriously, there is child abuse depicted offscreen in this movie. So keep that in mind.

Find connection with people around you. Start slowly with a few people, and build out from there. Don't expect to build a new life overnight.

The Party Starter Fondue

cook large beef bones, in one part water, and one part dry red wine
With a whole onion, clove of celery
(Yes the whole thing of celery)
and 8 carrots
Simmer overnight
In the morning strain the liquid.
(You are keeping the liquid, you can freeze the rest for a soup later if you like. That's what I do.)

Cut chicken, fish, steak, lamb, whatever meat you want into short strips

Saute bacon with a whole chopped onion
3-4 cloves of garlic chopped saute with bacon and onion
Once complete add the bacon bits, garlic, and onion to your stock
To this add Fresh rosemary, fresh Thyme, Bay leaves, and a whole sprig of parsley
Cook the herbs and liquid for 30-40 minutes depending on your method. (Sterno will take forever to heat up the liquid, and depending on your crock pot, it may be better to get it to temperature on the stove.)

Invite friends, (have them bring raw vegetables) and cook with a package of those wood skewers if you don't have fondue forks.

Now you may be wondering how you are supposed to keep this hot. In the living room, or where ever you want your guests to be. There are a couple of ways to do that. I like to use sterno, and light it right on a coffee table, and use a couple of bricks on each side to keep the quart saucepan hot, and above the flame. You could have everyone gather in the kitchen, but that's not very practical. Or you could use a crockpot.

Once I get settled into my new place I am having a housewarming, and I am doing a full Fondue layout. I love fondue. If you are interested in it, I can put my fondue recipes in the Cookbook in a future post. I actually have a few new posts I am working on, let me know what recipes you want to see me master, or bump up and out in the comments section.

Good journey my friend.

Going Grey Rock, or Secrets are How I Survive

There is a term in recovery circles, specifically related to dealing with narcissists, and other sociopaths, called grey rock. I recently found myself living with family. I am tempted to employ cognitive dissonance, and say they aren't bad people. Because the truth is they are products of their environment. They became the best version they could under horrific circumstances. But neither can I say that they are all good people. They behave very badly as all humans do, some worse than others. What I will say is that they are living the only way they know how. I can lead them to water. I can recommend therapy, but you can't make someone who isn't willing get help. Not even with a court order. I know, I am a lawyer remember?

I don't know where you are in your journey, or how much you have followed and read on narcissism or other cluster B disorders, so I am going to use a few terms for shorthand. There are other blogs that go into more detail, and I may do that later, but this isn't the time for that.

Grey Rock: by its nature it is invisible, because, BECAUSE it is so boring. There is no reason to pay any attention to it at all. It gets ignored. It becomes invisible.

Cognitive Dissonance: Knowing something isn't true, but having no alternative, but to believe it as a matter of self preservation. Any child who grew up with any kind of narcissistic or other abuse will, or should understand this. You defend your family, and fight to preserve the family structure as a matter of survival, and tell yourself that it isn't so bad. Even though you are afraid, you tell other people they are inherently good. Deep, deep down you know it isn't true, but you have to separate yourself from them before you can accept the truth of what is.

Stockholm Syndrome: Where a person relates to, and even defends captors, in order to survive. It becomes Stockholm syndrome, when you actually start to believe your own lies. You believe they are true. Children in abusive households often have this. Because children are dependent on their parents for survival. When the parent is the one harming you, there is no safety anymore, for a child this is a level of terror you have to live in order to understand. Safety doesn't exist, and children understand their own vulnerability at a certain point. This is usually reinforced by the abuser when they blame the victim of abuse, for the abuse. This may be reinforced by a non-protective partner of the abuser. In my case, my mother. While she is an inverted narcissist, (dependent on narcissists for her own self esteem), she was not generally the one doing the beating. Instead she made excuses for the abuser.

Flying Monkey: They do the bidding of the narcissist, much like the flying monkeys in the Wizard of Oz movie did the bidding of the wicked witch. They may be weak. They may be narcissists themselves, or they may just be duped. In any case, they assist the narcissist, and take up their cause, whatever it may be.

NMirror: This is the person the narcissist focuses their true self loathing on. Everything they hate about themselves that is too much to bear is projected onto the mirror. This person can do nothing right, eat, talk, stand, sit, breathe, literally nothing.They literally train you to stop living yourself, and let them do everything for you, make all your decisions for you. Of course if things still don't go well it's still your fault.

