Okay then, “controlling” it is.

If you know me you’re laughing wildly right about now. When I say my work in my thirties and forties was on control…well, if personal work could be described physically then my efforts to unpack my need to control would be best described as climbing Mount Everest on half the oxygen then competing in some sort of mountaintop marathon once I reached the summit. My gut tells me I should add “without food or water” to that description.

Undoing my controlling tendencies was — ahem — challenging.

I spent my first few decades convinced if I could just control the events around me I could live a peaceful existence. Work triple hard to make sure all my shit was in order, never forget anything, never miss the mark on my assignments, and (a detail no type A controller likes to admit) make sure the people around me stay in line.

Controlling folks never phrase it like that. We have all kinds of pretty-it-up descriptions like I just want the best for them and I just don’t want them to have to learn the hard way like I did. Except when you strip it down you’re saying I know what’s best for them and I see what’s in their future better than they do.

Say it with me, folks: me me me me me me meeeeeeeeee.

My need to control my environment had a lot to do with controlling my anxiety but the irony is my attempts to control everything around me contributed GREATLY to my anxiety. Byron Katie described it as fighting reality — well, sort of, let’s just sum up that point in this way so I can keep it moving. That banging up against what actually is can keep us stuck, unhappy, angry, anxious in ways acceptance never would. The finer point of accepting the reality but also deciding whether it was tolerable for me took work that’s beyond the purview of this post.

Linda hosts Stream of Consciousness Saturday. This week’s prompt is “open book, close eyes, point, write.” When you’re ready to sit down and write your SoCS post, open the closest printed matter, close your eyes, point to a word, and use it as your prompt. Use it any way you’d like. Have fun!