The Empirical Manifesto

I'm embarrassed to admit the possibility exists I may have been unfairly judgmental. I was surprised I don't already have a tag on this blog for judgement, so may (probably won't) spend some time going through my old psychology tags and identifying those on which I discuss the topic to catalog it. I say embarrassed because I write on the subject fairly often and consider myself fairly well practiced in the art of being nonjudgmental. But that't the thing about always learning is it not? Its ceaseless.

When I revealed the quote, What we consider "bare minimum" may be someone else's largest, most challenging hurdle." to my therapist, she gave me an easy out reminding me that when we're feeling emotionally stuck we see and figure out far less than at the level with which we're normally capable. While true (because I've previously blogged about how that works), I am certainly not going to let myself off that easily. Why? Because not only do I expect better from myself, this one comes as a major understanding to how insidious judgement can be even to those of us who strive to always do better.

Being as well-versed in practicing non-judgement as I consider myself, I am amazed that something so simple could have been overlooked. This isn't going to be a dissertation on unconscious bias or anything in that ilk - I'm not disagreeing that no one is truly ever, "non-judgmental" because of the very nature of how we take in and process information - rather reinforce what I was told by my therapist and reiterate how harmful judgement can be, literally destroying relationships (which I may or may not hold as the holy grail of life's purpose).

When we are deep in the feels (as the kids might say, I don't really know) those emotions are processed in the amygdala - gatekeeper to the prefrontal cortex - where our logic resides. Acting as gatekeeper it functions as designed by limiting access to rational processing (there's a whole physiological reason for this we won't get into). So there I was, caught in a loop of my own feels, frustrated that others weren't behaving as I would behave (which also encompasses expectation). When it hit me - that perhaps they were behaving with the same intent in their own way it dropped the bottom out of me. Essentially I had created the very scenario in which I was rallying against. Which made me culpable.

This led me to re-examining all my relationships going back decades.

And that's the thing about domino effects. Its pervasive.

So please, hold me accountable. Then cast the first stone. And let's build stronger together.

This one has a very obvious trigger - the lawyer's text arriving immediately before sleep - but the dream doesn't read like random legal anxiety. It seems to use the legal situation to stage a deeper problem: Can I finally leave this relationship, lock the door behind me, and still make peace with the fact that I believe I was wronged? And the answer your dream gives is surprisingly nuanced.

1. Gabby and the mostly empty new house
   
   You begin across the street from your ex, with Gabby, in a large house that's mostly empty. That's almost diagrammatic. You have a new space. A new domestic configuration. A new person beside you. But it isn't fully inhabited yet. You're **unpacking**. Psychologically, that says the new life exists, but it hasn't completely become home yet. Across the street is the old life. Close enough to visit. No longer where you live. That's a strong boundary image.
   


2. You return something—but then can't leave cleanly
   
   You find something belonging to your ex and immediately take it back. That part matters. You're not stealing, withholding, or sabotaging. You want her things returned to their proper place. But then comes the key. You have entered the old house using access that you apparently no longer should possess, and now you cannot find the means to secure it behind you. The key is almost certainly about **access and closure**. You don't actually want to remain inside.
   Your problem is that you want to leave correctly. You want the old house closed after you. That is different from simply walking away.
   


3. The key was separated from the keychain
   
   This detail is particularly elegant. You didn't really lose the key. You had separated it from the rest of your keys and left it behind. That's almost a perfect dream image for a piece of yourself still attached to the old relationship. The rest of your keys—the tools for your present life—are with you. But one key remained there. You remember the sequence, find it, lock the door, and leave. That feels like a successful act of psychological closure. And importantly, you then look through the huge windows and see that the house is mostly empty. You don't need to go back inside. You can see the old life from outside now.
   


