i realize i have been out of sorts of the last couple of months, i think a large part of that is some shame, frustration, and disbelief of what was happening all around me and i think that i thought that if i wrote it all down then it was real, it was recorded, it was reality and, frankly, my reality really sucked and i didn't want it to be real. i didn't want my reality to exist and i was so ashamed that i was allowing it to exist and, not just exist, but that i was growing it and facilitating the existence and sustainment of it.

i think sometimes, i take that back, i know that sometimes you get caught in such a rut and it isn't that you want to be with the person you are with, stay where you are, or that you are at all happy where you are, you don't like the way things are, you just don't want them to change. change is scary, change is unpredictable, change is unknown, change is uncertain, change is different, and for all of those reasons, even in the most miserable of circumstances we stay because at the very least it is predictable and it is known.

i knew john would break up with me nearly every day, i knew that the light in my eyes had completely disappeared, i knew that i was completely and utterly unhappy and, that, my thirst for life had completely left me and all that was left was bitterness and anger.

so what did i do to find my thirst to rekindle the light? i have to say before i "list" everything that i did that, for much of it, i did not realize when i was doing it that i was beginning the healing process and i was beginning to get down to the bottom of me. note: i said the bottom of me, not the bottom of why my relationship didn't work, not the bottom of john, not the bottom of anything else.

it started slowly and unconsciously, then i harnessed it and made it my own.

~ i mourned and i grieved. for everyone this is completely different the time, the how, the place, but the key is to allow it to begin and then be in it, know that you are mourning and don't try to avoid it or stop it, live it. i know that might sound somewhat counterintuitive to getting "better," but i assure you that it needs to happen or the rest is just going through the motions. i literally laid on the couch and stared into the abyss for what seemed like eternity. i didn't do anything, i just thought and thought about what happened between john and i, what he did, what i did, how it happened, sometimes i wouldn't think at all i just laid there in my utter sadness. i forced myself to feel the sadness, to honestly hurt and realize the loss. if i can correctly remember, it was two weeks, two weeks of not going out, not drinking, not distracting, not adverting my attention, two weeks of pure sadness.

~ i got off of the couch. you read it, i got off of the couch. i didn't resolve to do any extraordinary feat, i resolved to get off of the couch. i resolved to take a small step to begin healing and recovery. i also slept, went to work, did everything that was necessary to living because, frankly, i already knew how to do all of that and it had to get done.

~ i spent time with my family. people seem to think that you have to be spilling your heart with your friends or family after a breakup, but just the very essence of spending time with your family was the important part. i went to lunch, i went to dinner, i went to their houses and hung out, i had them over, i went places with them. so much of their mere presence was healing, it doesn't have to be cryfest to be healing.

~ i clung to my friends. i went out with them, i had coffee with them, i had cocktails with them, i spent time with them, and when i did feel compelled i talked about how i felt, i asked the questions that they could not answer, but that i needed to verbalize, i did speak down about john, i just spoke, i expressed my loss, my confusion, my pain, my sadness.

~ i allowed myself to backslide. there were times i called, text, emailed john begging for another chance, trying to sell myself to him, trying to convince him to stay, trying to find closure. i think in a sort of way, this had to be done to, i had to give into the crazy a little bit, so that i could find my sanity.

~ i started seeing a therapist. it's not crazy, it's actually the sanest thing you can do. t.a.l.k. about it. don't just get a therapist that is going to listen to you drone on for hour after hour, get a therapist that is going to guide you to healing, get you do to the work, but the thing you have to be ready for is TO DO the work. you're just wasting time and money if you are not willing to work.

~ i decided to do something that i had never done before. for everyone this will be different; the only thing is it has to be difficult, it has to be a challenge, it can't be just visiting a new restaurant, it has to have tangible results. i decided to run a half-marathon in nine weeks time on january 16, 2011. running has always been my nemesis and i wanted to overcome, sort of in a way that if i could overcome and love running, i could overcome my pain and hurt and love my situation.

~ i practice mindfulness. in every moment, i try to be present in it. try it, sit and drink a cup of coffee or tea, don't think of anything else, just the taste, texture of the drink, the feel of the cup in your hand, the way the drink feels traveling down your esophogus. be there, be in that moment. if you can do the coffee mindfulness, you can do mindfulness.

~ lastly, be you. take risks. live. be here.

19. Does money really buy happiness?
No. Because happiness isn't for sale. Many people get tripped up by this one, amassing wealth only to find themselves cycling into a bottomless pit of unsatisfiable yearning. Turns out, joy and misery are not that far apart when it comes to very big wads of cash. Consider the case of a Kentucky couple who won $34 million in 2000. Thrilled to be released from the demands of their boring old jobs, they frittered their fortune away on fancy cars, mansions, all the usual stuff -- losing everything that mattered in the process. They divorced, he died of an alcohol-related illness, and she died alone in her new house just five years after cashing the winning ticket. When it comes to happiness, only people you love, and who love you, can bring it. If you have enough dough to buy yourself a luxurious yacht, but no real friends to sail with, you're sunk.

