The Dangerous Assumption

. . “When first I was put into prison some people advised me to try and forget who I was. It was ruinous advice. It is only by realising what I am that I have found comfort of any kind. Now I am advised by others to try on my release to forget that I...

Path Finder…?

“Face your life, its pain, its pleasure, leave no path untaken.” ― Neil Gaiman . My mother used to tease me about a tendency I had - my attraction to what she called 'mysterious ways'. Mysterious ways = taking the path less traveled. Trekking off through briar and nettle patches when I could just stick...

Toxic Niceness

I really should have called this post something along the lines of – How to Miss Spotting a Covert Narcissist.
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However I wrote this a long while ago in blog time, before Upturned Soul, before the past became the present in the way that it did and I had to re-learn to deal with my own private narcissists.
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It was inspired by an experience which was one of the first of a few that stirred me out of a lull and forced me to figure things out.
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What I didn’t mention in this post, because I was a little less bold then in my writing and sharing, and a little more prone to blurring the details (and old habit learned from being the child of narcissists) was that this incident all happened online, when I was a newbie to the online social media communities. Green got a bit less green quite quickly.
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Someone recently suggested that I should write a bit more about online narcissists. I replied that I would not being doing that beyond what I’ve already done about it because that’s a can of worms I would rather avoid opening.
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I don’t always listen to myself, I’ve learned to not listen to others over the course of a lifetime. Or at least to listen with due consideration. So, we’ll see.
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This is one of my favourite posts, it isn’t my best, it’s just one of those which reminds me… of things which I need to be reminded.
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Narcissists, particularly the covert ones, always come bearing gifts and often look sparkly, lovely and represent an ideal…

An Upturned Soul

So many people move through life pretending to be who they are not, being nice on the surface when they are seething with rage inside, being mean when they have a heart of gold, being cold when they yearn for the warmth of others, being overly helpful when they actually want you to fail, being happy when they are inwardly crying, and being hostile when they are actually terrified. Sometimes people are not aware that they are pretending, sometimes they actually believe they are who they are pretending to be, and sometimes they are doing it with their eyes wide open with deliberate intent.

We all fake it a little bit every now and then, either because we want to fit in when we feel that we don’t, or we’re in a situation which makes us uncomfortable and we disguise our true selves for a while, whilst we figure things…

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When the Thinker becomes a Feeler…

. . There are times when we get so used to being ourselves in a certain way that we can be taken aback when we're not ourselves in that certain way. It can dumbfound us, find us dumb, unable to explain to ourselves or others cohesively what is going on with us. We're us but...

I Inhale Rooms…

. . There is nothing free about free association other than the word itself, but even that is shackled by the thoughts, the dreams, ideals, it conjures. A prisoner of the mind, emotion, a distant sense of something elusive singing a siren’s song luring us to places of fantasy whose reality lies hidden beneath the...

No Worries…

. . “You know that feeling at the end of the day, when the anxiety of that-which-I-must-do falls away and, for maybe the first time that day, you see, with some clarity, the people you love and the ways you have, during that day, slightly ignored them, turned away from them to get back to...

It’s not the face, but the expressions on it…

“It's not the face, but the expressions on it. It's not the voice, but what you say. It's not how you look in that body, but the thing you do with it. You are beautiful.” ― Stephenie Meyer . . . . When I first saw the focus of this week’s Daily Post Photo challenge:...

The Rebel’s Role Model

Can you recall who your role models were when you were a child? The other day I idly asked myself this question, and before I could form an answer in a logical, methodical and wordy manner, my mind was flooded with a succession of images of all the characters, fictional or real, who inspired me...

I Think This Belongs To You

In celebration of this time of year, when a certain event happens which prompts a review of this and that, with trepidation I ventured into my blog archives and ended up on this piece which I wrote in 2013.
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At that time a lot had been stirred up, the past had circled around and made itself the present, and I did then what I always do (at least in the always of now) I wrote my thoughts out to see what emerged, and if it might help me to figure things out.
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It did then, in a way, and it has done now, in a way.
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Revisiting my old posts is not something I do as often as perhaps I should. I keep urging myself to tidy up my blog a bit, but I never do because I prefer to just keep going forwards, evolving this way and that. Sometimes though… a going backwards can assist with going forwards.

An Upturned Soul

From the moment we are born, not our actual physical birth, but the moment our existence enters the conscious mind of others, the moment our birth mother realises that she is pregnant and our birth father realises that his sperm has created a being, people start giving us gifts.

Those gifts are a part of themselves, not a part of us, yet they become a part of us. We absorb them. Our growing self is nurtured as much by the thoughts and feelings of the world outside the womb as it is by the nutrients fed to us inside the womb by the umbilical cord.

If those gifts are positive they give us light. We feel welcome on Earth, safe, loved, wanted, good, and we look forward to being born. If those gifts are negative they give us darkness. We feel frightened, unsafe, unwanted, unloved, bad, and we dread the…

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All the small things…

. . “True life is lived when tiny changes occur.” ― Leo Tolstoy . You're asking me... as though you think, expect, are more certain than I am that I have an answer. That I have a system, an order, a ritual which guarantees something. And maybe, in a tiny corner of your eye, in...

Of Shadow, Shapes, and Shrouded Apparitions

. . “Then shadows and shapes, shrouded figures, appeared to join him, apparitions, ancient, mythical faces, wise and beautiful, like holy ghosts, shimmering around around him, beside him, beyond him, enveloped by a brume indescribable, shot through with shafts of pink and blue and gold, as though the heavens themselves had opened up and poured...