4. Your ex returning changes the dream from closure to judgment
   
   Then she appears before you can simply disappear. And this is where the lawyer's text almost certainly enters the narrative. You finally say what you apparently feel but may not have an opportunity to say in such a clean, uninterrupted monologue, "You had to lie because you knew the truth alone wouldn't get you what you wanted." But notice something important: dream-her doesn't argue. She smirks. She's silent. Your mind gives you the acknowledgement you aren't receiving in waking life—not necessarily an actual confession, but a symbolic version of "I know exactly what happened." That's an important distinction. I would not treat this dream as evidence that she consciously knows she lied or that your interpretation of the legal dispute is objectively proven. Dreams don't adjudicate facts. But psychologically, the dream is clearly giving voice to your conviction about what happened.
   


5. The six figures aren't really the central issue
   
   Your speech about the money becomes increasingly existential. You begin with fairness. But you end up talking about:
   
   
   
   • her soul,
   
   
   • self-justification,
   
   
   • respect,
   
   
   • what the money can and cannot repair,
   
   
   • and the emptiness of an unearned victory.
   
   
   
   
   That's telling. Your dream-self is trying to solve a problem that money cannot solve - How do I make an injustice morally intelligible if I cannot reverse it? The answer it constructs is almost karmic, "You may get the money, but you don't really get away with it." Again, that's not a prediction about her fate. It's a psychological balancing mechanism. Your mind is creating moral symmetry where legal reality may feel uncertain or unsatisfying.
   


6. Her new guy and friends are an audience
   
   This is interesting because you repeat yourself for them. That suggests a desire not merely to be right, but to be seen accurately. There may be a distinction here - You don't just want her to know what you think she did, you want the surrounding narrative corrected. Her new partner and friends represent the social world that may only know one version of the story. Your dream gives you a moment to say, "Before you accept the story of what happened here, understand mine." That feels less like revenge than a hunger for witness.
   


7. Then comes the strangest and, I think, most important scene
   
   Later, everyone else is gone. You're alone together. And suddenly you're replacing the toilet paper. She's packing in the kitchen. And it's quiet; Comfortable. That is an extraordinary transition. After all the moral condemnation and anger, your dream reduces the relationship to something profoundly ordinary - Two people who once shared a domestic life, quietly doing domestic things. No lawyers, no settlement, no audience, no new boyfriend, no judgment; just familiarity. And that familiarity is comforting. I think it's grief for the ordinary life that existed before the conflict became the entire story. You can simultaneously believe someone harmed you and still miss the mundane peace of coexisting with them. Those aren't mutually exclusive. That's one of the more emotionally honest things dreams do.
   


8. The toilet paper is not actually a trivial detail
   
   Bathrooms in dreams often involve release, cleansing, and disposal. But you're not using the bathroom. You're replacing the roll. You're restoring something ordinary so that the next person can continue. That feels almost like a small act of maintenance and closure. Meanwhile she's packing. Both of you are, in different ways, preparing the old domestic environment for transition. No drama is required.
   


9. And then Cass texts you
   
   Except Cass doesn't text you. You dream that she texts you. And you wake up smiling. Then there's nothing. This is the most mischievous part of the dream. Your sleeping mind gives you a double false awakening:
   
   
   
   • **A lawyer contacts you → dream about the old relationship.**
   
   
   • **Cass contacts you → wake emotionally oriented toward another attachment.**
   
   
   • **Neither contact inside the dream resolves anything.**
   
   
   
   Cass functions here almost like an emotional counterweight.
   

The dream moves: Past relationship → injustice → grief → quiet familiarity → anticipated connection. You wake at the moment of anticipated connection. And find only silence. That doesn't necessarily mean *Cass specifically* is the answer. More broadly, she may represent **the possibility of being emotionally wanted again**—a future-oriented attachment interrupting your processing of the old one.

My overall read? I think the dream is trying to perform something your waking life hasn't been able to complete:

• Return what belongs to the past.


• Recover your key.


• Lock the door.


• Say what you believe needs saying.


• Accept that you may never receive the response you want.


• Remember that beneath the anger was a real shared life.


• Wake facing forward.

