My friend Karen tells me that in order to stop repeating dysfunctional patterns from our past, we have to recognize that a situation may be a repeat of past stories and then change our reaction going forward. When we are in a situation where we may have reacted one way before, and we want to react differently going forward, we just have to wade through slowly, trying not to drift back into automatic responses that may have served us previously, but do not now. This is not fun. God, thinking of the one I’m in now makes my little heart go all arhythmic. I hate that feeling, my heart speeding up and thwacking in my chest. Specifically, there has been conflict with the people I shared my work with for the last three years. I find myself automatically reacting to stuff that is said or done, then stopping myself and talking myself down from the ledge. Don’t get angry. Don’t get hooked in. Even if they’re acting on their own impulses, I don’t have to be impulsive in my actions. Damn it’s hard. I want to avoid it. I want to go and hide. But more than that, I want it over, so I’m proceeding slowly through and it is not fun. Sometimes, I just want to go hide.