M.O. = RUN

My "Modus Operandi" is to RUN. When the going gets tough, the tough (thickheaded/hearted) get going. It's getting real with Ryan... my honeymoon phase is wearing off. I'm getting tired of waiting for him to come around. I get these glimpses... the first 3 weeks of our relationship was heaven. Last week or maybe it was 2 weeks ago now, we had another window of beauty. I felt loved, accepted, and safe. But that's not the norm. The norm is strife. The norm is me compromising my own happiness and comfort - offering it, instead, to Ryan...hoping that it will infuse his life with life-giving energy that will activate him into his higher timeline/potential.

Why don't I infuse my energy into myself to activate MY higher potential?

Partially, I egotistically think I'm already there in some aspects. This is a trick and lie. I have so far to go. I have not learned to listen to my own heart and prioritize my needs. I have not learned to protect and care for my sweet inner child... I have not attained peace, love, and harmony in all my relationships or the comforts I would like in this world (free-flowing currency in order to work less... though I don't work much, I just have to be away from home, which is honestly in my favor... interaction with other people helps me to grow...it's a good challenge.... but I want to be able to travel on a whim and go where I'd like. I'd like to have a handiman and animal caretaker I can trust.)

I used to want to sleep/snuggle with a loved one...but maybe I'm enjoying my own space. It would be nice for us both to have our own bedrooms but snuggle when we want. But definitely want to live together. Our own rooms is nice. My meditation space and self-care space. Important stuff for me. But chores together. Cooking and eating and cleaning together. 

I want to be FAMILY to my partner. 
Ryan just isn't there. And he is not a good partner. Sometimes and some aspects he is. But I get overly excited because he picked up a couple piles of Sioux poop. I do that every day... take care of all my animals. I want help...a partner... I'm celebrating crumbs. 

So am I running or just seeing clearly? Corie's warning about committing to someone who you know doesn't love you the way you need... it's sinking in. (She's talking about Jerry, and Jerry, to me, seems so great... a good partner, provider, man, etc.) Ryan is not that... not a good partner, definitely not a good provider. He's a good man...has a good heart, buried beneath trauma which he has to want to unbury or heal which he says he doesn't. He is really hard. But when he's not, he's the best ever! My favorite friend. I have peace sitting next to him. I want to go eat and go to the movies and go on walks and explore and talk with him. But maybe there is someone else out there that I'll feel that for and that will feel it with me and that will want to work toward a relationship with me. But first I need to take time to invest in myself.

Ryan is a good friend and playmate. He is, indeed, "damaged goods". I don't mind that so much because we all are. But he hurts me with his lusting after other women, short-fuse and egostudded attacks, and his lack of investment in me or my desires and needs. It's so clear...but I keep fighting myself in hopes that I can believe, hope, and love it into existence. Maybe I can.

I need to read the affirmations every day. And believe.

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Just talked to Ryan who expressed that he loved me when we were getting off the phone. And he expressed that he wanted to be my compassionate witness that would hear my heart - that I could share my feelings and challenges with. (I long to hear this. I wish it were true. It could become true. Right now I don't feel that it's safe to share my feelings with him.)

I want:
Safety - to be a mess and make mistakes and know we'll work through it
Commitment and a movement toward closeness and sharing lives. To be Ryan's family....cherished the way he cherishes his cats
To have the space I need to keep growing and changing and acceptance for the fact that I will always change and never be perfect

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I'd like to express:

That it hurts me to know that the man I am putting effort into building a relationship with unabashedly lusts after other women...and with the walmart experience, the duck/hide to get an eyeful of someone else was strange and confusing.

To know your thoughts on borrowing my car for work. Asking for you to uphold your end of the bargain in taking care of it, providing it for my use once a week to take my trash, and asking for a small "lease" fee ($100mo) doesn't feel exorbitant to me. I intended it to be generous - thinking that I am helping you keep the miles off your car (and putting a LOT on mine. It's likely you will drive mine to death.) And I'm sharing that with you to benefit and support you. The $100 a month will help pay for insurance ($509.22), registration, and taxes (around $200) and any left over will help me pay toward my other car.

I want us to live together. We can have our own bedroom and space, but I want us to be able to come "home" to each other. 

I want us to be family.

I want to poop or get off the pot.

I will never be perfect. I'm a work in progress (and so are you). I want to be works in progress together. If that doesn't work... if we have to "arrive" before we start, that's not going to work for me.

I want to be held and snuggled and pet and cared for.

I don't want to be berated or mocked or put down. 
I want to be seen and respected, mess and all.
I want grace. 

___

Ryan still owes me $600 for the Lowes gift certificate that Braden gave me for the dishwasher. Don't forget.

I want to go to the movies and Carrabbas with him on a date this coming weekend. We also have therapy at 4:30. 

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The other day I said to myself that I wished Ryan respected me. He doesn't respect me.
The very next day (yesterday?) he brought it up on his own - identified that he didn't show me respect.

Can these things above be addressed that way too? Hold it in my own consciousness and allow it to filter through to him and back to me that way, or do I have a responsibility to speak it out loud and try to shift it? Isn't that forceful? Is that controlling? Is that "trying to get my way"?