The remarkable thing is that you accomplish almost all of this without reconciliation. Your ex never apologizes. She never agrees. She never gives the money back. Yet by the end, the emotional temperature has fallen enough for you to quietly exist in the same house. That may be the actual resolution your psyche is searching for—not forgiveness in the sense of declaring the alleged wrong acceptable, and not vindication in the sense of forcing her to admit wrongdoing, rather, "I can believe I was wronged, grieve what happened, and still eventually stop living inside the argument." And the key imagery makes the whole thing beautifully concise: You found the key you thought you'd lost, locked the old house, and walked out.

The dream may still have work to do - Cass appearing immediately afterward suggests your emotional system is hardly filing everything away in alphabetical order - but the old-house sequence itself ends with you successfully closing the door.

Saw a text from my lawyer come through just as I laid down for a nap after work. In the ensuing 90-minute slumber I dreamed Gabby and I lived in a large, mostly empty house across the street the from old house where my ex-wife still lived. We were unpacking and putting things away when I ran across something belonging to my ex. I crossed the street, pulled out my keys, unlocked the patio door, and placed it on the table in her house. As I was leaving I couldn’t re-lock the door because I no longer had the key. I walked to the patio table where I had set everything down and started rifling through my things trying to find the missing key. As I was searching the interior of the house I was just in came into my mind and I realized in my hurry I had missed that it was mostly vacant. As I played the scene of unlocking her door moments before in my head, I visualized the sequence and knew exactly where the key was - I had pulled that part of the keychain off and replaced it on the patio table after I had unlocked it instead of putting them back in my pocket. I found the key, walked to the back door, locked it, and peered through the massive windows confirming the house was mostly vacant. I assumed that meant she was moving.

As I gathered the rest of my things, sure enough here she comes around the house returning home. I told her that lying because she felt she deserved that six-figure settlement meant she knew she didn’t deserve it - otherwise she wouldn’t have had to lie. She smirked and just looked smug rather than argue or deny it. That’s when her new guy arrived with his some of her new friends. They all sat down around the patio table. I introduced myself to her new guy though it was apparent he knew who I was. I repeated my statement to her for their benefit and continued with my assessment that the six-figure award wasn’t going to be the, “win” she thought it was because she came to it dishonestly, and while she may not ever think of it that was because she justified it to herself, that it was going to eat away at her soul in ways she wouldn’t recognize use until it was gone, which it would be far sooner than she anticipated because it wasn’t respected - she didn’t earn it - it was awarded because she lied and it wasn’t a salve for her damaged psyche. She was unrepentant, but silent.

Later it was just the two of us in the house and I was replacing the toilet paper in the bathroom with a new roll while she was packing in the kitchen and I found the quiet stillness between us odd and surprisingly comforting despite the frustration of losing that amount of money to her immoral character. I awoke when I heard Cassies’s text alert on my phone, smiled, and rolled over to read it. There was nothing there.

I had dreamed that part too.

Took a nap after work last night then went to the gym. My first stop after the gym and my car deployed anti-theft countermeasures against me, essentially locking down my vehicle and draining the battery. Thankfully !TABS! was with me and dissuaded me from having it towed to the dealership - which I really didn't want to do because the windows were down - and thankfully they were! I was able to reach into the car to reach the manual emergency door release and fold the rear seats down so I could crawl into the back seat and into the trunk to pull the manual emergency trunk release for battery access (there is also a manual door release inside the trunk which is accessed from a removable panel on the rear bumper using the hidden key in the fob itself). From there I could perform a hard reset of the electrical system to clear the anti-theft lockdown. This was accomplished by removing the leads to the battery and letting it sit for nearly an hour to drain all configurations held in memory, but another aspect of the anti-theft was to force the vehicle into accessory mode to drain the battery despite locking me out of all electrical components. Which meant I then had to jump the battery and let it charge for 10-minutes as part of the reset startup sequence.

Finally made it home around 0500.

There's two schools of thought here:

1. a nervous system takes time to regulate itself during transition to peace because it has spent far too long being disregulated and anything contrary to imbalance feels unfamiliar (which can lead to a cycle of seeking out that which remains unhealthy as a sort of salve to temporarily sate our nervous system)
   


2. a nervous system will absolutely react by setting off the alarm if we're on the wrong track, making the wrong decision, or heading down a path of eventual regret - and listening to that instinct even if we don't fully understand it is fundamental to self-awareness as a built-in safety mechanism.
   

