It's the same deal with most things that make me feel good- yoga, cooking, working out, keeping a happiness book, making gratitude lists, taking baths, getting massages, collecting beautiful images, staying in touch with nature, going for long walks, etc. These activities and hobbies make me feel good as I'm doing them, of course, and they generally boost my quality of life, but I am aware that I am simultaneously building a foundation for when I fall; a soft cushioning of "Feeling Betterness" to keep me from breaking. I know that breaking is part of the human experience though, and rather inevitable- in fact, I found that if you try to avoid breaking, something is bound to happen that's completely out of your control and will do a great deal of damage- so my preparations are mostly to keep me from breaking irreparably.
The idea is that when something "bad" happens, be it not getting a part I really want in a play or losing someone I love, I am not so distraught that I can't learn the lessons that are there to be learned, pick myself up again, and go on with my life. For a while, of course, I expect to be stuck in the pain of the moment- usually caused by suffering some kind of loss- and do nothing but mourn. I do firmly believe that the days spent under the covers, eating double-chocolate ice-cream and letting the dishes pile up, are necessary. But once they've run their course, I know I need to get out of what I call, The Cave of Life-Paralysis, Self-Indulgence, and Self-Pity.
And that's when I count on all the work I've done, all the falling stars in my pockets, all the collected wisdom and reminders of the beauty of life. For a while, I do it on auto-pilot- I read over my favorite wise quotes even though they don't really make me feel any better for longer than a minute. I breathe in child's pose and cry in corpse pose, hoping to feel lighter afterward, but knowing that there's no magic yoga pose that heals the heart, no matter how many glowing yogis skip out of class with their clean, shiny auras. I go into the ocean and let the waves do their thing, even if it only makes me feel a teeny, tiny, microscopic bit better. I know how it goes- baby steps, one at a time, until one day...
I read something and it actually has an impact on me.
In this case, it was a friend's email- but not just any friend, a dear friend and pen-pal who is wise beyond his years and has a much larger collection of wisdom/beauty of life than I do. He said a lot of eye-opening things- he always does- so I'll just quote him on the one that touched and inspired me the most, "Feel better (worry about doing better after that part!) and move on so that you can live well, if for no other reason than (what I aspire to in such moments) to honor the sacrifice his being made for your being's education in this matter."
His words were what I needed to hear, yes, and they were very wise, kind, and true. But it was the fact that something finally affected me and penetrated my understanding of life/love/loss/forgiveness/learning/myself, that let me know that I was alive again. That let me know, I'm not done living, loving, and learning yet. I didn't think I was done, no, not for a second, but I was suspended in this half-life place where nothing affected me, nothing touched me, nothing moved me. His words stirred something in me, and I didn't take that for granted. I repeated a mantra of gratitude as I went to sleep that night.
After a night of dreaming of many people I've wronged as well as many people who have wronged me, I woke up and there it was- that feeling I look for in Buddhist quotes online, in tree pose, in soul-cleansing bath crystals, in Eat Pray Love, in Adele's songs, in images of waterfalls, in other people's babies- that feeling that, yes, everything is okay.
Wow.
(that's not me in the picture. just some random person with an awesome blanket)
Image from here.
Special thanks to Chris, dear wise friend and pen-pal.
No comments:
Post a Comment