Fear and resentment.
- joneworlds@mailbox.org

There's  been  times  when  I'm  so  wracked  with
troubling  thoughts  and  feelings  that  I  can't
hardly function.   And I got told  about this sort
of  twice-daily  writing and  meditating  exercise
that sure  helped me almost right  away.  And also
it's helpful to  keep doing it as  a daily therapy
to keep things under control.

So I'll tell you about it. It goes like this.

First comes writing down your fears.  You sit down
with a pen  and paper, and you  start writing down
your fears what are bugging  you, as they occur to
you. You got  to write it like this:  "I have fear
that ... "  It doesn't have to be  big deep stuff.
Like, "I  have fear I'll  forget to clean  up that
mess in  the car again,"  is totally fine.  But if
you're feeling extra troubled  that day, I bet you
got a big  pile of fears and  insecurities you can
set down.   Probably some are going  to be repeats
from your last session, and that's fine. It's good
to repeat yourself.  You don't need to write in an
organized way,  or even  neatly, or  even legibly.
You're not going  to keep any of  this, that's not
the point.  The point is just to think of them and
write them down.   You can go all  over the place,
return  to some  topic and  find some  more fears,
jump to  something else, it's all  good.  Just try
to set them all down. 

Next, you  write your resentments. You  do it like
this:  "I feel  resentment to  (person) because  I
fear they  ..."  That  way of  writing it  is very
important, as  it helps remind you  that there's a
lot  of uncertainty  in  there. Resentment  sounds
like a pretty strong word, and maybe you think you
don't  have any  right now.   But everybody's  got
some in there somewhere.   Maybe even some for me,
for  being so  assuming  to write  that. But  even
really  little ones  are good  to write.   "I feel
resentment to that  person I saw in  the store who
bought so many light bulbs, because I fear they're
wasting energy."

You can go  back and forth writing  down fears and
resentments, as they occur  to you.  Probably they
will.  And so  you do this writing  a while, until
you can't think of  much more.  Probably it's good
to linger a bit as  you write them down, check and
see  inside you  if  there's  other fears  milling
around on a topic.

The  point  is  that writing  down  these  things,
somehow  frees a  space  in your  brain, and  this
helps. If you don't set it this stuff out, I guess
they just sit and fester inside there, and rot and
bloat and get pretty stinky.

Then you finish off with a paragraph like this:

		 I  am now  ready. I  release these  fears and
		 resentments.  I  seek now  a clear  vision of
		 what I am to do today, and the energy, focus,
		 and inner calm I need to do it well.  - Jone. 

Maybe you'll want  to appear to a  higher power to
grant  you  that peace  of  mind,  if you're  into
higher powers.  And you  probably want something a
bit different if you're writing before bedtime.

Then  crumple up  the pages  and throw  them away,
delete  your  buffer,  whatever.  You  don't  want
someone finding this stuff and getting hurt. And I
also  do  something  physical  to  symbolize  this
clearing of stuff,  like wave my arms  or hands in
front of  me, pretending  like I'm  clearing stuff
out of my field of view so I can see clearer.

Next, comes a sort of  meditation. You got to rest
your  brain  after   writing  all  that  troubling
stuff. And what you do here, is just sit somewhere
comfortable but not with your head leaning back on
anything,  and  close your  eyes  and  say a  word
inside  your head,  not out  loud, over  and over,
every  few seconds.   Maybe think  about how  that
word  looks as  you say  it.  Not  a word  that is
important, just some word  you pick that's sort of
empty and  simple.  I  use "easy".  Concentrate on
it, and try not to think about anything else.  You
set a timer,  and you do this  for twenty minutes.
It's pretty hard  not to think about  stuff, but I
do my  best and  gently return to  my word  when I
notice  myself thinking.  If you  end up  thinking
about troubles,  maybe next time you  got to write
down more  fears about  that topic.  I'm  not some
meditation   expert  person,   in   fact  I   know
nothing. But that's okay. I just try my best.

Anyways,  when the  time is  up, hopefully  you're
feeling  more at  peace. And  you do  this in  the
morning,  and again  the evening,  that's twice  a
day. They say you  shouldn't go adding extra steps
to  it like  prayers  or  dedications or  lighting
candles  or whatever,  or else  it might  all seem
like a big  chore and you'll stop  doing it.  It's
the  writing the  meditating  that  does the  good
stuff. That makes some sense to me.