So at some point I figured out that the more boring I became, the less abuse I suffered, mentally. Physically it was a crapshoot. If food went bad, I was supposed to know a loaf of bread that was just bought was moldy, for instance. If I didn't, face meet wall. It was a personal failing that I couldn't magically know it was already bad. he hit me so hard I bled at times, which made a mess I had to clean up, because I failed at bleeding, but enough about me. Beatings were often, arbitrary, and sometimes completely random.

Remember narcissists thrive by creating drama in other people's lives. And the NMirror suffers most of all. There are two ways to limit this. One is to disappear, you are simply gone, as far as the narc is concerned you don't exist anymore. This is when flying monkeys usually come in, get information, and try and convince you that the narc really should be a part of your life. After all they are your father, mother, former lover, baby daddy mamma, etc.

If you are being told this, trust me, don't do it. It isn't worth it. Once you have the strength to cut off that contact, keep it that way. If your narc is an adult, they are responsible for their own life choices. You are not responsible for their life choices. It is hard as empathic people to look an ailing adult parent in the eyes, when they tell you they need someone to take care of them, and tell them to find a home. It makes it a little easier in my experience when you tell them you will help them find a home. I have helped many clients find this strength. But allowing a person like that back into your life after you had the courage to escape is a mistake. (This is a discussion I have with my mother all the time. She says, "Who will take care of me when I am old." I tell her that "I will make sure she goes into a nice home.")

My mother encouraged me to reconcile with my father after he left us. I was 18. I no longer needed to depend on him. I had my own job at that point. I could walk away. He spent the few hours we were together showing off his new life, telling me how great he was, and continually belittling me, and the choices I made for my own life. I decided I didn't need his influence. My biological father sent me a letter when I suggested we could have a relationship, informing me that he had moved on and didn't want to be part of my life. He put this in writing. So from the time I was 18, I have not had a father. You know what? I haven't missed it. I know, I know healthy people reading this think, "More's the pity", perhaps, in my situation this was better. Also don't pity me!

The other method is called "grey rock". My life is not a topic of discussion in my family. I don't post personal things about my life on Facebook. I tell them nothing. I don't lie to them. I simply don't say anything to them about who I am, where I go, or what I do. Since any decision I make is often wrong anyway I see no point to discussing it. I took singing lessons, my mother found out. She wanted to know why. Not was I enjoying myself, or did it make me happy, but why? As if this was a personal insult to her. I told her I wanted to learn to sing better. Of course again she wanted to know why? I replied because I do, and then asked her about her life.

This is the grey rock. If I am brought up, or anything I am doing is discussed the answer is some version of because, or it makes me happy, (although if I say it makes me happy, she will say she thinks it is stupid.) If she continues to press the matter I tell her "I don't care. I love you, and I have to go." Then only way to maintain even a short discussion with me is to talk about herself, or other people. Any discussion about me is diverted, or I respond I don't care. And the truth is, I don't care. I have learned to accept that my parents don't love me, because they aren't capable of it. It doesn't matter if I became the pope, unless it benefits them, it is stupid, and not something I should pursue.

The greatest hubris, as far as narcissists are concerned, is that I would dare have opinions about anything that differs from them. After all they love me, so of course they want the best for me. And they know what is best for me, because obviously I can't make decisions for myself. So at this point, my life is "good, and you?", "fine, and you?", or "not much, tell me about yourself?" I became a grey rock. No matter what they accuse me of, no matter how vile it may be, I do not react. I have no life, only my work, and turn the conversation back to them. You can't react. Reaction feeds them. I choose to let them starve.

I survive because I am invisible. But humans were never meant to live this way. Humans thrive on connection. Some connections are toxic, like the ever sick friend who shares the current disease du jour, some connections aren't worth making. I cannot connect with some members of my blood family on that level, worse that I would dare connect with others who aren't blood or otherwise connected to them is not only unfathomable, but repulsive ... to them. It will always bother them that I don't connect with them, but I am not responsible for how they feel.

I am getting back to some semblance of a real adult life, until I can make a life unrelated to all this madness. Once I no longer need to be a grey rock, but I am maintaining for now. I am working on that, and having some success, not enough, but some. Progress is progress after all.

Currently cutting out white carbs, and starting to work out again. So no recipe unless I think of something in the next few days. It's been awhile since I posted, and this one has been lingering for too long in the drafts folder.

Good journey my friend.