Yes.  Intentional.

When I started this blog, I had hoped to have a place to process, purge, sort through such things as matters of the heart, my past and my unedited thoughts.

I started out telling only 2 or 3 trusted friends where to find it – then I went public online and after deciding I only have friends on Facebook that I trust and who know me, I then would share my links.

Mistake?  Maybe, maybe not.  But definitely I found myself editing.

I haven’t discussed Matters of the Heart – protecting the identity of people in my private life this past year.  I haven’t gone deep into my past – protecting the identities of those involved.  And I certainly have been editing my thoughts.  As if I would feel I owed everyone an apology for having them.

I just can’t do ‘phoney’.  I can’t.  It eats at my gut and sticks in the forefront of my brain gnawing away at me.

Relatives and acquaintances have told me in so many words, that I think too much.  I share too much.

It’s who I am.  Who I have always been.  Who I always will be.

I think those concerned with me sharing too much are the ones who have shared too much with me.

They needn’t worry.  If my story line crosses over to someone else’s, I don’t feel it’s my story to tell.

But when it comes to me and me alone, I have to be authentic.

A friend posted this today and I laughed.  So true.

I do love my life.

But find myself editing my statuses too.

I’ve had this self-imposed expectation of myself for a few years, that I can’t be ‘human’.

Always wanting (needing) to do the right thing – making living amends to myself and others for years of wrong choices.

Trying to be some perfect unobtainable example for my son.

I can’t do it anymore.

Not because I am incapable, but because it is not authentic and it is not healthy, spiritually, to deny a facet of me exists.

I am blunt and very forthcoming by nature.  It is inherently who I am.  If I edit myself, I’m not honoring that part of me.  I’m telling myself in a round-about way, ‘that part of you is unacceptable’.

Unacceptable to whom?  I’m fine with it.  Why am I always worrying about what ‘they’ are going to think?

I seem to in constant battle with myself this past year or so.  The care-giver and sensible me shaking her head at every personal desire.  “That’s selfish”  “That’s wrong”  “That’s not putting others first”.

In a quest to be the best me I could possibly be, I left some of me behind.

I am not always happy.  I have high-highs and painful lows – I feel to the nth degree and I love that about me!

And – shocking news: I want things.  Not material things – but things that would serve to give me pleasure.

I want pleasure without guilt.

I want to be able to say “No.”  I want to be able to say “Yes.”  Purely based on how I feel about something and not how it effects the person posing the question.

But the battle wages on.

And it’s not a matter of ‘good’ vs ‘bad’ – it’s a matter of acknowledging that I deserve things sometimes too.

That being grateful for what I have and making good choices, doesn’t mean I should ignore the woman inside me who has needs that don’t sustain life.

And that they don’t make me bad.

They make me whole.