Totally Detached...your Thoughts Please

[maryiscontrary]

Hey guys, I want to let you know how much I appreciate this forum. Thank you!

This is a mechanical, logistical issue that I find bizarre. I need your input, please.

Went to this bitchin' Halloween party. The first in my life. My friend, who is a gifted PTSD therapist who worked at San Quintin prison for a long time, was the Oracle, and she was reading tarot cards for fun.

Well, she pulled me in her reading room and started doing my cards. She asked me what question I had. I absolutely drew a blank. Now mind you, I read Tarot cards for party fun myself, so I knew that questions were part of it. But I was shocked myself when I could not come up with an answer. I absolutely had no curiosity about the future, or my the future of my relationships. I mean, I was always curious before. I told her that I was sorry, but that apparently I was completely detached and had no questions. It was a little strange, so I left thinking that I needed to examine this in my head.

All this last weekend I really wondered what the hell was up. In a way, it's like I don't give a shit, but not quite. I am empathetic, but will lay the law down to whomever crosses, I don't care who they are. I have zero inclination to see my dysfunctional family. My perspective is business like, it just ain't profitable. I saw my semi healthy friend do some dysfunctional stuff last night, and I just stepped out of the line of fire and left, thinking how stupid she was acting and it is not my issue to fix it.

I have lost so much that I don't care if things come or go, as everything on a gut level, is shaky and impermanent anyway. I have lived 10 places in 9 years. All I have are 5 boxes from my past life in the US, and even that was too much. I have a beautiful cat that I love dearly, but I look at her knowing she is impermanent. I lost two sweet beloved kitties in a row 1 and 2 years ago...like they disappeared (turn out that were eaten by the wildlife near my place). But it's like they went outside and never came back. I look at this kitty the same way. I thought about getting her put down due to her special needs (she was abandoned in the streets at a month old when I found her starving), as she is impulsive, destructive and very aggressive sometimes. Other times, not so much. But she is impermanent.

My boyfriend, ditto. Just a passing ghost, he seems. Sometimes, I think I need to let him go, as I am just so ambivalent about him, as he has some very stressful behavioral issues he is trying to work on. If things don't improve when he comes to visit this Christmas, I will just have to let him go. It is just like that. Total business like. I love relationships and sex, but I have this detachment now that I didn't before.

I have no religion, as a scientist, it just doesn't hold up to scrutiny. Spiritual, yes. I regularly buy 2nd hand clothes, become tired of them, and give them away. I am always giving my other stuff away, too. I gave away a beloved large record LP collection, along with turntable, cause I just didn't need it. All the time.

Same with death. Hell, I don't care. If I have a terminal illness, I am not going to fall apart like a baby. I'll just go to hospice and get on with it. I mean, today could be anybody's last day. I feel this in my gut. I really don't care, no regrets. Totally opposite to what I was. Totally.

Long story short, I think it is odd to be so detached. Ideas? I am not depressed or anything,

 

[Spiderallis]

I can relate. Even if it is odd, you're not the only one. Not sure what else to say. Are you hoping for tips on ways to reconnect, or is this an acceptance thing?

 

[arfie]

Odd, you may be, but you are not alone, my odd one. My own greatest phobia is entrapment. Being entrapped by Things is even more terrifying than being trapped by commitment to living beings, including my own bio-form. They need care and consistency. Yucko bucko. Don't I get to just float like a oxygen atom in search of her twin Hydrogens?

Leastwise... That is what your post brings to the forefront of my pragmatic mind...

 

[maryiscontrary]

Thanks for your response, Spider. I know part of it is healthy, but I think I have somehow overshot it. I am grounded. I am certainly not delusional. I have done a lot of really focused therapy and work on myself. I feel very fortunate for the first time in 42 years. But it is odd. Yes, any tips, thoughts, etc.helpful.

 

[maryiscontrary]

Arfie, yes entrapment. I will not be tied down. But this kinda transcend it. For autoimmune reasons, I had to cut out my coffee with milk habit several weeks ago. I went to drinking 5+ cups to zero caffeine. Yes, I went through the withdrawals, but I was surprised I was not craving it at all. Total detachment of a beverage I have drank like a horse since 15. It is not so much fear. Maybe a neural dopamine circuit burned out.

 

[shimmerz]

For myself I feel like I have lost my ability to attach to expectations. Having a future in mind holds a given that I can expect certain things. Even a future. That is a mind boggler for me. So, no future thoughts, no expectations, therefore no disappointment. Simple Simon. Not sure if this fits but I think that is where my disconnect is.

 

[maryiscontrary]

Wow, Shimmerz, you really hit the nail on the head. Thanks so much. I mean, is this not the tenants of Buddhism? Isn't this what monks meditate and train for years for? Sure, a future is there, cause time does pass. But like you, I cannot visualize anything, because everything has disappeared from my life. No foundation.

 

[shimmerz]

I wasn't sure that it would be helpful @maryiscontrary but am happy if it is. Thank you. For all of the agonizing I did for years after I melted down worrying about 'the future'. If only I could get those moments, days, weeks, months, years back and just accept that as long as I stayed true to myself and followed my instincts I would not have gone through half of the crap that I did. I beat myself up so badly over it. I wish I had trusted myself enough to know that it would unfold and be seen again when I had processed what I needed to first.