One of the most common causes of failure is the habit of quitting when one is overtaken by temporary defeat.

~ Napoleon Hill

Failure is simply an opportunity to begin again, this time more intelligently.

~  Henry Ford

I am in hell.  One of my making I realize.  One that I could have avoided had I not given in to the overwhelming sense of defeat and self-flagellation insisting on accompanying the emotions I cannot seem to control when something is important to me.  When someone is important to me and I want to do something grand for them, yet at every turn set myself up for failure by my own actions and by counting on others to help me achieve my goal.

My friend had a birthday on Saturday.  A friend who has done more for me than I could ever begin to repay so I thought at least if I could do something really special for her birthday it would be a start.

I lost sight of the fact she never required repayment, lost sight being a friend in return was enough.  Somewhere in my mind in the last few days I decided the measure of my value as a friend to her, was in my ability to put together something spectacular for her birthday.

Much of it has to do with the state of my mind right now.  I am not feeling well.  My thoughts scare me and maybe it was more about proving to myself I am worthy of her friendship.  Of anyone’s friendship, consideration, love, time, of anything.

I am raging and hurt and sad, about other things and I wanted to feel good about doing something good.  Doing something for someone else to bring them joy is one thing which has always helped me feel better.  It is hard to hang on to bad feelings in the face of another’s joy.  It is hard to give up on happiness when another has found it, especially if you take part in giving them happiness.

I have been on the edge, teetering between falling deeper into the shit storm and climbing back out.  I was self-aware enough to see I was in danger and kept myself on this edge but in my mind somehow the big step out of it, was to do what I set out to do and …  when I realized it wasn’t going to happen, I did the worst possible thing – I let go.

Not on purpose, I did not willfully and with forethought let go. I just made the mistake of not having a backup plan, failed to realize what others did or did not do was not a reflection of me and the amount of love respect and gratitude I hold for my friend, what I do is.

How much of this is caused by the cycles of being of unsound mind… how much is just plain being human?  I don’t know and don’t care.  I don’t expect forgiveness based on the fact I am not always of sound mind.  I don’t expect forgiveness at all really, it matters not what my intent was, it matters what my action was.

The fact I am forgiving of almost any transgression is of no importance – whether I think it is right or not, I probably committed it inadvertently in the chaotic crap of mood swings and disordered thinking, I am sure.  Who am I to not be forgiving?

I don’t expect the same of anyone, although my friend probably understands me better than I understand me sometimes and she probably saw it coming a mile away.  She’s good like that.

I have a birthday post, a funny and poignant and kick ass tribute to my friend for her birthday and I have yet to post it.  I had every intention to go ahead no matter in what other ways the grand gesture failed, at least there was that, however the house of cards kept tumbling and I was disheartened and disillusioned and disgusted at my own wrong turns in getting it done as much as the ..as much as anything else.

It was the end of what I could take as a whole and I gave up and retreated to the soft and comforting cocoon of sleep and dreams.  There, wrapped in the warm comfort of change, for in our dreams we often see where we failed and how we can make it right, sometimes to the point of convincing ourselves we did indeed and when confronted with the reality upon waking, can only realize we aren’t ready to emerge from the cocoon back into the real world , the pain of knowing we failed someone we really care about, even with the knowledge we can make it right, still too much to bear.

I dreamed and drifted, thought of butterflies, and moments and forgiveness and love and what it means to be a friend,

I missed it because I was already in a bad place, because honestly I know this like I know that back of my hand.

It doesn’t matter about anyone else, all I had to do was be here, be present and do something.

Something besides sleep.

I am learning that is how I cope when I have gotten to the point of enough.  Enough of anything, enough hurting, enough feeling or anything. When I hit my breaking point I fall asleep. If I cry myself to sleep, it just means I sleep longer.  In my dreams I don’t fail, or disappoint or hurt anyone.  In my dreams I always find solutions to the problems of life, and then I really sleep to rest my soul to regain the energy to try again.

Trying again, is harder than letting go.  It means going back and asking forgiveness.  I honestly think this is where the people who have bipolar disorder end up getting the reputation for being flighty and unpredictable.  A person who hurts another by their inaction or lack of caring has no problem showing up again.  For me, if I wasn’t at a bad place to start, I wouldn’t have let go, I am not that kind of person.  My heart is full of good intentions – more than anyone can ever know because I do have a hard time sometimes turning them into action.  Intention or no, good person or not, I have so many times before in my life inadvertently  caused someone hurt and have no idea how to fix it, no clue how to recover their opinion of me and mine of myself in the face of my actions, so I don’t just let go, I disappear.

Is it shame for doing something we would not have done had all the chemicals been in the right balance?  Shame all the knocks and bumps before only stopped us for a minute while this bump which the stop should have been pushed through as well… Brought us to full force stop?  I don’t know, I just know I feel terrible and I know I made it worse by staying asleep and away for longer than I should, for not just saying I;m sorry and what’s next and helping with other things I was helping with.

I hate myself at the moment for not being able to overcome my disorder and  I am saying this because this is the plain and stark naked truth about mental illness – I want to just get over it more than anyone else in the entire world wants me to.. and I can’t.

Maybe there is a lesson in my failure.  A  message.  I don’t know something compelled me to write about it until I came to that point.

Beyond that, Happy Belated Birthday my dear and wonderful friend Red.  You deserved better.

To others I have hurt inadvertently by letting go, by not being present when that was all really required of me, you too deserved better.

Tomorrow is a new day and I am going to go about it in a much more intelligent manner.  I am trying again .

Tomorrow I am grabbing hold and hanging on for dear life.

I love you and thank you for being my friend.