Ah, Angel

 

Ah, Angel

We met

She danced

So I named her

Dance-ala

We fell in love

So I called her

Yoga-la

Cheeky-la

Laugh-ala

Tipsy-la

Feets-ala

Sexy-la

Hug-ala
Kiss-ala
Love-ala

Angel-ooh-lala 

Shewasamymumma-la

Angel, ah

 A     n     g     e     l     a

          - SuperFly Clint

Adventure Of A Lifetime

Ah, Music: Mystical. Evocative. Healing. Magical.

2017 was a motherfucker. In music therapy the other day, each of us had to chose a song that somehow symbolized the past year. We then went around the room, announced our very personal choice, and that song was played while we all listened to it. The person who chose the song then talked a little bit about what the song meant to them and why they chose it. The experience proved incredibly powerful and moving.

The choices were as varied as the people who chose them. Everything from "Float On" by Modest Mouse, to "So Far Away" by Staind, to "Change" by Tracy Chapman. And people chose them for different reasons. Some chose a song that represented the year as a whole. Some chose a song that defined their throes into addiction during a very rough period, while others chose music that has helped them move through their recovery. 

I thought long and hard about what song I would pick. There were so many. I had a laundry list that felt relevant and poignant. And I could have gone in a million different directions.  

I considered the song "Ship To Wreck" by Florence + The Machine, because it was a song that I answered with a vehement "No" as I listened to it on the night of my last birthday (see my post about it). I considered a song called "Wicked Soldier" by Tonic, an upbeat rocker that's on every workout playlist, because I felt like a soul warrior for most of the year, battling my inner demons. "Mean Street" by Van Halen, another all time favorite, also resonated with a resounding clang of the heart; for I had walked my own self induced Mean Street for enough of the year to know I do not wanna go back. I ping-ponged with these choices, until another song hit me between the eyes and felt like a hot needle in my heart. 

"Adventure Of A Lifetime", by Coldplay.

I haven't been able to listen to that song in almost half a year. That song was Our Song; Me and My Sweet Angel's. I had heard it for the first time just before we got together in April of 2016, and I immediately fell madly in love with it. It was instantly one of those precious and rare songs that strikes the harp of your heart and the cello of your soul, and you have no idea why, nor do you care; You just accept it as an is, and you roll with it. Our first weekend together, in New York City, we played the song together and realized we both loved it. We fell for that song about as quickly and powerfully as we fell for each other: Instant-Head-Over-Heels-Ass-Over-Tea-Kettle-Full-Blown-Double-Whooper-With- Extra-Cheese-Madly-In Love-With-Each-Other. Magic. Just like the song.

I played that song when we weren't together to remind me of her, and it usually turned on my water works. I even sent her a video of me listening to that song and balling like a baby to it. That song was her to me. That song was us to me. It will always be her to me. It will always be us to me. A marriage of physical and meta-physical  form that defies words or explanation. It just Is. It just as sure as fuckin' shit, IS.

Sitting in music therapy group at Zen Recovery the other day, surrounded by people I trust and love, going through so much of the same shit as I am, I felt to myself "This is the time to hear it again. This feels like the right moment. This is It." 

So on it came. And on I sobbed, in front of a tribe I have I have only known for less than three weeks. 

I didn't chose that song because I wanted it to mean something different. I chose it because I wanted the support to be able to listen to it, at all. I chose it because, in addition to it being Our Song, my life over the past year has been the Fuckin' Adventure Of A Lifetime. I've spent most of it in treatment, doing the hardest work I've ever done in my life. 

It will never replace the meaning it has always held. It will just add to it. David Lee Roth once said "Everything I do in life is 'in addition to', not 'instead of' ". I connected so strongly with that quote, that I have attempted to live my life along those lines whenever possible. 

I'm not going to to blasting that song anytime soon. I'm just grateful that I could find the love and support to listen to it, Period. I'm not looking to redefine it, because, I can't (nor do I want to), and that would dilute what that song means to me. I am, however, looking to recover, to heal, to connect more deeply to this tribe I'm with and to my process of recovery. Any and all means at my disposal are thus fodder for that healing, for that connection, and for my own growth.

Whatever the fuck I'm doing these days, and whatever the fuck I'm doing for the rest of my life, I'm moving. I'll keep moving. Sometimes, so subtly, that I can't even see it, that I can't even feel it. But that doesn't mean something isn't happening.

Like the rock that becomes a geode of glistening Amythyst; like the slab of limestone that becomes gorgeous marble; like the hunk of aluminum oxide that becomes a sapphire; and, just like it says in "Adventure Of A Lifetime", I'm a "diamond taking shape".

©2017 Clint Piatelli, MuscleHeart LLC, and Red F Publishing. All rights reserved.

Between You And The Wall

Should you ever find yourself up against The Wall

With your back pressed tightly against it

Feeling like you have nowhere to go

Feeling like you don't know what to do or where to turn

Feeling like there is no one who can help

I will put my strong and loving arms behind you

I will put my strong and loving arms around you

I will cradle your body 

I will cradle your soul

I will pull you towards me

I will meld myself to you and to your struggle

I will put myself 

Between You and The Wall

So that you may breathe

And in that breath

Take that first crucial step away from the edge

With me

You Will Be Safe

You Will Be Loved

You Will Be Okay

You Will Know

That I Have You

You Will Know

That We Are In This Together

No Matter What

We Will Move As One

Forwards

Sideways

Or maybe Straight Back

Right through that Fucking Wall

We will do

Whatever it takes

To get you out of there

That Is What Love Means To Me 

That Is What You

Mean To Me

- Clint Piatelli

At The Edge Of My Forever

I dreamt of her last night
Sweet
Beautiful
Her

I awoke
Laughing
Crying
Feeling
Missing
Wondering

Do You ever dream of me?
Do you feel the same pull
Towards a sacred space
Where our two hearts beat as one
Where our two souls
Live together

