Monday, March 25, 2013

Love and Belonging ...

It happened that my life put me in a situation where I have to ponder a lot about love, feeling of belonging, and worthiness ...

I read The Gifts of Imperfections by Brene Brown's sometime ago where one of the subjects she talks about is love and belonging. And let me go back and recap.

It seems like in this culture people struggle with feeling or worthiness. I have met so many people that has a long list of prerequisites for feeling worthy:
  • I'll be worthy when I lose thirty pounds
  • I'll be worthy when I make enough money
  • I'll be worthy when I finish school
  • I'll be worthy when my parents approve
  • I'll be worthy if he calls me back and asks me out
  • I'll be worthy when I can do it all and look like I am not even trying
BUT we gotta be worthy NOW. Not ifs. Not whens. We are worthy now. As is. Right this minute.

We also have to understand what is love and belonging.

A lot of people say "I love you" every day without actually understanding what it means to love somebody or to be loved. We don't talk about love. It almost feels like this is a very uncomfortable topic. So, love mirrors shame, how weird! Apparently, we are afraid of those two topics. "Shame and love are grounded in vulnerability".

Another topic that is very important to human experience is belonging. Belonging does not mean fitting in. Indeed fitting is gets in the way of belonging. Fitting in is about adjusting to the situation and being someone the situation requires us to be when belonging doesn't require us to change who we are, but rather to be who we are.

This the definitions of love and belonging according to Brene Brown:

Love: 

We cultivate love when we allow our most vulnerable and powerful selves to be deeply seen and known, and when we honor the spiritual connection that grows from that offering with trust, respect, kindness, and affection. 

Love is not something we give or get; it is something that we nurture and grow, a connection that can only be cultivated between two people when it exists within each one of them -- we can only love others as much as we love ourselves. 

Shame, blame, disrespect, betrayal, and withholding of affection damage the roots from which love grows. Love can only survive this injuries if they are acknowledged, healed, and rare. 

Belonging: 

Belonging is the innate human desire to be part of something larger than us. Because this yearning is primal, we often try to acquire it by fitting in and by seeking approval, which are not only hollow substitutes for belonging, but often barriers to it. Because true belonging only happens when we present our authentic imperfect selves to the world, our sense of belonging can never be greater than our level of self-acceptance.

I wish someone I really care for understood what love is about. And understood how important it is to love ourselves first, and to trust ourselves, and not to be hard on ourselves. I wish that person understood that he is worthy of being loved or loving. There are no ifs or whens needed. We all are worthy of that feeling, and of being love.

It breaks my heart to see a lot of my loved ones struggling with those concepts.

We are such shallow generation that cares about fitting in, putting on a show, dating beautiful people, but all those things are disastrous for ourselves. People's relationships don't mean anything, especially here in Utah. I feel that a lot of divorces happen because of that. They pretend to be what they are expected to be, but it is not them ... And then all of the sudden this whole shallow thing falls apart because there is no real love, no real feelings, no real anything ... it is SO sad ...

Sometimes, thinking about all this makes me want to cry. Why is that that we care so much about the label that someone is going to stick on us? Why? Does it even matter? Does it matter what my neighbor is going to think of me? I don't think so! I don't care if people around me judge me. It happens to me every day, I live in Utah. And I am a foreigner. I dress differently. I act differently. Do I care when those Mormon moms give me the dirtiest looks because I wear black boots on a high heels in the winter? I am who I am and a lot of times I am the weird one ... BUT WHO CARES???


I wish we could just be ourselves, I wish we could take our relationships and feeling seriously and nurtured them. I wish our parents did not have to mess us up when we are little kids so that we don't have all the issues we have. I wish we all could be good parents and had the right approach teaching our children with love and care. I have met so many people that don't know how to love. I have heard so many people say "I have never loved anyone" Isn't it crazy? Isn't it scary?

I hope one day I can be a good loving partner, and perhaps, one day a wife, and maybe even a parent. I hope I can teach them how to feel and have them make their own mistakes instead of confusing them with who they are supposed to be.

I love life, I love love. When I love I love with all of my heart without holding back. And most of the times it bites me right on my arse ... funny, huh? or not really, but I wish there were more people that would pay attention to those things and know how important those things are.

Anyway, now I am just whining, haha. I gotta wrap up and go to bed.

Love,

Kristina








Saturday, March 23, 2013

Little Manhattan ...


"I came over to my friends the other day, and they were watching Little Manhattan, one of my favorite movies. The movie is about two eleven-year-olds from new York. They fall in love one summer, but Rosemary has to go to summer camp, and then private school ... The back story of the movie is Gabe's parents that are going through a divorce for over a year, but they are still living together (reminds me of a lot of families in Ukraine), and Gabe's mother starts to date again.

At some point, Gabe says something that he doesn't really mean to Resemary, and ends up miserable because of it. To avoid the pain, he convinces himself that he doesn't care about her anymore. Later, he is talking to his father about love: 


Gabe: Dad, what's the deal with girls? I mean, why are they the way they are?

Dad: You're talking to the wrong man.

Gabe: Well, how come all love has to end?

Dad: Let me tell you something about me and your mom. Once upon a time, we really loved each other, but as time went by, there just got to be all these things, little things, stupid things, that were left unsaid. And all these things that were left unsaid piled up, like the clutter in our storage room. And after awhile, there was so much that was left unsaid, that we barely said anything at all.

Gabe: Well, why didn't you just say them then, dad?