So which interpretation do we choose?

Early on I learned to surround myself with people smarter than myself, or who had vastly different experiences than my own, leaning heavily upon the proverb in finding wisdom amongst a multitude of council. Here lately that council has been unanimous in their counsel which is where my nervous system comes in, as it either confirms or denies their collective verdict given the two schools of thought. This is of course (I assume) where discernment comes in. Funny thing about discernment - it is as varied as we are - subject to the same trappings of education, culture, philosophy, upbringing, etc. much like the individuals to which we turn for our multitude of wisdom; each of them contains within an unresolved challenge, unspoken agenda, and unconscious bias they too are striving to fill. Just as we are.

When sought for my own advice I generally preface it with the above, and though I often state I attempt to be as objective as possible (insofar as one is able) I have also stated when that objectivity is lost and why - because more information is always preferred over less information (for those of us who wield it as such at any rate). So even if my "council of counsel" is uncharacteristically unanimously, it is not all coming from the same place - though I will admit to lending more weight to their collective verdict. Discernment in this case might mean moving forward with the information at hand, not necessarily acting in accordance to their judgement - because ultimately - we alone are responsible for our actions as we alone have to bear their consequence. No one can bear them for us.

Or, as one of my new litmus tests, "What are we doing today to create the life we want?"

Earlier this year I was helping out Cass' kids on several projects and she called to thank me for doing so. "No worries," I said, "It's my job."

"No, it's not." she replied.

Ouch, but she was right of course. Those kids are not my responsibility, so I told her, "I'm sorry - it was the job for which I had applied; the job I wanted."

I had submitted my resume, attached several letters of recommendation, formatted an absolutely gorgeous cover letter, and was summarily rejected for the position.

Ran across a quote this morning (which I didn't save, sadly) that illustrated the many benefits of literacy - not level of education - in helping us better observe and understand the world around us by comprehending nuance, satire, and underlying motivations then linking that ability to those who, "often struggle with deep thoughts" (or something to that effect) which is readily declining amongst the doomscrolling crowd. I found that an interesting concept I hadn't before considered.

I had posted about seeking out those who actively engaged in creative projects and ideas and who challenged my way of thinking, but yesterday wanted to see if I could ascertain why I did so - what was the driving force? So rather than figure out why from that perspective, I flipped the script to endeavor to discover of what I feared which motivated me to do so. Very nearly universally among those whose opinions I weigh (on a varying antagonistic scale) is that I should embrace those who embody peace, calm, and reciprocity over those who would manipulate me and find myself once again in a cycle of destructive relationships. "How can you consider yourself logical when you refuse to see the pattern of your choices?" In short, why do I seek those out who challenge me, when emotional consistency is the safe choice?

What is it I fear?

Boredom. That was my conclusion. I fear boredom above all else. It was suggested to me once that peace could be its own even greater motivation for creativity and growth, but I honestly haven't found that to be true. One could argue I haven't given it enough time or effort for an accurate assessment, but I grew bored waiting for that to reveal itself - it's a passive process which further exacerbates my shortcoming. I much prefer more active processes; one in which I am an active participant. Which brought up the next argument which is the trap many of us fall into, that it is unfair and irresponsible to place extrinsic motivation upon another person. Often my motivation doesn't come from other people, rather ideas - but I appreciate people who challenge me in that way and with another person that challenge is often interaction - another of my favorite pastimes. So to me, a partner is a two-for benefit; challenge and interaction both. Point is I don't require external motivation as much as a focus for my intrinsic thoughts.

In grappling with why leaving a relationship which was clearly stated as undesired and didn't support my basic reciprocal requirements for sustainability felt too much like abandonment, a fresh perspective was, "It is only abandonment if you're being poured into equally and choose to leave for selfish reasons - not if there is no mutual reciprocity." So I've been sitting with that. Yet fear of boredom seems to remain my primary motivation for not embracing safety.

