Reflection

There is one good thing about having a Sunday to myself until I have to go and pick up Emily and Catherine from there mum's, it sometimes gives me time to think and reflect upon the past and look towards the future. I have grown to like this time and miss it when I don't have the time to do it.

I think reflection is a important thing to do and it allows us avoid the mistakes of the past and move onward into the future knowing what we want in life. The hardest thing about this process is being honest with yourself about what you have done and where you might have been wrong and rather than covering it up. By doing the former you can forgive yourself and allow other people to forgive you which is not always an easy thing to do, however once you do this you can find understanding of what really went wrong. Talking to those involved helps speed up this process, but this isn't always a option and sometimes we are just left with self reflection which is the hardest type of reflection to do. It something we all should try and do because by covering things up and changing history to stay in control the way forward is blocked. This way of thinking is just a way of running away and not seeing what really happened and why. All this results in is that you just make the same mistakes again and again and you blunder on through life wondering why your world always falls apart making you feel so out of control. When you are out of control life becomes one big panic, a constant running away rather than standing and looking and understanding the problem and dealing with it before it becomes so big that it crashes in on top of us. 

Control is a funny thing. It is something we all like to feel about our lives, that we need to be "in control", but the fact is we are only in control to some degree and not totally. For example we can't control the world and the people around us. The best we can do to the people is suggest a direction that is in tune with our own and the world around us is always pulling surprises that are as unpredictable as a long range weather forecast. It is this that makea the world in we live in grey and not black and white. Most of us realise this and understand that is how life is and this allows us to reflect upon our lives. A mind that strives to be constantly in control will see things as "black and white" or "right or wrong" and feel the need to justify life choices in the same way. For minds like this reflection is hard and brings back the pain of the past and the areas of grey that can cause panic and the things that nightmares are made of. In this pain gets lost the good that was there for that sometimes has to be buried as much as what caused the mind to be like this in the first place, however it is sometimes in this state that reflection occurs and these minds see clarity before they try and regain control and bury the truth they have just discovered. 

Thankfully understand not everything is "black and white". We know that there are things we can't do anything about, however there are times we feel we are totally responsible for everything that goes wrong and it is only through reflection and talking about the past that we can find out what really happened. I have been in that place were I felt and was told it was all my fault and I'm still in that place to some degree, but by looking back and understanding I can make sense of my role in the past and that of others. This allows me distinguish between those roles and discover the truth. I'm slowly returning to the person I was and doing the things with I use to do with the children. In order to do that I have made an effort to understand all I can about the recent past in an attempt to rediscover myself. Somewhere in the last few years I lost sight of who I was, however I knew one thing that was true which still is.

Somewhere I have lost some years and I know they are still there to be rediscovered and worked on. The middle is still rather misty and the fog has yet to clear. I know I will get there and I will rejoice in the rediscovery of the good and understand the bad. Although I'm not there yet or fully healed I do know where I am roughly heading which is better than the place at all because I had the time of reflection.

One thing is for sure I know I will get there as long as I have time to reflect and do it with an open mind. I will do this because I'm determined to heal the past for the sake of the future. I don't blame anybody for all that has happened, it just how things are, the way of the world and how affects us that can't be controlled. I will discover the truth as much as I can and forgive others and myself and move onward....