The Topsy Turvy World of a Child of Narcissists

When is being ignored a positive thing? When you’re the only child of two narcissists. I’ve read a few pop psychology takes (which would probably not consider themselves to be the pop’ kind of psychology) on what an only child is like…   . this has been doing the Pin rounds on Pinterest, with quite...

What’s Your Thinking Style?

When is addiction good and when is it bad? Can something like addiction ever be considered good these days when so much attention is focused on how bad it is for us, and not just for us but for others too? There are countless articles, books, blog posts and more written about the negative side...

A Strange Kind of Peace

“What do you think…?” I asked my partner as he walked into my office while I was working on the image in this post. He paused. Looked. Paused. Paused a bit more. I knew he didn’t like it. “You don’t like it,” I stated the obvious in an obvious yet neutral way to remove the...

I can’t go on, I’ll go on…

A chimpanzee brain at the Science Museum London . . “I can't go on, I'll go on.” ― Samuel Beckett . That quote sums up my tactic for living my life, or at least not ending it prematurely due to extenuating circumstances beyond my control which make me want to just stop. Stop the world...

UNINTENTIONAL BULLIES

Beautiful post, wonderfully written, please read it.

Thank you for sharing!

HASTYWORDS

We are all bully capable.

The problem is some kids and adults are serial bullies.  As a society we want to discourage bully mentality.  Sometimes we don’t do enough and sometimes we do too much.  There are hundreds of stories of people who don’t do enough, but I would like to point out that sometimes we do too much and in doing so we become the bullies ourselves.

There was a little girl, Amy, who had gotten suspended from school.  She was 9.  One of her friends did something mean so Amy told another friend she wanted to just kill her mean friend.  This friend, the one she confided her hurt AND anger,  told on her.  Amy was interrogated the entire day in the school office, in part by an off duty police officer about what she said and why.  She was scared but told the truth and confessed what…

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Useless Adventures…

. . There have been many moments in my life when, upon self-reflection, I have concluded that my life is useless. I am useless... Some of those times have been dark, where the thought of being useless has led me to the edge of an abyss with very little stopping me from throwing myself over...

There is No Wrong Answer… narcissists, selfies, and other musings

I was roaming the internet searching for… Something to stir the fire within the sea. A thought, an idea, a prompt which would prod me in any manner and awaken a conversation within which I could then write about and explore further through that medium. My writing helps me to get to know what's going...

A Red Hair Day

Does how you appear on the outside influence who you are on the inside? Do you judge yourself based on your looks? Do others do something similar? . “Patch smiled. “You come by your red hair naturally?” I stared at him. “I don’t have red hair.” “I hate to break it to you, but it’s...

Who Do You Think You’re Talking To?

It just occurred to me that my most recent posts concerning January’s two-faced-ed-ness (is that a word… it is for now) could be interpreted in a different way from how I perceived them when I wrote them. . “I can't go back to yesterday because I was a different person then.” ― Lewis Carroll ....

Experience is a brutal teacher…

. . “Experience is a brutal teacher, but you learn fast.” ― William Nicholson . . What is shadow? Is it the contrast of light or is light the contrast of it? And what about the shades of grey which exist between shadow and light? . What is... shadowed? Is it the same as shadow......

Born Today 7 January

One of my favourite astrologer-bloggers yet again hits the nail on the head... and blows me away with her intuitive insight. This interpretation... synchronises with my Solar return chart for this year, and with me in general. Focus on your goals, make sure they're in line with your personal values... and don't forget that working...

Born in a Two-Faced Month…

by Frances Brundage . . “I don’t know!” I said rather loudly, emphatically, and suddenly… suddenly as in there was no conversation at the time wherein this statement was required, nor was there a verbal interaction at all. I just said it. “What don’t you know?” the person within earshot asked. What do I know?...

The Scent of a Woo Man

. . “Beauty is in the eye of the beholder and it may be necessary from time to time to give a stupid or misinformed beholder a black eye.” ― Jim Henson . . Can you smell that, what is that scent…? Is it sweet, bittersweet, sour, umami - can you have umami for the...

Breezy Upturned Thoughts…

. . "Breezy, we always called it, be breezy and forward thinking and expect good things. Your upturned thoughts and actions write the script for a better day!" - Satori, via Elsa Elsa - Daily Forecast: January 7, 2015 . . "Just let it all go..." I whispered to myself as I eased my way...

Where the Wild Roses Grow

. .   He looked at me as though I had just broken some unspoken rule… or at least a once spoken rule which had faded into silence but still hung in the air, because he cared, staying a giving hand, because he cared. “What beautiful flowers!… but who are they for…?” “Me… I bought...

What is the best Revenge against a Narcissist?

image by Daniel Clarke . . What is the best revenge against a narcissist? This question is a search term which someone used online which brought them to my blog. Whether they found what they were looking for or not, I don’t know. And I don’t know what the best revenge against a narcissist is....

Between the Devil and the Deep Blue Sea

Scylla and Charybdis - Italian fresco . . Pull the curtain back, it hides a wall, but the wall is not a wall at all, it is a board masquerading as a wall. Pull the wall back, it hides a door, open the door… The other day while I was working on the image which...

Love is a Doing word…

. . Love is a doing word… and the heart loves a new challenge. I would like to thank the beautiful soul who inspired me to do this. They messaged me on tumblr and, as I replied, what they had shared with me swirled within the place where I listen and a spark set light...

I knew this friendship with myself couldn’t last forever

(the lines on the palm make a goat symbol...or at least that's what I saw) . . “My life failed on the very day I was born.” ― Robert Bly . . Ask any man or woman about the day of their birth, what they personally recall of one of the most momentous days in...