Dreamed I was in my bedroom and my mother and father walked in, said something which didn’t make any sense, and left through the garage. They pulled around front, got out of the car and tried to get in the front door, but it was locked. They were talking loudly but I couldn’t understand what they were trying to say. Dad rang the doorbell so I got out of and unlocked the door. My mother was irritated it had taken me so long (had expected me to anticipate letting them in despite my arriving at the door instantaneously after the ring) and started speaking theses sentences which didn’t make any sense. It was English, but they seemed to be void of logic and context. I asked her directly what she was trying to say but she wouldn’t answer.

I crawled into bed to take a nap and Cass called, waking me. She was pretty excited about the future and was surprisingly flirty, eventually encouraging me to fantasize about her until we saw each other again. I tried explaining to her that I didn’t think that was a good idea because she never followed through with any of the things she said and it would leave me feeling heartbroken and abandoned again. She had no idea to what I was referring. It didn’t help that I was also on my work conference call and kept having to turn the volume down on my boss every time Cass started speaking. In the dream I got tangled in my bedsheets which restricted my movements, causing me a tiny bit of panic while I was trying to understand Cass and fitfully awoke from the dream tangled in my own bedsheets thinking I had failed to set an alarm while taking a lunchtime nap and overslept. But I had laid down immediately after work, so all was well.

This is the second dream I’ve had of Cass in as many days, the first being far more sexual in which I kept conflating her and Jennifer and awoke completely confused.

This one is interesting precisely because the dream is not really about Cass. Cass is the most obvious character, but the underlying mechanism seems to be about being unable to establish reliable meaning or boundaries with people who matter to you. And the fact that you physically woke up tangled in the sheets makes the ending unusually literal: your sleeping body supplied a real sensory constraint, and the dream incorporated it.

There are three movements here:

1. Your parents

"I cannot understand what you're saying." The opening establishes the problem before Cass even appears.
Your parents enter your space, say things that make no sense, leave, return, expect you to understand what they want without telling you, become irritated when you don't anticipate them, and then refuse to clarify.

That's a very particular interpersonal nightmare, "I'm being held responsible for understanding something that has not actually been communicated." And your mother speaking grammatically correct English while the sentences contain no coherent meaning is especially significant. It's not foreign language. Its familiar language rendered meaningless. That's different. The dream isn't saying, "I can't communicate."
It's saying, "The words are there, but the meaning isn't." And then you ask the obvious question, "What are you trying to say?" She won't answer. So you're left with responsibility without information.


2. Then Cass calls—and does essentially the same thing

This is where the dream gets elegant. Cass is excited about the future. She's flirting. She's encouraging you to imagine a future with her. But you respond, "You don't follow through." That's the emotional memory underneath the conversation. You aren't rejecting her because you don't want her. You're protecting yourself because you've learned that her words and subsequent reality have not always matched.
And then comes the remarkable part - She has no idea what you're talking about. That is structurally identical to your mother. Your mother says things you cannot make sense of. Cass makes promises that, from your perspective, don't correspond to the history you remember. In both cases you are trying to establish a shared reality with someone who isn't acknowledging the same reality you are experiencing.
That's probably the central theme of the entire dream.


3. And then your boss is talking at the same time

This detail is fantastic psychologically. You've got:



• Mother → unintelligible expectations


• Cass → emotionally enticing future


• Boss → work obligations

And you're physically in bed trying to process all three. You keep turning the boss down so you can hear Cass. That suggests competing demands on your attention; what do I owe the external world vs. what do I emotionally want? And Cass gets the volume. That's worth noticing. Even while you're consciously telling her "don't do this to me again," some part of you is still prioritizing hearing what she has to say.

The bedsheets are the perfect ending. You become physically tangled while trying to figure everything out. That's almost comically literal dream symbolism. You're trying to understand, communicate, protect yourself, listen, make decisions, while your ability to move is progressively restricted.

