跟你分享一个告别2020的写作题目，在个人成长与和解的路上继续向前。
我今天和朋友一起看了看了Netflix的《Death to 2020》Mockmentary（中文可以翻译成嘲讽纪录片？）
虽然看着Samual Jackson (神盾局特工的局长), Hugh Grant(李安版本理智与情感的Edward&真爱至上总理), Lisa Kudrow(老友记的Phoebe)等等的熟悉脸孔，还有各种对社会政治的讽刺笑出声来，我却不得不面对“这荒诞的剧情居然真的是2020的现实”而满怀悲哀——这以英美代表的西方视角2020，是我切切实实以一个中国留学生+实习戏剧治疗师感受到的。我已经知道今年发生了很多事情了，没想到居然发生了这么多事情。
还没看到职员表的时候，我就对我朋友说:”Netflix一定要再拍一本2021的’纪录片”。 结果他们片尾还真的自己吐槽自己哈哈。希望有机会能够写一写其中的感悟。
I watched the Netflix Mockumentary Death to 2020 today with my friend. Seeing the familiar faces such as Samual Jackson (Nick Fury in Agent of SHIELD), Huge Grant (The Edward in 1995 Sense and Sensibility & prime minister in Love Actually), and Lisa Kudrow (Phoebe in Friends), I couldn’t help laughed aloud at them and the satire toward society and politics. However, I also couldn’t help feeling sad about “this f*king story is the reality of 2020” fact – This 2020, this western perspective in which the UK and the US represent, is exactly what I experienced as a Chinese international student & drama therapist in training in New York. I had known so many things happened this year, but I didn’t know there were more than I remembered until watching.
Before the end of cast and crew parts, I said to my friend: “Netflix should shoot another mockumentary for 2021.” They actually toasted about this idea hahaha. If I have time, I need to write down my thoughts about the show.
哎呀给你扯远了！
这可不是我想说的。
明天就是2020年最后一天，可能你会许下新的一年信念和愿景，可能你会和家人朋友庆祝，可能你因为疫情独自一人享受自由。无论如何，给生活带来一点点的仪式感都是很美妙的事情。如果你想跟2020做一个告别，我这里有一个写作的题目分享给你。
我的同学Megan在我们Messenger Group里面发了一个Megan Fally’s writing prompt: Write a resignation letter to a role you play in your life that you want to leave behind in the new year. 给你想要在新年来临之前，生活中曾经有重要意义，但是现在可以放下的一个角色，写一封告别信吧。
可能我今年学到的最重要的事情其中之一，是告别的重要性吧。原来告别都是是一件需要时间去准备和消化的东西。我们总是那么期待新年的开始，匆匆写下愿景，然后匆匆跑到结尾，发现什么也没有完成。巨大的失落感把我们逼向下一个新的开始，又是一个循环的奔跑。越跑越累，越来越停不下来。
我发现我很优秀的朋友，要么是对过去与未来都不会太过于执着，要么是永远都带着过去的成就感和未来的期待感。他们都是活在当下的人。
当然，他们不会去思考我这些，想这些的你我他下意识的把时间的钟表已经按了暂停。我抓着一根过去的绳子，看着它在我手中飞速的溜走，我想抓住它，但它用加快速度的消逝提醒我早已离去——其实那根绳子都不是真的，只不过是想象中的。是我内心执念的绳子，我害怕。我害怕放下它。因为我害怕未来的未知。
所以你我需要停下来，用放大镜缩小确认一下自己的位置，自己与自己的过去和未来的位置。
Anyways!! That’s not what I want to say here.
Today is the last day of 2020. Maybe you will prepare a New Year resolution list; maybe you will celebrate the New Year Eve with friends and families; maybe you will enjoy the freedom of being alone due to COVID-19. What I want to say here is it’s wonderful to bring a sense of ritual to life. If you want to say goodbye to 2020, I have a writing prompt to share.
My peer Megan shared a prompt from Megan Fally: Write a resignation letter to a role you play in your life that you want to leave behind in the new year.
Maybe this year, one of the most important things I have learned is the importance of goodbye. I didn’t know goodbye is a thing that requires time and energy to prepare and process. We always look forward to the beginning of New Year – rush to write down resolutions, rush to find out nothing finished in the end. The tremendous disappointment, maybe even self-blame and shame push us to another cycle of beginning, and another cycle of rushing. The more we run, the more we feel tired, the more we feel hard to stop.
I found out that some friends I admire, either has little obsession with the past or the future or live their lives with a sense of accomplishment gathered from the past and a sense of hope toward the future. They are those who live in the moment, the present.
They won’t think about what I write here. For people like you and me, we have consciously pressed a pause button on the time compass. I am holding a string of past, watching it slipping fast away from my hand. I want to catch it, but it moves faster, reminding me it has long gone. Actually, the string is not even real. It lives in my imagination. It is my obsession. I am just scared, scared to let it go. I am sacred of the unknown future.
That’s why you and I need to stop. Grab a microscope, zoom in, make sure the position of ourselves, the position in the life path, from the past, and the future.
(The following below has no translation. It’s simply my letter and thoughts about what to write, how to write, in English or Chinese )
我和Regina讨论了一下该写哪一个，我有想写lonely one, negative one, sad one, ED one。但他们都差不多，而且我目前也好像还没有办法说再见。她给我推荐了一个caretaker，就是我总是去照顾别人的想法这个角色。我最后把它命名为取悦平息者people pleaser/appeaser.
下面是我的告别信，就不翻译了。我个人觉得写英文能够让我表达和连接自己的情感，而中文能够增加我的理性。我也和Regina讨论过这个问题，可能是：
1)我写英文作文表达情感的次数远远大于写中文 ，我能够找到更多精准的词语来表达
2)中文太接近我的创伤了，英文有一种distancing effect距离作用，让我更加安全的表达
3)英文比较straightfoward& personal(直接，个人化），中文比较关系化社会化，通常不会把个人放在首位
4)从中文转化到非母语的英文需要左脑处理，能够让我更加镇定
总之，用你喜欢舒服的方式来就好。
Now, I’m going to write the resignation letter to the role I have been holding for so long.
I tried to wait for it until my 24th birthday, but somehow life is warning me. Stop procrastination. Procrastination is fear.
The English language has some magic power. Every time I write, I am making a special treat for myself and for the audience who dropped by across time and space. Three cups ofjoy, two scoops of gratitude, one splash of tenderness, with some sprinkles of sorrow as decoration.
It’s a phase I hardly enter when writing Chinese. Maybe because a second language forces my brain to slow down. Maybe I learned this language through love and care, which will automatically come out when I use it.
I’m here to say goodbye to the role I have held for so long. The role of a people pleaser.
Dear role of people pleaser:
You have worked so hard. For 23 years. You have been trying to make others happy and content by sacrificing your own needs. Sometimes, a large chunk of times, through hurting and torturing yourself.
It can be traced back to childhood. Your mom cried endlessly when you are an infant. You developed the role because you want your mom to be happy. You didn’t know what’s wrong and thought she cried because of you. It must be you. You did terrible things, so you were meant to be punished. Then growing up, you experienced tremendous joy visiting your dad every month in a different city. Every encounter has to end with departure. You hated goodbyes. You must have done something wrong so your dad had to leave you. Growing, growing, you saw parents fighting and arguing. Again, you thought you weren’t good. You wanted your parents, to stay together and be peaceful. So you created some troubles yourself, either by crying louder and shouting to distract them toward you, or by demanding them doing things for you constantly such as picking you up in school, making food, going on trips, etc. However, you actually didn’t want that. That’s why when the three of you went outside, you didn’t enjoy the trip at all. You wanted to grow independent. But you also worry about them so much. They couldn’t understand each other and communicate. Your mom wants verbal affection from your dad. Your dad wants sensitivity and physical attention to the cleanness, care from your mom. Your mom kept demanding and wouldn’t listen, your dad couldn’t express and kept complaining. You saw everything. You thought you had to do things between them. To hold them together.
Growing growing growing, you got an eating disorder. You lost the sense of purpose, to meddle business of your parents, of people you shouldn’t take the responsibilities in the first place. You developed an illness in order to return to your child’s state, go back to your parents. You seek destruction, and then attention, then amendment, and finally peace. However, you are growing up. Your adult identity, the wise one also wants attention. The wise one wants to keep growing to find the bigger world – remember because you want to see the bigger world and are still figuring out the world. The child identity, the innocent one, however, is innocent, lively, and scared. The people pleaser, you, come out again, carry out two confused, in development roles forward and backward.
