Underneath my yellow skin

Tag Archives: meditation

Mindfulnot, not mindfulness (part three)

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Yeah, I’m back for part three of my musing on mindfulness. Here’s part two in which I talked about, well, I’m not really sure what. I think I had more side notes tahn I did actual post. That’s just the way I roll, though. I make no apologies for it. I will footnote you all. day. long. I have footnoted footnotes before, and I will do it again.

That’s a word I love, by the way. Footnote. Side note, too.

Back to mindfulness. When I started researching the negative sides of mediattion, I expected to find nothing. I thought it was just me because people seemed to be universally positive about it. “It calms my mind!” “It makes me see the world in such a different way!” “It eases my anxiety!” “It connects me with the world!”

I know that there are proselytizers for anything and everything. I know that. I have lived that. I am careful not to do that myself because I can tip into that way too easily. And, I’ll be honest. The more praise something gets, the more suspicious I am of it. Not because I think it’s going to be trash, but because I know it won’t live up to the hype.

There is only one movie that I ever ended up really liking after being skeptical about it before going to see it and that was The Royal Tenenbaums. I don’t like many of the actors in it, and I did not have hope. Much to my surprise, I really liked it. Other than that, though, I am pretty accurate as to what I’m going to (not) like.

I really wish I had known I was neuroatypical earlier in my life. It would have made things so much easier. Things fell into place once a friend gently suggested that I take online autism test. The irony is that I knew my brother was autistic several decades ago beacuse he exhibited classic autistic traits–no eye contact, did not like being touched, very into techie things (there’s a picture of him gumming an alarm clock when he was a baby, and my mom told me he took it apart around the same time), had to do things his way, and basically stimmed (before it was a known thing).

A few months before my medical crisis, I was talking to my brother, and I casually said something like, “Because of you being on the spectrum–” He stopped me and asked me what I meant by that. I scrambled and backed up, but in the end, I told him what I meant. We’re pretty open with each other, and I did not want to lie to him.

A few weeks later, he called me to tell me that he had looked up autism and it really helped him. i felt bad that I hadn’t told him before beacuse I thought it was obvious and because he knew his older son had it–and his son was a lot like him.

It’s funny to me that he had no idea that he was autistic and needed me to tell him whereas I also had no idea that I might be and needed a friend to suggest I check it out. I thought I might have ADHD, but I never in a million years dreamed I might be autistic as well. Why? Well, mostly beccause of how autism is portrayed in society. What is emphasized when autism is mentioned? Male, stimming, can’t look you in the eye, can’t empathize with other people, low-to-no emotions.


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More on being mindful and meditation

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I want to talk more about mindfulness, meditation, and Taiji. I started a post aabout it yesterday, but as is my wont, I meandered all over the place. And probably fell asleep while writing it. My sleep is just terrible lately, for reasons that aren’t part of this post. So, yeah. Mindfulness? Miss me with that noise.

Look.

Look!

I’m not against mindfulness. In general, I’m pro-doing what makes you feel better as long as it’s not harmful to you in the long run or to other people. And, by not harmful to others, I mean truly harmful. Not, “you hurt me by setting entirely reasonable boundaries” harmful, but actually harmful.

I’m a big believer in acknowledging that most of us are just getting by as best we can. Life is hard, yo. And that’s for almost everyone.

Side note: I had a deep and abiding hatred for Christianity for most of my twenties. I had the  misfortune of being raised in a restrictive, sexist, conservative, Evangelical Christian church. I reacted very poorly to God with a capital G after that.

It took me ten years to get over my hatred. Then, I spent my late-thirties being studiously neutral to Christianity (while secretly judging it). It’s only in my forties and fifties that I can truly say that I’m fine with Christianity*.

Side note to the side note: It’s like Christmas and my birthday. I hated both when I was younger.Really hated them both. Then I reached a point when I said I didn’t hate them any longer, but still felt negatively about them. It took a long time (and a lot of Taiji) before I actually felt neutral about them. Do I feel positively about them? No. But, I’ll take it as a win that I no longer hate both.

Also, I have a new birthday. It’s the day I died and came back to life. It means much more to me than my actual birthday because, well, it just does.

Side note to the side note to the side note: When I was in my twenties, my mom would call me every year on my birthday. Foolishly, I would try to brush it off because I absolutely hated my birthday back then. My mother would get teary and go on and on about how important the day had been to her. That and the birth of my brother were the two most important events of her life. She went on about it for so long, I started comforting her.

That’s my role in life, you see. I’ve called myself her emotional support human, and I am used to it now. Back then, though, it really chafed that she dumped all this on me ON MY BIRTHDAY. It had to be about her, even on a day that was supposedly supposed to be about me. One reason I hated my birthday, by the way.

Wow. I really went in circles in this post, didn’t I?


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The Art of Peace

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“It was so much nicer this time. When you smile, you’re much….cuter? Is that the word?”

My father to me on the phone yesterday about why his trip home was more pleasant this time around. I started laughing as did my mother. I was talking to him through LINE, which mean she could hear him as well. He said, “Is that not the right word? Attractive? Is that better?”

By now, I’m flat-out laughing, but I tell him  I know what he means. He keeps pursing it, and my mom says the Taiwanese equivalent–kuh-ai. I say, “Yes, cuter, but that’s not exactly the right word.” I kept telling him I understood what he meant, and more importantly, I didn’t get pissed as I would have a few years ago or even last year, even though what he was trying to say is a literal meme about one of the most condescending things you can say to a woman.

Last year, I would have lashed out and told him angrily how condescending he was being, blah, blah, blah. He would not have understood what I was saying at all, and it would have gotten ugly. I would have felt pissed off and insulted, whereas he would have felt confused and affronted. It would have gotten uglier and uglier until one or both of us exploded in anger. We both have terrible tempers and are very bristly, so we’re like oil and water.

Or we were, anyway.

I marvel at how effortless it was to keep my temper most of the time during this visit. The thing is, I’ve changed. He has as well, though he’s still more himself. One of my father’s biggest flaws is that he cannot imagine someone else not feeling the same way he does, but for whatever reason, I didn’t take it personally this time. I was able to see that’s just him. His narcissism. His prickly skin. His shaky sense of self and pride.

The thing is, I didn’t have any plan. I mean, I told myself to be chill about it, but I’ve told myself that in the past and failed miserably. He would say something incendiary, and I would explode without even thinking about it. This time, he could say the same thing, and it didn’t push my buttons. I was able to not react to the words and see the intent instead. I was also able to remember his limitations and firmly delineate his issues from my issues.

I know I sound like a broken record, but I credit taiji for the ability to deal more effectively with my father. It’s given me a sense of self that I didn’t have before, and, more importantly, it’s taught me how to relax.

I will admit there are still a few things that have made me snap or that have me on edge. One has to do with my mother. I’ve said before how she has a habit of narrating events from her life as if she’s Morgan Freeman. It’s fucking annoying especially if I’m trying to do something else. Another is her laser-like focus on my father’s ailments. It’s a tricky line because he’s failing in many ways, so it’s understandable that she’s concerned. However, she focuses almost all her energy on him, and I think it’s one way for her to not have to look at how lopsided their relationship is.


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