Letting Go
Does not always mean
Stop Loving
Stop Caring
Stop Missing

Sometimes
I don’t know what it means
Except
Sometimes
It  just hurts

I Love You At The Edge Of My Forever

- Clint Piatelli

Digging Up A Body Image Disorder (Body Addiction part 3)

In my last intimate relationship, my lover noticed that, for a while, I became a little distant. That “while” coincided with the time span of my obsessive compulsion to get my body where I wanted it. I didn’t see the connection between distance and getting in killer shape. She noticed it. She felt it. But I wasn’t aware of it. And I certainly couldn’t explain it. 

I can now.

When my focus becomes my body, it leaves less space for other people. Especially my significant other. I learned that in a Body Image Disorder group. I didn’t know I had a BID before I got into treatment (just add this to my list. If I wasn’t so healthy, I’d think I was totally fucked up). I thought that, when I hit the gym and the cardio hard, and really watched what I ate, I was just kicking the ass I needed to get into shape. I was indeed doing that, but when you have a BID, things get far more complicated. 

Body image disorders are relational. They stem from, here we go again, a lack of nurturing, mirroring, and attunement in childhood. If we don’t get enough of that, and lots of us don’t, it can, sometimes, manifest itself as a body image disorder. As kids, if we don’t get what we need, we can believe that there is something fundamentally flawed about us. I did. Deep down, I thought I was, literally, a Defective Model. 

I carried that Defective Model bullshit into adulthood. I didn’t consciously feel that way most of the time. I didn’t act that way most of the time. But it was always there, somewhere very deep. And, when we get older, if we believe that we are fundamentally flawed, we can make the unconscious choice to go to our bodies to “fix” it. This makes sense, because our feeling of defectiveness is abstract. The body is concrete. It’s something we can alter, and actually see the results. Our body is our physical connection to life, our membrane to the world. So those of us with BID's unconsciously believe that, “If I just looked better, I would be more lovable”; no matter how loveable we truly are.

I was also a fat kid (this just gets better and better, doesn’t it). It felt beyond awful to be ridiculed and shamed. So when I discovered, in my teens, that I could do something about not being fat; in fact, I could do something that actually made me look….damn good, I took to it like a crack whore to, well, crack. 

There is some good news here. Being a heavy kid and never wanting be heavy again creates a very strong drive to be fit. And, for virtually my entire adult life, I’ve been very fit. In fact, I look and feel better today than I did at twenty-five (I’m 54). So there’s the gift in the wound. There’s always a gift in the wound. But if you don’t heal the wound, and you can’t heal it by having a great body, the wound is still there. 

Combine the fat kid syndrome with a body image disorder, and I was an accident of exercise and militant eating waiting to happen. It wasn’t about the actions of exercising religiously and eating right as a way of life that was the problem. Plenty of people do that in a healthy way. The problem was how I attached to it. I attached far too much of how I felt about myself to how buff I was. So I developed a mild to moderate obsession about being really fit. 

Being buff, however, does feel great. And not just physically; but mentally, emotionally, even spiritually. By working my ass off, educating myself, and applying great discipline, I made an ideal a reality; like creating a great career, or crafting a beautiful song. I had achieved something very difficult, so there’s a powerful sense of satisfaction. It fundamentally boosted my self-esteem, self-confidence, and sense of self. And there are more endorphins constantly screaming through my body, even long after I exercise. I looked and felt better than most men half my age. I felt more connected to my body, and more connected to life. Looking and feeling the way I want powers up my prana, my “life force”. It fills my heart and soul with positive energy. It feels like electricity is surging through me all the time. That’s spiritual. I know, because I was aware of it. I felt it. It was visceral. It was real.

However, there was a dark side to that. A dark side that not everybody shares. That dark side is that it became too consuming. Again, if I’m that consumed by this, or by anything for that matter, there’s less room for you. It’s akin to being a workaholic. If so much of your energy and so much of yourself goes into your work; if you over-identify yourself with your career, the loved ones in your life pay for it.

In my last relationship, I was very loved. I felt very loved. More so than in any relationship I ever dreamed of. But deep down, I still had that wound. I knew I wanted to look better. But when I unconsciously believe that I can fix something on the inside by looking better on the outside, I’m in for trouble and a rude awakening. And I’ve known, for many years, that you can’t fill an internal hole with external dirt. But if you’re not aware of that hole because it’s unconscious, then it’s a blind spot. Everyone’s got blind spots. That was one of mine.

The Great News is that, Clint, "You've come a long way, baby!" (Remember that ad?). I’m currently once again getting in killer shape. But I’m not consumed by it. I’ve turned this unconscious pre-occupation into a conscious choice. I no longer attach any of my self worth to single-digit body fat percentage and a muscular physique. 

I’ve had the privilege of working extensively with Ari Winograd (www.bddclinic.com), who, literally, wrote the book on body image disorders, “Face To Face With Body Dysmorphic Disorder”. He has educated me, impacted me, and been a powerful ally in my healing. And before I worked with him, I made tremendous progress in residential treatment to develop myself from the inside out. I feel better than I ever have in my life.

Finally, on a very personal note, I want to say, I’m sorry Sweet Angel. The last thing I ever wanted to do was create even an inch of distance between us. The last thing I ever wanted to do was make even an inch of less space, for you.

©2017 Clint Piatelli, MuscleHeart LLC, and Red F Publishing. All rights reserved.