Small Steps Forward

The more steps I take to manifesting my goals, the more I let go of people, places and things not in line with those goals. Actually, it’s less people, places and things than it is my attitudes and behaviors towards people, places and things that I’m letting go of.

Specifically, there is a woman at the shelter that I know from prior to either of us being in the shelter. I see where she could be playing a stronger game of life and I want to help her. Before, I would jump right in and start helping her. Now, though, I sit back and watch.

How to Help

First, I was watching to get a better idea of how to help her. Then I started seeing them. Red flags. They were everywhere. (You know, I hadn’t thought of them as “red flags” until just now, as I was writing.) She told me that a family member didn’t want to give her money to “support her habits” of cigarettes and lottery tickets, and she was upset about it. How dare they judge her, she said, they should just give her the money and mind their business. (By the way, I don’t know about you, but I’m about ready to cut off association with anyone who uses the term “mind your business” in any level of conversation, ever.) She needed carfare, and a family member had given it to her and she’d bought those scratch-off lottery cards. That she’d bought them wasn’t as troubling to me as that she was not only defending her actions, but vilifying their response to her actions.

And then I noticed how she spent her energy. And she seems to be fairly wasteful. I keep remembering her telling me how this or that ride was taking forever, and I found out she was taking the long way, out of the way. And I feel confused because there are maps all over the place and because I showed her how to get to her destination quicker.

And then I noticed that her associations and her interactions were mostly draining. From the people she choose to hang out with, to how she spent her time when socializing.

How to Hinder

The more I kept watching, the less I was interested in helping her and the more I was interested in protecting myself when I did associate with her.

Yesterday, she had an opportunity to make money and an opportunity to go to class and she did neither. She told me she blew the whole day off, due to something which had happened the night before.

When I close my eyes, I get the sensation of me right in front of a flag waver. He’s got a big red flag and I’m right in front of him as he’s waving it back and forth. I can feel the sun on my back and the air moving with the movement of the flag. That’s how I feel as I recall these events.

I remember being on the other side of that red flag. I think that same guy was the one warning others about me. There were countless times someone I thought of as a friend or as friendly would suddenly seem to be distancing themselves from me and I’d be watching their weird retreat, wondering “What’d I do?”

How to Run

I sort of want to tell her. And then I wonder if it’s even a big deal for her. Maybe she’s perfectly fine with how her life is at the moment. And maybe she’s not really interested in what I think or feel about it. I tell myself if my distancing myself is that much of a concern for her, she’ll ask. Closer to the truth is that I think it’s a weird conversation even when someone really wants to know why you seem to be moving away from them. I imagine it being an even more weird conversation when the other person doesn’t care. I look at the energy involved in having that kind of conversation and find that I feel uninterested in the investment. So I’m going to leave it alone. Be friendly, but not friends.

I feel weird though. Like I’m leaving her behind. Like I’m betraying her. Like I’m on the 7:15 out of Hiroshima on August 6th. I know I’m not doing anything special that she couldn’t figure out for herself. I know me pursuing my goals isn’t exclusive, she could start doing the same thing for herself tomorrow. It’s not like I’ve discovered gold and I’m not sharing. But it feels that way.