Lost on the Range

Grounded. I was grounded once. Not that I was a perfect child. I just never ventured far. The only time I did and got home after supper but before dark I was immediately grounded. I learned fast. The funny thing, I was fifteen at the time. Maybe, I learn slow.

Over the last few years I have had plenty of reasons to be grounded. This is a different kind of grounding, or maybe it is the same just slightly different. Both force you to think of right now.
Living in or trying to figure out how you could changed the past brings on depression.  Avoiding or doubting the future gives you anxiety. Both places take you from the now or reality. That is where grounding comes in.

I went into a depression years ago. I had enough sense to pray. I asked the Lord to help me. I didn't like who I was becoming. The Lord answered me right away. He told me to pray each day, never ask for anything, only be grateful or pray in gratitude for thirty days.
I did it and within less than a week I was who I was again. I continued for the allotted time but found it so refreshing that I wrote ten things each night in my journal that made me happy or grateful.

Years later my world was rocked again. After the passing of my dad the gates of hell swung open to engulf me. Still to this day I can feel the tremendous power sweep through me as I pressed my head against my father's head as he laid in his coffin.
It was the blackest feeling I had ever encountered up until then in my life. I have seen blacker days since.

That is when I needed grounding. My therapist was good at it. Tom learned how but sometimes neither could help. I just had to write myself out of it.

One day as I visited with the jewelry ladies at the bottom of Salt River Canyon I came across some new beads. They told me they were Juniper beads. That they kept evil spirits away. Instantly Tom said "You pick some out you need them". I did need them. Not that I believed they worked but I already had a love for the juniper tree. It has magical powers to activate sourdough starts.

Well I picked out some and found I couldn't live without them. They did work. Things got me down, I would think of the juniper bracelet that I wore, rub my fingers across it, notice how each bead was different than the other.

That is grounding. When you have to live in the now. Use as many as the five senses that you have. It brings you back from the past and future.

I don't have to wear my beads as often. I still write sometimes but it is happier scribblings. I have become stronger.
One day I felt myself fading. I asked the Lord how I went for so many years without all this yuck. Some of the stuff creeping out of my closet was from when I was little. How did it stay in there so long?
The Lord told me that my children grounded me. Between diapers, nursing, and all other things mothers do, I lived in the now and collapsed into bed to do the now again at day break.

I now look at my past and change me. My future holds miracles, mercy, and hope. Today is better because I have stepping stones and not stumbling blocks.

I can step on those hard lessons, it is a step up if I can forgive, grow, give and accept mercy, and try as hard as I may to be meek

Forgiveness comes pretty easy. To not forgive caused me much more pain to hold on to than to let go.
To grow from an experience still takes time for me, I have to analyze it until I can see what change it can bring and then apply it. Mostly reapplying time and time again.
Giving mercy is a kin to forgiving, I don't understand where they came from so it is hard to judge them. To accept mercy is hard. I still find myself not feeling worthy of mercy. I judge myself by an unreachable standard but yet lower the bar for others.
To be meek encompasses the before mentioned stepping stones plus another ten percent of controlling emotions. I am human, I still use the secondary emotion of anger. I try hard to back up when anger is felt to see what true emotion brought that on, be it hurt, fear, loss. It is hard to take a boiling pot, figure out the source of the heat and turn it inside to melt the cold heart trying to build a hard frozen shell. It is possible, but for me I have to stop and find the first emotion so I can understand it and fix it.

My mom used to laughingly say "I hope Steve is never my paramedic. He has no compassion."

If she was here I would love to share this with her,
http://www.spsp.org/news-center/press-releases/can-narcissists-be-moved-show-empathy

I bring this up because my partners who I say are bullying me really have a condition that I don't understand but have felt time and time again. The emotional roller coaster they put me on.
But it makes it easier to understand why they are nice one moment then not. Why they say I need to be nice because it is upsetting a family member but when I ask them do you not think it upsets me I get a blank stare. They can manipulate but they have no empathy.
Knowledge brings understanding. Understanding brings forgiveness, growth, and mercy. But with distance, for emotional and safety's sake.
What I have learned is narcissistic behavior enjoys each other's company. It is hard to think that is true but they feed off each other and have learned to not cross boundaries. Look it up. It is an amazing society they invent for themselves.


I have been studying the words the Lord himself spoke. Like the beatitudes then the parables. For His time on earth the Lord did beautiful miracles but said so little. But it is powerful what was spoken. Take the story of the woman taken in adultery. So few words, "Let him without sin cast the first stone, Go and sin no more". Powerful to me.

Poor in spirit-kingdom of Heaven.
Those that mourn-comfort
Meek-inherent the earth
Hunger and thirst after righteousness-shall be filled
Merciful-obtain mercy
Peacemakers-called the children of God
Persecuted for righteousness sake-kingdom of Heaven

This talk gave me something to reach for and acquire.

https://www.lds.org/ensign/1987/12/the-beatitudes-pattern-for-coming-unto-christ?lang=eng

***************************************************************************
Above is Pre Cow, this now is Cow Cow. My mooers  for some reason give me a deeper thought on things. To ponder on, how things pertain to me, and how I need to proceed. These thoughts came to me as I went to check my cattle.

After all my reading the last few days I have come to learn there are narcissistic tendencies and narcissistic syndrome. If you are full blown narcissistic you are reclusive. You can't even get along with other narcissistic people. I think I met one recently but that is for another day.

Anyway from my reading narcissistic people believe no matter what there is a means to the end. Whatever it takes to get the end result. It is found they believe if a goal isn't achieved it is because someone got in their way or it was the fault of someone else. We have discussed how they have no empathy. No compassion, there fore do they have a conscience? They believe consequences are given but unfairly to them because as previously stated they are not at fault.

So with that said a thought came to me of, have I been treating them fairly. It is a mental state of sorts. They believe they are right. They can use any means to gain their ends. When I have caught them in a lie and approached them on it they blankly stared at me. There was no comprehension in their eyes. They even went as far as either blaming someone else or turning it around to show my fault. When Steve wanted to steal a ladder out of an abandon, locked building, Cody and Don both gave me the blank stare again when I stated the ladder is not ours they said nothing. When Cody stole fencing, Don went as far as contacting the owner trying to defend Cody and lay the blame else where.

This answers so much for the killing of my cattle. Coming on to my property and breaking the door on my house because they couldn't find the ranch papers they were looking for.

Or Cody shooting over our heads when we checking our cattle. This is seriously a lack of mental conscience.

Now for me, what part do I play. Knowing they don't have the mental compactly to understand, do I need to treat them differently. How does mercy play into this. Do I extend more mercy, how does the Lord hold people accountable if they have no mental ability to understand that to lie, cheat, destroy is not ok.

Is narcissistic a sin? Can you be judged for something you don't understand? How does the Lord judge the cruelty to us, and how are we judged as we interact with them?

I can't give into their demands, I have a life also. Where is the line of doing as I please and provoking them? I have tied to run my cattle as far from them as possible, quietly, we have notified them when we needed the corrals but only to find they have dismantled equipment so we can't use it.
We only have pushed back. We don't throw the first punch. But I see now their mental state tells them that we are a threat to their end. They will use all means to achieve it.

I now know this is not bullying like I thought. It is scarier. It can't be reasoned with or taught. It is a mental state.

Or I could be deeper than I need to be and do some more research. Prayer might help. I only know these thoughts came to me as I contemplated my part in all this. Asking the Lord to help me understand what I have read.


Signed,

Baffled