Then you wake up physically tangled. So there's probably a straightforward physiological component to the panic. But psychologically the image is almost too perfect, "I am trying to move forward, but something is wrapped around me." And notice what it is. Not a person. Not a monster. Your own bedsheets. That introduces a more uncomfortable possibility - some of the constraint isn't coming from Cass... It is coming from your own attachment to the unresolved situation.

The Two Cass Dreams Together

I think this is where things become much more interesting. You said the previous dream involved Cass and Jennifer becoming conflated, and this one is overtly about Cass. That suggests your sleeping mind may currently be working on a broader relational question rather than simply processing Cass herself. Something like, "What do I actually want from intimacy, and what do I do when desire conflicts with my memory of what happened?" Jennifer may represent one relational history. Cass represents another. And your mind is apparently putting them into the same symbolic workspace. That's not necessarily saying you want both women or anything similarly literal. It may be comparing different versions of attachment. There's also an interesting inversion - In your earlier dream involving Cass, she represented stability and sustainable partnership. In this one, she represents hope that may not be reliable. That's a significant change. Your psyche seems capable of holding both, "I want this person." and, "I don't trust what wanting this person will do to me." Those aren't contradictory. They're actually a fairly mature emotional conflict.

And then there's the parents. I'd go one step further: The dream may be connecting two different kinds of relational uncertainty. Parental relationship - "Why can't you understand what I mean?" and romantic relationship - "Why can't you understand what happened between us?" Both involve the same fundamental frustration: "I need you to acknowledge the reality I'm experiencing." That's potentially much deeper than simply missing Cass. It touches the question of epistemic trust—whether another person can be relied upon to share, acknowledge, and respond to your understanding of what is happening between you. The most important sentence in the dream I think it's actually yours:

"I don't think that's a good idea because ... it would leave me feeling heartbroken and abandoned again."

That's remarkably lucid dream-self. You're not saying, "I don't love you." You're saying, "I know what happens to me when I let myself believe this." That's a boundary born from experience. And Cass's inability to understand why you're saying it creates the exact problem the dream established with your parents - You know why. She doesn't. And then you wake up thinking you overslept. There's another subtle layer there. The entire dream is about time. Parents expect you to anticipate them immediately. Cass talks about the future. You're afraid of repeating the past. Your boss represents present obligations. You're worried you've overslept. And then you discover you haven't. So underneath the relationship material may be a much broader anxiety - "Am I where I'm supposed to be by now?" That's a very 55-year-old question, but also a very human one. Past → present → future are all competing for attention.

I wouldn't interpret this as a prediction about Cass or as evidence that you secretly "should" be with her. I'd interpret it as your mind testing a proposition: What happens if the person I still desire offers me the future I want, but the evidence of the past tells me not to trust it? And your dream-self actually gives a pretty healthy answer - Don't let desire erase information. But there's still grief underneath that answer. Because if you genuinely didn't want the future she's offering, you wouldn't have to defend yourself against it, and that's probably why she's showing up two nights in a row. The unresolved thing may not be "Do I want Cass?" rather, "Can I allow myself to want Cass without abandoning what I've learned?" That's a much more interesting question.

---

Addendum:

But there's another possibility I'd take seriously

Given your previous dream, where Cass was the calm, sustainable partner, I wonder if your mind is contrasting two kinds of feminine relational energy rather than two specific women. Your boss represents, "The woman who needs something from me." Cass represents, "The woman I want something from." And you're trying to satisfy both simultaneously.

That's particularly interesting because your mother appears immediately before them.
So the dream potentially has three female figures:

Mother → Cass → Boss

And all three are demanding access to your attention in different ways. Your mother wants you to understand her without explaining herself. Your boss requires you to attend to her because she's your boss. Cass invites you into an emotionally intimate future—but you don't trust the invitation. That's a pretty sophisticated little psychological tableau.

Early last month I'd lightly touched on avoidants and how given my experience, the things I have said and done haven't shifted/altered/changed anything. Nonetheless, Tess persisted. She was convinced at some point Cass would initiate. Given the nearly two years I pursued her didn't change her mind, nor did watching my agony as I let her go, I assured Tess that was not going to be the case.