1. Can love really last a lifetime?
Absolutely -- but only if you chuck the fairy tale of living happily ever after. A team of scientists recently found that romantic love involves chemical changes in the brain that last 12 to 18 months. After that, you and your partner are on your own. Relationships require maintenance. Pay a visit to a nursing home if you want to see proof of lasting love. Recently I spoke to a man whose wife of 60 years was suffering from advanced Alzheimer's disease. He came to sit with her every day and hold her hand. "She's been my best friend since high school," he told me. "We made a promise to stick together." Now, that's a love story.

I realize that I write you long emails, on average, once a week. I apologize for that, I really do. I am in a weird place right now and feel. Oftentimes when I write these emails they go unanswered because of busy schedules and lack of time and I receive abbreviated answers, none at all, or a confusing and foolish act. I know you may think I know that answers, and maybe I do deep inside, maybe I just need to hear them again so I can once again digest them and do my very best to accept them. So here goes…

I don’t really understand what direction we are headed in, friends, moving toward each other, moving further away, to an end, to a potential future? What is it? I keep trying to set boundaries that I am unable to keep and maintain and it dawned on me that I need to come at this from a different angle. I don’t need to make “Turner bans,” I need to work on friendliness, but also being guarded and finding a way to protect and heal a heart that aches for you.

That being said, I do want to tell you, somehow, where I am now. I am still the same Alicia you met two and half years ago, as I was last year, and as I am now, but there are things that are different about me. There are behaviors I have changed and actions that I take to be healthy, mentally and physically. I am doing all of those things that you thought would have “saved” us, and I am not doing them to impress you, I am doing them because I truly want to do them. I truly want to be a good and better mother, I want be at the gym, I love it, although I remain guarded, I enjoy talking and hanging out with my family. There are other things that I have begun to do because I want to, I have friends, I feel bold, I feel good about me, I like me, I am comfortable in my own skin. None of these things are fleeting or temporary, they are real, they are my reality. If those things could have saved us, couldn’t they maintain us and help up thrive now?

On the matter of us, I believe that we have improved. We are supportive and understanding of each other, we show raw emotion, and it isn’t rejected or belittled, but heard, we seem to understand each other more and better. I believe that we should give us another chance. I believe that we should, well, date. Instead of saying that it wasn’t working, we tried, it wasn’t working, take a good and honest look at the progress and differences now, and give what could be the rest of our lives another chance. We can’t go through life allowing our pain and our past dictate how we behave and how we live. I would like to try us again. I believe in us. I believe we might even fall in love with each other again, but in a different and healthy way.

If the above isn’t what you want, isn’t where you are, tell me, even if you think you have told me a dozen times. I’m not going to “ban” you from Turner or from me. I will simply be more cognizant of the things I need to do, the interactions I need to or don’t need to have in order to remain healthy, to grow, to heal, and to find true and real love again. I won’t be mean or spiteful or angry, I will accept. I believe we belong together, I believe we need each other, I believe in us, but the thing about all of that is a relationship isn’t one person’s decision, and one person’s love, feelings, or beliefs can’t change another’s.

I, again, apologize for sending this to you when you are so incredibly busy and tired. I’m sorry. Also, no matter what the response, you are still invited to Shrek, if you can make it.

last night i had the worst dream and the worst part about it it seemed like it could be a reality. for whatever reason john and i were at dinner with some people and steve radolinski was there talking about a lisa leonard necklace that i had told him about. john wanted to know when i had told steve about those necklaces, he was livid. i tried to let it go and not talk to him about it and told jen about it, she said she would talk to him, i hadn't heard anything so i went to john's at like 3:30am. he opened the door, i went in and he got back in bed, when i saw a bra on the bed i asked if it was mine, then he shined the light on the other side of his bed and there was jennifer, there she was. they had slept together and he told me "now we're even." I was sobbing, literally sobbing, and all they did was stare at me and do nothing. i started running down the stairs, john started running down the other stairs, he caught me before i could get out of the building and started yelling at me. i woke up sobbing, sobbing and even now, hours later, i haven't been able to shake it and i don't like it very much. i am so angry, and it only adds to everything i feel about last weekend, about john and i not being together.

i want to be with john, i want him to be mine, and if he doesn't want that i need to find a way for the pain to subside. i need to.

we become what we behold...we shape our tools, and thereafter our tools shape us.    ~m. mcluhan

stop looking at yourself as a designer, and start thinking of yourself as a deliverer of ideas.

found