The value of unacceptance?
I like to say "I've come to self-acceptance' but it feels false. What is the function here?
My issue can possibly be stated like this:
"One can not achieve self-acceptance, because it negates the process of living. If you accept yourself, you've stopped growing, or trying to grow, something which you should never do. You should never fully accept yourself, and never can. Total self-acceptance is something for your death-bed, and must only be achieved as the final lights begin to dim, otherwise, you've given up somewhere along the line."
However, I could possibly die in ten minutes' time. My brain could spontaneously hemorrhage as I type this sentence. (Phew!)
Is it 'parts?' You accept one or another 'content' of the unconscious as you go along, always knowing that there is more to achieve? Or is 'acceptance' a temporary meditative state that you experience and strive to achieve the ability to 'go into' when you need to? The third eye? It feels like it in the moment, for sure. But it still does not negate growth.
I 'accepted' that I was CD long ago. I had no conscious guilt of what I was doing in that arena. But I was also resigned to a meaningless existence and death, and it wasn't until I looked back and examined the thing that I had to force myself to NOT accept the way I was, and delve for deeper meaning. I CD'd, sure, but that did not mean that I was living anywhere close to full potential in the rest of my life, which tormented me. I had no career, no joy, no purpose.
CDing was a 'behavior' I did. It was harmless and meaningless, so I thought. I was wrong on both counts. It was harmful, but the harm came because I viewed it as meaningless. It was a fruitless waste of time, a diversion, distraction. I couldn't accept wasting time anymore, and something happened, some self-awareness grew out of it. All I had to go on was the fact that CDing was one of the only things I'd done, consistently, for decades, while most other interests came and went like the wind. It had to have meaning.
I stopped accepting my CDing as being a 'personal' thing, something I just 'did' that should not be questioned by anyone. I started to look for universal themes that applied to why I dressed. Otherwise, it would make me feel alone, even among other CDers.
And then I found a whole sea of darkness underneath of it. I found that the 'reason' I dressed was due, in essence, to a 'larger problem.' but that this 'problem' could be termed 'the human condition.' Dressing ceased to be a harmful diversion, and became the window to the soul, where personal strengths and answers awaited. It jived with what I was reading from Jung. The anima is the inner personality that faces the unconscious universe, and through it, one can explore that world with a guiding hand. I had to come out of myself as this personality, and become it, integrate it.
I told my lower-self, who I once was, while dressed in the mirror. 'I am going to take over your life. I am everything you fear, and you must give it up to me, so the totality that is us can live."
And that was terrifying for 'him.' It meant the death of his ego. But at the same time, 'he' understood the truth and necessity of it, and yielded to me. He was a CD. I am not, of you get me. He was a stereotype which I seduced and put to final bliss, devoured through a process. He was the shadow, the personal unconscious. Now he's my 'quiet little friend,' instead of me being his. It works much better this way, just a rearrangement of the pieces on the board.
Suddenly CDing was no longer a diversion, but a 'spiritual pursuit of truth.' A therapeutic tool of growth and self-exploration. At first, to call myself a CD, meant that I wanted to dress like 'a girl.' Makyo, stereotype, false for me. It was not me. A non-fit. I can't dress like "a girl." It means nothing. I can only dress as called to dress, for whatever reason, pursuing whatever vision called.
A year ago, I mostly dressed like a 'clown,' closer to what I was seeking, in imagery, but still unable to word, and still an ill-fit. Clowns are archetypes of one's inner creatures, but I was still holding to a bit of the stereotype, and had not honed "MY" inner archetypal creature to where it's image did the job required. (A lot of 'growth,' for me, is essentially in coming to experience the collective archetypes hiding behind and masked by the personal stereotypes.)
But nowadays, when I dress, I dress like my 'spiritual/astral body.' Or of the anima image personified and transferred onto self, or the inner self, or something...something not influenced by opinion, rationalization, or conscious effort to be something else. And it all makes sense to me, somehow. This fits more than the previous iterations, and forces one to search and be honest with oneself. I am growing, I think, towards higher spirituality and wholeness, and service. My life is fuller today, and I am on a path to having a career doing something I was always fascinated with, and I am happier, and those around me are happier,
...But it was all for finally NOT accepting myself in the original form, for not accepting the community's 'reasons' and labels and pidgeon-holes, but instead painfully challenging and examining myself from all angles I could muster. (I became quite the masochist about facing painful things.) Challenging and working through the personal unconscious to reach the collective one, so to speak. Being able to relate to other people by touching the empathy of how we are all the same person, once we get past the personal darkness.
Is that 'acceptance?' Is it 'embracing yourself,' or insanity? :D How can you accept yourself if you don't yet know yourself? And how can you come to know yourself if you're busy trying to blindly 'accept' without looking?
Now, it seems that my only option, the one that feels the most 'right' is to no longer see 'myself' at all. I have to keep a balance of focus outwards , and 'accept' (that word again, lol) what is directly reflected back from others, as a real part of my identity. I am contented that I can see this, but is it acceptance? Not really, I think.
From another point of view, though, accepting the existence of a 'content' is but the first step to integrating it and putting it to work for you. Maybe one is not destined to fully accept oneself, but only to bring more and more into awareness.
"Gimme gimme shock treatment." :)
Wen, please be careful of OVER THINKING things!
While I agree with MOST of your salient points, I think in many ways, I've passed thru the, "thinking things thru", phase of my life! I'll tell u why.
I was angry and frustrated during my teen and early 20's, and was "fooled" by my subconscious during the War. For years after, I tried to figure things out.
I FOUND the answer FOR ME! I simply wanted to be happy!:)
In my late 20's, I began to do things that made me happy. Whether anyone else approved of them, or not. When I worked, I tried to be successful! I found when I was, it made me happy! And, as got older, there became fewer and fewer things that I had ever wanted to do, that I haven't done! Re-doing old tasks, and re-visiting exotic locations that once made me happy, didn't any more. :straightface:
Then, in my 50's, I discovered CDing! Which makes me VERY HAPPY!:D
And, I have no idea why! :brolleyes:
After 13 years of CDing, I still deal with CD guilt. I still think of Sherry as some strange and lovely apparition! I certainly have not internalized her or accepted what I do! I know my subconscious is VERY involved in all this. But, have received no conscious clues! I'm still not aware of any "female side".
I KNOW there's more to my CDing than meets the eye! But, the longer I enjoy dressing, the less I think/worry about the personal, curious "reasons" that I do!:eek:
Because the secret of life for me is, to do what makes me happy! And whether or not I understand the reason(s), is becoming irrelevant!:straightface:
