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  <title>Samsara</title>
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  <lastBuildDate>Mon, 22 Sep 2025 14:38:09 GMT</lastBuildDate>
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    <title>Samsara</title>
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  <guid isPermaLink='true'>https://lathriel.dreamwidth.org/486226.html</guid>
  <pubDate>Mon, 22 Sep 2025 14:38:09 GMT</pubDate>
  <title>Things that have broken my heart lately</title>
  <link>https://lathriel.dreamwidth.org/486226.html</link>
  <description>Canceling appointments&lt;br /&gt;Deleting a line from my budget spreadsheet&lt;br /&gt;Throwing things out&lt;br /&gt;Putting things away.&lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;Walking the dog&lt;br /&gt;All of Cazenovia Park&lt;br /&gt;All of Cazenovia Creek&lt;br /&gt;The pink and white striped garden zinnias by the baseball diamond&lt;br /&gt;The farmer&apos;s market on Sunday mornings.&lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;Good neighbors&lt;br /&gt;Bad neighbors&lt;br /&gt;Opening the mail&lt;br /&gt;Opening the door&lt;br /&gt;Chopping vegetables for dinner&lt;br /&gt;Accidentally dropping an ice cube on the floor.&lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;Blankets.&lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;Waking up&lt;br /&gt;Leaving&lt;br /&gt;Coming home&lt;br /&gt;Going to bed.&lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;Whenever I remember&lt;br /&gt;Whenever I forget.&lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;br type=&quot;_moz&quot; /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;img src=&quot;https://www.dreamwidth.org/tools/commentcount?user=lathriel&amp;ditemid=486226&quot; width=&quot;30&quot; height=&quot;12&quot; alt=&quot;comment count unavailable&quot; style=&quot;vertical-align: middle;&quot;/&gt; comments</description>
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  <category>rusty</category>
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  <guid isPermaLink='true'>https://lathriel.dreamwidth.org/484614.html</guid>
  <pubDate>Mon, 25 Aug 2025 14:51:26 GMT</pubDate>
  <title>Grief, grieved, grieving</title>
  <link>https://lathriel.dreamwidth.org/484614.html</link>
  <description>I keep trying to explain to others that I&apos;m okay even though I&apos;m suffering. Why do I need them to know this? Is it true? I think it&apos;s true. I think it&apos;s the heart of the matter: I&apos;m okay, because I know I&apos;m okay. In grief, that&apos;s the one time I know I&apos;m okay because I&apos;m feeling things, deep, painful things, and I&apos;m not losing my mind over it. I can&apos;t argue with myself about it. I know I&apos;m sad because loss and grief are sad, and there&apos;s no analytical thought process that&apos;s going to slide me out of that feeling of loss, or the feeling of love with nowhere to go. And since I believe in life after &amp;quot;death,&amp;quot; that love does go places: to the true heart of the being I&apos;ve lost. So I am loving, and I am grieving the loss of their physical presence, and that&apos;s okay. Good, even. I am comforted by my own grief, I think. It means the love was real, and is still real. Grief is almost evidence of life after death, at least emotionally. Because you can&apos;t love something that no longer exists.&lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;So why do I feel the need to explain this to people? Maybe because I believe they are uncomfortable with other people&apos;s suffering. It&apos;s probably true&amp;mdash;it&apos;s usually true. It&apos;s true for me, even though I try my best to be supportive and genuinely helpful/comforting. I guess I don&apos;t want people thinking I&apos;m having a breakdown when I&apos;m just experiencing normal grief. I want people to be more comfortable with other people&apos;s grief. I think if everyone could be more accepting of everyone&apos;s emotions, no matter what they are, the world would be a better place. But I get it&amp;mdash;when you&apos;re flying high you don&apos;t want someone&apos;s depression bringing you down. Idk though because when I&apos;m feeling good other people&apos;d grief don&apos;t generally get me down, it just makes me present. I am more mindful of how I talk to them. Masking? Maybe. Manipulating? Only positively. Is it manipulation if you help them feel better in a way that doesn&apos;t deny their loss or feelings? Is it manipulation if you just offer a soft place to land?&lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;I don&apos;t know. And that&apos;s okay.&lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;I would like to be coddled a bit, though. Is that so wrong? I would like my own soft places to land&amp;mdash;a soft life, for a little while. I am grieving, yes, but I am also balancing on that fine point between hope, faith, and delusion. I want to believe Rusty will get better. There is a part of me already grieving him, though, and I can&apos;t tell if that is instinct or programming. Is my mind trying to protect me by preparing me for the loss by &amp;quot;seeing it coming&amp;quot; or is it actual instinct? Is it programming or is it gut? I don&apos;t know. I know what I want to believe: it&apos;s old programming, protective programming, old programming that believed everyone has their own death date and when an animal is sick you should just prepare for the worst. &lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;But no. The timing doesn&apos;t make sense. I think this is my storm before the calm&amp;mdash;I&apos;ve been focusing so much on manifesting and being in my power, and now this is the ultimate &amp;quot;loss&amp;quot; of power&amp;mdash;watching someone you love be sick and maybe dying. All my old beliefs had a lot to do with passivity and forgiveness and accepting lack of control and all that jazz...and it was good for that time and still true and valid and helpful. There *is* a lot you can&apos;t control, because even if we&apos;re manifesting this whole reality we&apos;re not so skilled at it that we can just snap our fingers and get what we want. And sometimes, I think, we *do* experience random shit to respond to. I think that&apos;s part of the point. Video games are fun because they&apos;re an adventure, not because you have complete control over everything. So you get a mushroom coming at you and you have a choice: jump on it, shell it, jump over it, run away. Etc. You get to choose.&lt;br /&gt;&lt;p&gt;So we got some undesirable news about Rusty&apos;s body. He&apos;s not feeling great. I don&apos;t like those things, and I don&apos;t want those things. And if Rusty must show me the side of him that is real to me, I choose a Rusty who is in exceptional health. Rusty who is thriving and happy and enjoying his life.&amp;nbsp;&lt;/p&gt;&lt;p&gt;So be it.&lt;/p&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;img src=&quot;https://www.dreamwidth.org/tools/commentcount?user=lathriel&amp;ditemid=484614&quot; width=&quot;30&quot; height=&quot;12&quot; alt=&quot;comment count unavailable&quot; style=&quot;vertical-align: middle;&quot;/&gt; comments</description>
  <comments>https://lathriel.dreamwidth.org/484614.html</comments>
  <lj:mood>determined</lj:mood>
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  <guid isPermaLink='true'>https://lathriel.dreamwidth.org/484444.html</guid>
  <pubDate>Fri, 22 Aug 2025 18:01:30 GMT</pubDate>
  <title>The Force (Urge to Journal) Awakens</title>
  <link>https://lathriel.dreamwidth.org/484444.html</link>
  <description>&lt;p&gt;I think I might start using this thing again. Idk, I&apos;m feeling the call. I want to anonymously post my random thoughts where I don&apos;t have to worry about how this might influence my &amp;quot;audience&amp;quot; or my &amp;quot;platform&amp;quot; or my career. Why? Will I make these posts public? Will I ever have friends on here again who comment and make their own posts? I have no idea. All I know is I&apos;m glad I have my archives from LJ and after, and I wish I&apos;d kept posting even if only for myself.&lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;And, having been Going Through It lately, I&apos;ve realized I need a place to spew without worrying about how I&apos;m perceived. I process verbally, often out loud, but also on paper. I have a drafts folder full of half finished blog posts for my official website that I lost steam on because I processed my feelings on the page and realized there wasn&apos;t enough there for a public post. But I still got something out of it.&lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;So...idk. Maybe I&apos;m back? Maybe I&apos;ll be posting here.&lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;And if you read this because you previously subscribed to my feed and you know who I am, please remember to keep this journal anonymous so I can spew without fear of observation from my &amp;quot;audience.&amp;quot;&lt;/p&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;img src=&quot;https://www.dreamwidth.org/tools/commentcount?user=lathriel&amp;ditemid=484444&quot; width=&quot;30&quot; height=&quot;12&quot; alt=&quot;comment count unavailable&quot; style=&quot;vertical-align: middle;&quot;/&gt; comments</description>
  <comments>https://lathriel.dreamwidth.org/484444.html</comments>
  <lj:mood>contemplative</lj:mood>
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