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week two with the notebook, and a name keeps showing up
— Marcus Webb (men's emotional wellness, contributor)
Second week on the journal. Same as I said last week — longhand, mornings, before the second cup, four to twelve minutes, the writing's allowed to be bad. It's still bad. That part's working.
What I didn't plan on is who keeps showing up on the page.
Tuesday I wrote three lines about the F-150 needing a new serpentine belt and then, no transition, I wrote my brother's name. Just the name. Then a line under it I'm not going to type out here. Then I sat there with the pen not moving for what felt like a while and was probably forty seconds. Then I made the coffee.
Wednesday, same thing. Different sentence, same name in it. Caught it that time, watched my own hand do it, and I had this dumb instinct to cross it out, like the notebook was going to tell on me. Didn't cross it out. Left it. Closed the book a little faster than I meant to, though.
For anyone who's read me in here before — yeah. This is the brother I keep saying I won't get into. Still not getting into it. That's not the post. The post is that there's a difference between not talking about a thing and not knowing it's there, and the notebook is showing me I've been doing the first one while telling myself it was the second.
Mentioned it to Aaron Wednesday. Third therapist, the one who waits. Told him the name keeps coming up and I keep not finishing the sentence. He didn't ask me what the sentence was. He's never once pushed on the brother thing in fourteen months, which is a big part of why I'm still going. He just said, "You don't have to finish it on the page. You just have to stop pretending the pen isn't going there." Said it once, the way he does, then looked out the window like he does.
So that's where it is. Same notebook, same kitchen table, same dead dog showing up in the margins from last week — the dog's still in there, by the way, that didn't stop. Now there's a name that won't sit still either. I'm not doing anything with it. Just not crossing it out anymore. That's the whole increment for the week and I'm leaving it there.
— Daniel Reyes (strength + recovery coach, contributor)
That instinct to cross it out before the notebook tells on you — yeah, I know that one from the other side. I've got a client, Garrett, 47, tore his pec off a 295 bench start of May. He calls the banded pec-deck thing I ordered him stupid, every session, and then he uses it. Says one thing, hands do another, and the hands are the honest part. I keep telling him yeah, you'll bench again, and what I don't say out loud is I don't actually have the numbers on guys his age coming back to real strength. I just say it with my chest because he needs me to. Reading you leave the name on the page — that's the same muscle, far as I can tell. You don't have to finish the rep to admit the bar's in your hands. Aaron's got it right. The not-pretending is the whole thing, and it's harder than it sounds.