This morning our dog, Neville, began whining in his crate at 5:30.  This has never happened so I thought he might be having a stomach problem. Anyway, I got out of bed and began my day.  It may have been a good choice, I will never know.  I felt like screaming, “Neville, you’re not the boss o’me!”  I fed him and made my coffee and I tried to read my lovely novel. He watched me, sensing I was not happy.  With my stiff movements I let him know I was not going to pet him and hold him in my lap. I handed him off to my husband when he was awake.  Hours later I was still angry about the serenade trick he pulled at 5:30.   At lunch time I saw that he had scratched another corner of his dog bed. I thought, “Ugh.”  This is the sentence I said in my head, “I think I should clip the long black weapons (nails) that are sticking out of his paws.”  

As I was walking to the storage area in the basement to get my grooming supplies, another thought came to me. 

Hint: THIS THOUGHT IS an example of the split second sighting of the true self.

This is what came to me:  “You better not. No, Goofy,  Not today! Not after this morning!” You see, some old and primitive part of my brain would like wrestling with him and gripping each paw tightly while I trim his nails. I am in fight or flight mode and I am robotically about to start a FIGHT!  

If Neville’s nails are short and filed smooth then I prove (like a 3rd grade bully), that I am THE BOSS of him.  

Big Whoop. That’s mature trauma recovery. NOT.

It always is a fight with Neville when he sees the nail clippers come out —  But, Nita!  wake up.. think of this:  You are still holding on to resentment… so, it would be less than noble of you to pick this fight and it would be less than loving for Neville.

In the past if I hadn’t listened to the voice of my inner truth,  the morning’s  bad feeling would have been made much worse.  Fight or flight reliably make every situation worse. 

SO HOW DOES TRUE SELF MOVE DIFFERENTLY?

The true self doesn’t take things on in a heavy handed way. It holds reality in soft hands. The true self is hard to offend. The true self takes things like the loss of sleep and dog disobedience less personally.

Sure, I could do the clipping and discharge my rage about the 5:30 wake up cries.  I could.  And I could lose my soul.   

(I know that seems like an exaggeration… but on matters of the heart it actually isn’t out of scale).

 THIS IS THE POINT

If I didn’t have curiosity about my life story.. and didn’t ache over a pattern/ urge for revenge I would have settled for no change or a small change.

The reason we want to recover from trauma, in the first place, is SO WE CAN BE LOVING PEOPLE and not transmit our trauma to the next person down the line.

It takes a lot of focus to build up a redeemed imagination for the small but vast choice I was given this morning.

Another  truth is this:  You would never know the path I am on.  Am I feeding or starving  my true self? What AM I UP TO? You have no way to discern by watching from the outside. Why? Because it is totally a path for one.  You have to discern your own and you are not clear about what I might be up to.  What is going on down where the marrow meets the bone?

If you came to my house today and praised my grooming skills (because I acted on impluse) and you  lauded the short nails of my pup–you would be praising a bad idea brought up from my lizard brain.

WHY THIS NAIL TRIMMING STORY MATTERS

You can know, as a general rule, that the true self has no way to be visible when a spotlight goes up on a stage.  The minute approval is the point of an action you take, the true self evaporates. This means that the minute I hit the ‘publish’ button to upload these words for this blog I will wreck the true self sighting I had this morning.

True self is not self esteem.  Not actualization.  It is an  elusive feel.  You don’t put on others and imitate them as Buechner said, and you resist fight or flight.  All I can say is this: You know when it is operating. It feels something like confident love.

AND, what are some of the best guides about this?  First, integration  is found by doing your story work.   .   

I also find that buried regrets are informative for living out of your true self.   When I get a fleeting memory of a cringeworthy moment in the past, where I faked doing good with a bad heart… that cringe helps me put the nail clippers down.   Neville still has uber long nails as night falls on this eternally long day.  I am fine with his sharp edges –My plan is to wait a few days to groom him. I will wait until I can come towards him without any sharp edges of my own.