Day 117 – Emotional

Just like a teenager, hormones can majorly affect you when you’re menopausal.  Today, my nose was blocked, my mouth full of ulcers, my heart heavy and emotions filled with sadness.  Partially, this is because there have been many late nights and a lack of sleep can have that effect on me.  If I manage to recognise and control my emotions in this sleep-deprived state, something happens in terms of emotional growth. 

There were times throughout the day where control was seriously challenged.  A couple of persons, who challenge me in when in peak emotional days had me almost fall short. However, as opposed to normally suppressing it, my voice box worked with me controlling the words, still short but not reflexively so.  That is, there was no need to apologise afterward as the response was still professional.      

If I were to look for a trigger for the emotional state, it would most likely be the change in the circumstances of how we have been keeping the cats.  If animals were extensions or metaphors of aspects of ourselves then cats represent our freedom, independence, free thought, intuition, truth, are defiant and elegant – mostly.  The trigger, then, is the shift in how we need to treat our cats.  Unknowingly, we’ve been on the border of putting our cats in danger.  By allowing them to roam in a non-fauna-precious environment to restricting them 24 hours a day. It’s like being forced to constrain intuition and shut down independence, free thought and suppress defiance.  No wonder I feel like I’m grieving.

Yes. The cats will cope, they’re adaptable. However, if like in dreams the world reflects our inner selves, then their restriction is something which first had begun to happen inside me.  Sometimes when your intuition tells you to move on but you’re comfortable where you are and ignore it, somehow your intuition attracts circumstances which move you on. 

Like in my first fulltime job.  After two years I needed to be placed in a single branch.  This was to prevent burnout in those who were relieving officer travelling across Sydney, filling in for staff who were either on leave or sick.  A permanent base of operations was considered essential. As a “reward”, the relieving officer got to pick a branch, of those available at the time, where they wanted to be placed.  Inwardly, my intuition was telling me this wasn’t going to work for me anymore.  After being in a permanent base then going to relieving staff then back to permanent base it wasn’t going to work.

Looking back, at the time my first marriage to Joe (not his real name) was too soon for the person I wanted to be.  There was time, when I wanted to be able to talk about flatmates, travelling to various countries about experiences, here I was married.  We were looking at land to build a house, this meant a mortgage.  Mortgage meant constraint in my head.  Next would be children, and children meant constraint.  Joe wanted to be traditional; man works, woman home, look after babies.  No, we didn’t talk about it before we got married.  We were late teens, in love – enough said.  Joe’s argument was we could travel when we were older, like other people did.

That was fine, but those other people were telling us to travel while you’re young before you get the constraints.  I was listening to them; he wasn’t seeing them.  What we did agree on before we married was, travel first, family next.  Around that time, the stock market crashed.  The stock market crashing meant an increase in house and land values, putting us in the predicament to decide whether to travel or to settle down – that’s how Joe saw it, anyhow. Pushing the pre-marriage agreement into focus.

There were a couple of other factors at the time which also felt constraining.  So, when the time came for me to no longer roam the region and go to a single branch, I was reluctant.  As relief, I felt like a spy going on missions.  Absolutely, killing each role I was thrown into. Received like a hero for saving the day from the disaster of overworked staff, who would go home on-time because of me!  One branch would be a letdown.  There were others who hated the insecurity of not knowing where you were going to be tomorrow. Not me.  

When the branch choice was removed from me by the selection officer, he placed me in a branch which needed my versatile skillset not the branch of choice.  On arrival at the new branch, I vented.  The vent was to one of the girls I then indignantly stated, safe in the belief no-one except her was listening, I was going to resign.  The accountant walked by and overheard.  He turned to me, “did you say you’re gonna resign”?  The world stood still while I thought, “money where your mouth is, girl?” and said “yes. Saul” (not his real name – my head remembers him looking like the actor Saul Rubinek in Warehouse 13).

That’s how my intuition and the universe moved me on.  While tiredness brought about the emotional state, it’s not the reason – metaphysically speaking – I’m feeling it.  The question is, what are my constraints since the cats’ restriction is being felt so keenly? This time the constraints around marriage aren’t there, work’s okay.  The need to roam is no longer there for me, “been there done that!”.  Just a little more wiggle room in the yard space, not too much – it would restrict our time with tending a lawn.  Oh well, another day’s discussion. 

Let’s see what the cards have to say!