Dad: I don't know, Gabe. I kind of wish I had.

After this conversation Gabe had a revelation that he didn't just liked Rosemary, he loved her. And he wanted to tell her that he did not mean whatever he said before. So, the little guy risks everything to tell her that he loves her, but that shocks her. I mean she is only eleven after all.

Gabe: You think you might wanna love me, too?
Rosemary: I don't know what I think, Gabe, I'm only 11. I don't think I'm ready to be in love…but I'm really happy you came.

That, “but I’m really happy you came,” made putting his heart out there worth it. And even though they had to go their separate ways, something good came out of his experience. When Gabe came home his parents were laughing and talking together. When his mother left, his dad told him "I just cleared some old stuff our of the storage room" 

"Love is an ugly, terrible business, practiced by fools. It'll trample your heart and leave you bleeding on the floor. And what does it really get you in the end? Nothing…but a few incredible memories that you can't ever shake"

I love this movie, it always makes me think about my love life and all the experiences I have had. I like what Gabe says to his Dad when he said that about "all the stupid things that were left unsaid"; he says: "Why don't you just go and say them then, dad?". Adults complicate things SO much. I do it A LOT. But things are so much easier in real life. It all comes down to two people either loving each other or not, and either willing to communicate, compromise, work on things, or not ...

I also thought it was funny when Gabe told Rosemary all the mean things he did not mean, just to protect himself. It was funny to me because adults do that too. 

I have been in Gabe's shoes when you put your heart out, but there is no response ... or the other person is trying to decide what's best for you ... it sucks ...  should it not be much simpler than that? We should not need games, strategies, etc. in romantic relationships. Am I not right? Perhaps, I am not ... I did not grow up in America. I was a child of teen parents, and to be honest a lot of times I feel peculiar. I mean I do have a big heart, I'd do anything for people I love and care for. 

Anyway, that movie always makes me sad and then makes me smile and provokes a lot of thinking. Talk to your loved ones, don't pile up things, don't complicate anything. Go do it now, it is NEVER late! 

Much love, 

Kristina 





Friday, March 22, 2013

Life lessons ...

Wow, it has almost been a year since I have written on here. So many things have happened I don't even know where to start. I guess I am not going to give you guys all the details about my life. 

As always I have been busy with my life. School has kept me VERY busy. 

I also learned a lot of things about myself this year, and I changed a lot to be honest. 

I love being me. It might sound silly, but I really do. I come from a very tough background. And I love the fact that I was able to use it to my advantage. I was able to turn my heart aches, hardships, etc. into forgiving, loving, caring, and serving others. To be honest, nothing makes me feel better than being helpful to someone. It does not matter who it is, I just love doing those things. There is no better reward than knowing that I made someone's life a little easier and uplifted them in any way. It might sound weird to some of you, but doing those things makes me happy. 

I love life. I love the challenges that it brings. I am just a happy girl :) 

I was reading about Michelangelo today. And I came across this quote, he said: "In every block of marble I see a statue as plain as though it stood before me, shaped and perfect in attitude and action. I have only to hew away the rough walls that imprison the lovely apparition to reveal it to the other eyes as mine see it". I can totally relate this to life. I might be weird I don't know. I mean he is talking about marble and here I am with my analogies, haha :) But anyway, I feel like in our life we might not see things plain and perfect as Michelangelo saw his statues, but we gotta "hew the rough walls that imprison the lovely apparition" to be able to be happy to be able to achieve our goals, to be able to get where we want to be. And when I think about "the rough walls" I think of emotional connections. When we are born, we are naked, not only that we come with no clothes on, we are also emotionally naked. We have not learned yet how to not trust people, we have not been hurt yet, and everything is exciting and new. But once we start growing up, we figure that we cannot carry on like this. We gotta change. We have to learn to be careful, we have to build those "rough walls" to protect ourselves. We absolutely have to. But then once we built those walls, it becomes hard to let anyone in. I mean "we were hurt before, please, no more!" I bet this sounds familiar to a lot of people. But we all know that we'd have to "hew away the rough walls that imprison the lovely apparition to reveal it to the other eyes". It is hard to take our walls down, but so worth it. I have learned within the last few years that if I do let my walls down, I will most likely get hurt, but I also learned that having my walls down teaches me SO much. It makes me a better person and it makes it possible for my heart to really love and care. I might sounds awfully strange, BUT I love it! 

I love seeing little children play together. When they meet they usually say something along the lines: "What's your name? Do you want to be my friend?" and next thing you know they are best friends. Unfortunately, adults are not capable of that. But we once were those little kids that did that at least once. What happened? ...

I also believe that we live in a society to lighten each other's burdens and uplift each other. Today, someone on Facebook called me naive and weird for saying that. And you know, perhaps, they are right. Maybe I am naive, but I like it. 

Let's "hew away the rough walls", let's be kind to each other and uplift each other. It is not that hard to be nice. Let's try it out, let's smile at people, let's not envy (that feeling is so harmful). I know that when I do those things I feel so happy and uplifted. Kindness is contagious catch it and pass it on! And there are really no reasons to be gloomy or unhappy even when things are tough. There will always be people that live a better life than we do and people that dream about what we have in this life. And it is ok :) I figured that the best thing to do is aim high, do our best, and learn to be sincerely happy when we see others succeed. Life is beautiful, it is all about how we perceive it and what we make of it. 

I feel happy, blessed, and I am just SO grateful for everything I have in my life. I love life =))))))) 

Thank you for taking your time and reading it :)