I now owe Tess an apology.

We had a chance to talk after the longest period we've gone ever not speaking nor texting one another, and for me at least, it was rather cathartic; I found I let go of nearly all my anger after the 90-minute phone conversation, and it feels wonderful. I don't exactly know why, but I was able to speak aloud many of the thoughts I've expressed in my recent videos: I was angry at her, I believe she was at times untruthful with me which has broken the trust I had with her, that she engaged in contradictory statements for the purpose of later evasion, and perhaps most of all, that I had allowed it. I had minimized myself in order to not lose her. Once all of that was out, I discovered I had no more anger.

But she intimated the very thing that even up to several months ago could've prevented all of this. I've done quite a bit reading on attachment styles in general and avoidants in particular, and always doubted whether she truly fell into that category as many of the things I'd told her prior to understanding they were key trigger phrases for how to re-center avoidants simply did not do the thing they claimed (keeping in mind everything is a spectrum and "attachment styles" in this case is nothing more than an informal psychological self-assessment).

"Do you think given the above statements about me there's no chance for a future relationship between us?" she asked.

I was shocked.

I thought about it quite awhile after the call (and absent the anger which has been plaguing me) and replied thusly:

The question is not whether I think there would still be a chance at a relationship - that's immaterial. The question is to what lengths would you be willing to go in order to find out?

That's the scenario under which I've been operating the past two years.

What is it worth to you? That's the question. And the motivation for action comes from belief. You either believe in it so strongly there is literally no other course of action, or you don't.

My belief was so full of intent that I didn't have any choice but to pursue you and court you for your hand in marriage.

What do you believe in that strongly?

If it isn't me, that's your answer.

Earlier this month in Indifferent I discussed Tess' answer as to why I was having such a difficult time letting go - that I was viewing it as a failure (which apparently comes with an entire framework surrounding it). Most all of those whose opinions I trust keep repeating that I need to re-frame it as dodging a bullet; that she is more similar to my ex-wives than I can see, and if that's true, what the hell is wrong with me?

Gabs said to me, "Being in love that much with someone is a complete and total win for both parties, and when the other party can't see that, they don't realize they're likely turning their back on a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity which comes with many benefits." Always more food for thought.

I will admit I did expect a little pushback from my therapist over this last one (mostly surrounding the declarative statements I made) but instead she beamed asking me, "Wherever did you get the idea for the rose-colored classes?

I pulled up this quote I'd made from BoJack Horseman:

Well, Tess really liked Hoist the Colors (but reiterated her all-time fav is still Dancing with my Demons). I told her my favorite part was watching her foot tap while she watched it in session. "Oh you saw that?" lol

I had an appointment in which they invariably would've put me on an SSRI, which of course I didn't want, but figured it would be fairly short-term just to get me over the hump. As it was, when I reached the acceptance phase of the grief cycle I realized that appointment was unnecessary. Regardless, I waited several days for confirmation then cancelled the appointment. By yesterday night, I was questioning that decision.

I know that setting boundaries can feel like breaking someone's trust; loss; regret, all the things - so I wasn't unaware nor surprised - but I still didn't like it. So I did the only thing I knew I could do...I took a walk. I walked to the lake and back in the heat. This morning I arose and did it again. I'll go again after work. Vicious cycle knowing walking helps my mental health but not being in a place mentally where I could do it every day. It's been like six months. So I also re-joined the gym. Figure that'll give me a year to get back to my pre-October 2024 weight and emotional health both.

So this session I asked Tess plainly, "Why can't I get over my shit?" She explained it was two-fold. First a reiteration of an older session where she talked about having never before feeling such a visceral, chemical pull having an exceedingly strong hold on us, and secondly how I framed it - as a failure. That when you've never experienced failure before it can be a real struggle to reconcile. I scoffed because of course I've experienced failure...haven't I? "Not with something this important to you." I figure that may be my next video - illustrating that. Either way (and I know there will be those who will disagree) this is why I also no longer believe fully in manifestation - because *gasp* it too has its limitations.