Day 176 of Bound Lotus...

...and I am still going, but in just 3 more days I would have finished 90 Days of 'Praanpathi Namo Namo' meditation, and I forgot. I have to start from scratch. I did 40 days of it, and was going for 90, as well as 40 Days of chanting the 'Pavan Pavan Guru' mantra. That too, I forgot. They were both the only practices I have loved doing every single day, and I forgot because I was too busy enjoying watching the guardian of "The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo" get 'I am a sadistic pig and rapist' tattooed on his stomach, while being trussed up as I was many times in the past, by someone I keep thinking I have forgiven. THAT past, from roughly 1996-1999, is what I apparently am really angry about. And it wasn't just a man in my story...there was a woman condoning it, besides me. My mind, twisted with grief then, and now twisted with rage, is still trying to recover the last pieces of the self I lost.

And though I missed finishing 90 Days of 'Praanpathi Namo Namo', it was worth it to vicariously imagine and process my anger and blinding rage. If I would have seen that movie last year, before doing Bound Lotus, I would have been crying, shaking, filled with fear and fearful memories. Now...tonight...I just laughed a sick little amused laugh as I watched the proxy for my rage suffer. I know that this kind of rage won't last, that I won't continue to hate the man and his wife for the rest of my life, but right now I do. I admit it. I felt sorrow for the movie character's victims and for myself, and the other men and women I know in reality who have been abused. I felt no sorrow or compassion for the perp, either in the movie, or in my vicarious image of the person who tortured me.

It is such a long road...this healing. But the good news is that I know I will come back to compassion. The good news is I am healing, deep, old festering mental and emotional wounds. The good news is that in 11 more days I will have done the "Releasing Fear Meditation" for 120 Days, to seal that into my being as a woman who is quite fearless. The good news is I will begin 'Praanpathi Namo Namo' again. The good news is: I am on Day 176 of Bound Lotus, and I have NOT missed a day of that.