At this point, I suddenly realized that you are actually the defender, the protector, the guardian, the warrior role in disguise. Or maybe call you the doppelgänger (the ghost of a living person, altered ego)? You came up when people are drawn to you and become your friends, close relatives. You saw them suffering and couldn’t help solving and giving up yourself to salvage them. You are afraid to lose them, even though sometimes you actually don’t need them at all (like clients, like some acquaintances). Here are several reasons. One is you treat them like your original family. Your mom or your dad. You are afraid they will be mad at you and you did something wrong. Another reason is you were traumatized before in middle school by one of your classmates. You trusted her too quickly and couldn’t get out because she controlled you. You crave friendship and relationships and believed if you leave, you will be lonely and back to isolation.
People pleaser, you have two strong powers. Please and appease. You never allow people to see who you really are because you believe you have to exist. They won’t accept your true identities. You believe your true child and wise one, are intimidating and chaotic. People want peaceful people. Actually, you want peaceful people because you are so tired of childhood chaos and noises.
At this time of writing, I felt you felt seen. My heart is feeling, releasing so it means suppressed emotions are coming. If I pay more attention, my neck is feeling, shaking, because I am speaking the truth. It felts scary and also exciting, right? You have to keep doing your jobs even if you are surrounded by misunderstandings, judgments, even curses. No one is more sincere and courageous than you to keep fighting and keep living. I awe you. I honor you. I cherish you so much, at this moment.
How amazing! English, a second language acknowledges you so much and gives me the words to thank you! How amazing that is!
People pleaser, are you ready to let me go? Or to say more correctly! Are you ready to return to your master Warrior self and enjoy lifelong peace?
I think the answer, I know the answer is YES. I feel you are nodding with endless tears coming out of your eyes. How much joy to be seen? To be seen by self with so much care and love?
People pleaser, people appeaser, you want to say something to me at this time of leaving. You will go back to the Warrior side and then transform yourself to a new identity, People carer. People carer gives moderate attention to those who really cherish and honor you. You give moderate care without any sacrifice of my true self. You are not afraid to stand up against bad guys when they are harming you. You “please/appease” them to help me get away from them, not to make them tie me close longer. You are speaking now, that you see how much I have grown and gained.
You trust me now to deal with the feeling of loneliness – the dissatisfaction of being alone. You won’t come out to save me and drag me to another loophole – even though you have a good intention – because those people can’t save my problem. You trust me now to deal with a goodbye and strong boundaries – the fear of abandonment. You won’t try to manipulate people and give people more than they should have because you know I am attracting real connections only if I allow myself to shine and show up. Those are not what I want. I am rising up to get into a higher level of people and friends. I can still go down to connect with others if I want to, but I don’t need to sacrifice myself in order to fit in. I belong to a higher state. When I see suffering people, you won’t come out and ask me what should you do to save them? They are having as same strong power as I have to solve themselves. I carry them for a little bit. And I let it go. Well, you are sacred right now. I get it. It’s too much for you now. Remember, you are not abandoned. I still cherish every action and intention you have. But I ask you to give the power back to me and let me decide. It’s okay to surrender. And remember you are transforming to a higher state as well, the greater care role. You care and know letting it go is also care. Their frustrations are their problems unable to see the truth. Even they are directed to me and you want to protect me, remember I am not taking them in. You don’t need to, and when you feel you need to, ask someone else, the warrior, your main buddy to step up. You are exhausted and burnt out. Pleasing them only makes you have to do more and drain me more. 无为 art of doing nothing, let myself be a crystal, be a mirror, reflecting all back to the person.
Your responsibilities are done for now. I don’t think you are sad to leave. You just worry about me. You are actually crying for me. Tears of joy right? Can I call you inner mother? The last time? People pleaser, people appeaser, this is my last time to call your name. At the end of this writing, you are now People carer. With new responsibilities, hallow task. You are now carrying me to a higher state. You are no longer a defense position. I bring you from the front gate of my castle to the window of my bedroom. You are with me now.
Now, back to your warrior master. Take a big big sleep. And wait for the transformation in your dream. Wait years of struggles and hardship soothed by the spirit in your dream. And then, open your eyes, feel refreshed, to begin your next journey.
Goodbye, and welcome back, People carer.
I’m ready to blossom. I am already blossom.
Thank you. Thank you. Gratitude. Thank you. I love you 1000.
”我个人所特别respect的人，是勇于告别自己过去的成功，永远追求新生活的人”——鲁白
