Picture Analysis

I remember my first crush. He was 11 or 12 and I was 10 or 11. He had shaggy brown hair and blue eyes and he liked to show me how to do things on his family's farm. We rode on tractors and captured, killed and skinned moles. We played in the wheat silos until I got asthma real bad and had to go lie down.

We spent all day long running wild in the corn fields or down by the creek. Our hair got lighter and our skin darker as the summer wore on.

I liked his stories and the way he laughed and the adults noticed how well we got along. I couldn't admit that I liked him but I think they could see it.

There was one picture of us on a horse. We had been riding all over the farm, he in front and me behind. I felt hot being so close to him and was self conscious about being right up next to him. Touching him.

When I looked at the picture of us riding along so close, so intimate, I couldn't believe how awkward and silly I looked. My hips were right behind his but my chest was a foot away from him. I was as far away from him as I could get and still be on the horse. This was too close for me, touching a man, this was too intimate for me.

I have a great friend that's been married for 15+ years. They have beautiful kids and have achieved a lot in life - if you care about material stuff. Their photos look like my horse picture. She holds everyone away from her - even her husband.

After 15 years.

Look at your photos. Can you see the relationships in them? How far away do you keep people. Who do you put your back to and who do you hold close?

Practice Humility

I have this nasty little monster. The one that wants to look better than everyone else. The one that judges other people and then "notices" how much better I do/wear/know things. The one that looks at a suitor's car before I will go out with him.

This part of me thinks it's protecting me. It thinks that if I just figure it out then I'll be able to make the "correct" choice. It's the part of me that wants to avoid pain - all pain - at any price.

Now, this is not to say that I am a masochist and enjoy pain - though there was that one relationship that seemed to be mostly pain - but, I think there is good pain and bad pain.

Good pain, you say, are you kidding?

During the school year of sixth grade one of my friends gained close to six inches in height. He went from being the shrimp to a big awkward young man over the course of the year. I remember him rubbing just below his knees and complaining about his "growing pains". That was what his doctor had labeled them. The pain was from growing too quickly.

To me, this is good pain. When I am working on myself and recognizing my defects and admitting my mistakes, it's really hard. I want to look good so admitting my deepest darkest fears is scary. It's being vulnerable. It's being courageous. It's growing me. It's good pain.

Then there's the pain of hiding. The pain of staying in my little box. Doing what I've always done because I can look good doing it. The pain of self judgment, criticism and comparing my insides with your outsides. The pain that makes my life smaller and smaller until I disappear.

This self pain is the pain I learned from my family. The pain that I continued to perpetuate on myself even when my parents and grandparents were gone. There is no growth in it. No one wins and everyone loses. This is what I consider "bad pain".

The monster has lived with the bad pain for so long that it's familiar, it's known, it says "oh, that's just life".

This monster, my ego, is always what creates the pain. When I let go of the monster, the pain goes away and what is is.

Simple really. As long as I remember that it is what it is, that nasty monster loses it's power over me and I remember that what is is actually pretty darn good today.

Humility. A novel approach to life.