I am writing a daily blog about being homeless with my family, to try and process my emotions on the issue and take the lessons from it. If I help someone along the way, I will be very happy.
For the first time in a long time, I actually feel quite settled. Our friend who has kindly given us a roof has said that there is no rush nor pressure to leave which is a relief because the options for emergency housing are not appealing. It has verified for me my intuition not to apply for emergency housing. I don’t know how I know, I don’t need to know the how, but I do know everything is going to work out well.
Today was the day I decided to be a bit more organised and shopped for food for the week. It was what helped make me feel settled, that there was something for us to eat regardless of what went on. And I realised that the lack of it was a reason why I was feeling so insecure in my blog yesterday. There is something inside me that struggles to feel secure when I am reliant upon other people I realise now. That is likely because I have been so let down in the past by the very people who are supposed to make you feel secure. So, I seek security in all ways in myself. Something I had never truly appreciated before.
I do know now what security feels like, I felt it as soon as I got back in the car at the supermarket because I had food for the week and it was paid for. That is what has been bothering me for the past couple of weeks, even when I was staying with my mother because there was nothing settled in that area due to the health issues of my step-father.
I do think what this means, though, is that I need to have a semblance of control in order to feel secure in myself. There is a need to have things ordered, for me to have a sense of certainty about things as mundane as what we are going to eat on a daily basis. Given some of the content of previous blogs, about feeding my son and having the money to do so, I also find security in making sure he has certainty. Or is it having the certainty that I have the money to purchase food? A basic requirement of life, really. And something I haven’t had recently – in part because I relied on someone who didn’t deliver.
Security is a feeling that I think we all chase…and I’ve just realised that in order to feel that within myself, I need to surrender to the universe. To have the faith that the universe will provide, that my security can be found in my faith that the universe will deliver. For me, this is really seeing things in a different way. Subconsciously, I have always sought to find my own security which is why, for the longest time, I have tried to force the outcome I felt would be best for my security. This was an almost obsession with winning the lottery.
I saw winning the lottery as the only answer to my problems because it would set me up for life. That I would be secure if that happened – I was trying to control the outcome, to manage the how. And in the process, closing down all the wonderful ways in which the universe can deliver the how differently. Obviously, I didn’t win the lottery and almost always didn’t even win a penny. You’d think that would have been message enough, but no, I would see something that would convince me it was a sign to play because I was going to win…and the cycle would start again.
I have now stopped playing. I’m working on surrendering to the universe and the myriad ways in which my goals can be achieved. The ways in which the inspired actions can be communicated to me. It’s a bit scary because my ‘rational’ brain says how on earth can your wishes happen without something tangible like a lottery ticket? But as I’ve written before, the Reticular Activating System (RAS) directs what we see and perceive in life. Due to my belief in something tangible being necessary, my RAS doesn’t present to me the magic that I do know exists all around us. The magic I have now decided to see by closing down my attempts to dictate the how.
Because I am soaring. I am thriving. I am successful. I am grateful. I am winning in life.
Louisa Simpson 