Subconscious Wisdom

Heya! How's life treating you? How's the job? Love life? Kids?
Wouldn't it be nice to meet up once in a while, have a cup of coffee and just connect with each other? But if you plan to sell me insurance, you might as well forget it.

I'm kidding. You know, one of the things I love best about having this blog is how comfortable I am sharing my life stories with a small group of readers. It creates an illusion of intimacy. Each time I blog I imagine talking to a specific person, but I can't picture the face. It's not necessarily anyone real.

But the problem with intimacy is I also feel like a self-absorbed ass talking about myself all the time. Yes I know that's what a blog is for, it's just that I wish there was more interaction apart from a comments page.

I appreciate all of you who ever left a comment. I would not claim to know the answers, but if you can learn something, especially all the mistakes I've made, and little things I discover in my journey to make sense of my life, then please, share with me coz I sure as hell never seem to learn.

Well, what else is there but to continue talking about myself. It's the last day of my sabbatical and I'll be back to work again. I'm not quite gay as a bird yet, but getting there gradually. The trick is fooling my subconscious. Have you ever tried rationalizing with your subconscious mind? I tell you, you might as well command the seas to part.

Okay, here's an experiment, those of you terrified of ghosts. I once tried walking alone into the jungle during a camping trip. My mind was sharp as a tack, I don't believe in ghosts, but no matter how much I made sense to myself, I just couldn't lower my rapid heartbeat and quaking knees.

After several minutes I just had to run back to my friends in a panic. And all the while I was thinking bewilderedly, "What the hell is wrong with me? What am I so scared of?"

So it is with love. I tell myself I'm over her, and by all accounts, I cannot think of a logical reason why I should still be sad. But I am. From my dreams I know, my subconscious is not about done just yet with letting me off the heartbreak ride.

It's funny how the subconscious works huh? Funny as in downright intriguing. There are workshops, courses, books and shit all teaching us how to train (fool) our subconscious mind, to be more successful, more punctual, more disciplined.

And the passage of time is not always the answer to convince your subconscious that you're over someone.

I had a girlfriend once, let's call her DT, who ran away for a week after a quarrel. What were we quarreling about? Well, I was enraged she was always close to this married older man who had business dealings with her office. But let's not call him married older man, instead, let's name him Adultering Asshole.

Anyway, after our quarrel, we did not speak or see each other for 2 days. Then I called her on the third day, already somewhat calm. No answer. Called her office, they said she took a week's leave. Called her home, they said she went overseas. I was frantic with worry and anger, as you may well imagine. By the fourth day, I was driving myself nuts picturing all the sins she was commiting with Adultering Asshole.

When she finally came to see me after a week, acting as if nothing happened, I knew we were finished. She admitted she was with Adultering Asshole to see his overseas operations, coz she was considering a job offer from him. Now, that might sound like pure horseshit to you, but the thing is, it was a plausible excuse to me.

So we did manage to move on, but still broke up shortly after.

Fast forward a year and a half later. I was with a friend who knew both Adultering Asshole and DT. Somehow we came to talk about DT and how I used to date her. And then he told me what Adultering Asshole shared with him before - that he took DT on a week's vacation to a local island resort.

That instant, I almost had what is known as a brain aneurysm, partly from gripping my balls so tightly but mostly I think, from triggering the suppressed hurt and anxieties dormant in my subconscious.

I pressed my friend for details (I think he became a little alarmed at how upset I was). I pieced together the information and got the truth I've always suspected. I was shaken for the whole night.

But the next day I was surprisingly feeling alright, like suddenly finding out I didn't have cancer after months of tests. (just a metaphor) I'm thankful I had space of over a year to discover the truth, because if I had know then when I was still with her, who knows what I would've done. My subconscious finally let go. I guess it couldn't earlier, always holding on to a suspicion that I was right.

And you know what? I reckon that's what letting go really means. Letting go of all your grudges, unresolved suspicions, hurts, and guilt. You need to come to terms with your painful past, because just shutting it out of your conscious thoughts doesn't erase it from your mind. The more you store it in your subconscious, the more screwed-up you get to the point you don't even know what's wrong.

So now, even as I tell myself I have no reason to be upset anymore, I know it's only because I don't remember. But my subconscious surely does.