Patterns

Last week Mac went to see his oncologist in Iowa City. I don't know why it bothered me more then usual. It seems to have knocked me backwards. Then everything just slows me down. All endeavors just become fraught with emotion. Soon, the emotion is a bigger problem then whatever caused the emotion in the first place. I can't afford to be bothered. Too much emotion. Too much backlash. Then, a couple of things happened. One friend sent me some information about the Parelli patterns. It is a part of the Parelli horse training program and of course, I couldn't afford to buy the instructions. I'd been craving this instructional set. So some of the pattern information was sent to me. The idea is to teach the skill. Have the horse confident in the skill and then how to build on it. The building is either making the task more complicated or doing it at a higher level, such as going from a twelve foot rope to a twenty-two foot long rope, Eventually the forty-five foot rope. And when you are really good, you work at liberty, which is no rope. I don't know what there is about Parelli but you can't seem to work on your horse without working on yourself. Actually I think I have had to work on myself first. I'm not quite emotionally fit enough for the horse yet, but I digress.... So, I have this pattern information that I am studying. Another friend e-mails me and we get to sending e-mails back and forth. We talk about aliens and ducks and childhood, and how I am trying so hard to make money. How I worry about money. Then it becomes the blinding flash of the obvious. I see my own pattern. Because as surely as there are good patterns that give growth, confidence and education, there are patterns that take them away. I see my childhood of ... you can have this much but no more. You an dream, but only this far. No matter how hard you worked in high school, no matter how smart you are, you can't have a real college education. Then later in life I would be told , "If you try this, then I'll help you when you get to this point." But the help never came. I would be left hanging. You can go this far, but no farther. Sometimes it feels that everything that I tried was stopped short... yanked out from under me. Now, the pattern is learned. I work to halfway and then I stop. If I try to proceed, the anxiety is overwhelming. The pattern is completely ingrained in my nature. I can only start, but never finish. Then the opening is there to be told that I am a failure. And I have certainly been told that. I have been told what I deserve, what is good enough for *me*, what I will be allowed. That's all you will get, because you can't finish anything anyway. The vicious circle continues. So, now what? Well, I have a couple of good things going for me. I see what I have been doing. How I have been subverting my self. Just like I have been trained to do. And, I have been studying how to train, so why not re-train myself? The other thing that I have going for me is that I am friggin' awesome at starting on something new, even if it is a huge project! No matter how beat up I get, I have the capacity to drag myself up and start again. My middle might have to be many, many beginnings until I build on my new pattern and create some endings. The more I succeed, the more confidence I will build. Then the more I will build my new pattern of success. I see this from a new perspective now. I can do this. I can change this. I can start again. Louie