The budget didn’t support a trip to Limerick this week but that won’t slow this train down. Have keyboard will type.

About a month ago I took a trip to Maryland. It was unexpected, it was life altering.

Within me there was a general disturbance of spirit, a malcontent which made life I can’t say difficult but it certainly didn’t make life simpler.

We unpacked a lot during that trip and the humor in that is we didn’t even begin to do any of the heavy lifting that my journey requires. It would take literally months to get at the core of some of these issues and she doesn’t have that kind of time and I didn’t have that kind of energy. I am thankful though she was willing to expend the energy she did.

One of the ongoing issues I’ve had over the years is seeking permission to exist. Yes..me. By now you understand that I don’t seek permission for some things, but that didn’t happen overnight. It took decades to get to the point where I accepted some of the truths of me which you see now and wonder how I am able to sit so comfortably in that particular truth of me.

This permission thing though, is something that I am going to have to unpack with a state licensed professional, possibly one who can write a Rx. In the interim, there are things that I can do to elevate my quality of life and I am currently doing them. The difference is tangible. The difference is evident.

I am a different woman after that trip. I won’t say better because I’ve been this chick all along. I am less restrained in accessing some of my power and that my friends is long overdue.

I got to return to that place a week ago, and hearing her say I was different helped cement the changes I’ve put into place after the trip. Those changes are becoming habit, that habit is going to reveal a version of me I am not sure you’ve seen. Glimpses appeared and were swiftly snuffed by the learned behaviors of life. I’m in battle mode though and this particular battle is about me with me and FOR me.

She reminded me that I walked into her house one person and left another. She isn’t wrong. It’s my work to love that different person and I don’t require permission to do that.

I’ve joked for close to a year now about Nu Nicole and she’s finally here. She’s still got some shit to do, but her foundation is poured.

Like most things though, it creates questions. I view things differently, and I am more in tune with the messages the universe is sending me. I can believe in the universe again, without that nagging terror that it will cause a series of unfortunate events. Yes I am going to go through some shit. Hell truth be told I am in the middle right now of said shit. How I am managing said shit is a little different though, no a lot different.

I am learning how to trust the process. I am learning how to not shut down. I am less apprehensive with feeling. I will improve.

My overall energy is different. How the people around me respond to me is proof of that, if I required that validation. Something as simple as a performance on a stage I’ve been on dozens of time is tangible video evidence of Nu me.

I still have fears though. Big ones. In those moments as I examine those fears, I get to the bottom of me. I told a friend that I didn’t know what my BDSM life looks like now. I sort of still don’t. Since my emergence in this public realm I’ve been one thing. That one thing still rings truest to me, it is still representative of who I am, while I am also ……more.

For quite some time now I’ve described myself as a person who ______. She still exists. She still needs to be fed. There is more to her though, and those other parts are also in need of substance.

While I process this last month, I can say aloud that clinging to the defining relationship of my adulthood was in part loving that girl who existed with him. The permission she needed to exist she always found within his presence, and the longing is not for him, rather it is for that safe place. I walked about terrified that #5 would appear, and I don’t have to any longer.

Number five is not something I need to fear. I won’t be an idiot and say never, I’m working hard these days to keep the universe from saying hold my beer.

What I am saying though, is I better understand the compulsion, the attraction, the need and because I understand it better, that will prevent me from making the same mistakes. I will make other mistakes but not that one.

I don’t need that confirmation from belonging to him. I can give that to myself. It’s not going to be an instant process, but it also doesn’t have to take decades. I got this.

Since I got this, I can now imagine what life looks like where I am the source. I can create. I am.

I still need to serve. Not serve as those around me describe it but as I understand it for me. I still need to have control. Surrender is the primal urge within me that needs to be stroked. In this moment though more than ever before I understand that I don’t have to wait for it I can manifest it. I can create it. My longtime joke of it not walking up to my doorstep is no longer truth. If that is what I desire I can make that happen.

It means doing some more work, to get some things in order. I am going to need some help along the way. Asking for it though, doesn’t seem as daunting as it used to. And those around me who take issue with how I get to that point will accept or reject but I still can get this done.

Kewl

Aphrodite Brown