 Shortly after George died, I came to the following conclusions:
My life no longer belongs to me. It is all about Nova now. I surrender. At the time, and thereon after, I found solace in this. I let go of any illusion of control and surrendered to a higher power. I accepted that which I could not change. I called resistance futile and carried forth, day by day, waiting for the universe to show me the way. It felt noble. It felt humble. It felt wise. And, perhaps, in those first days turning into years, I needed to surrender my life. The dream I’d been creating around my true love and inspired career choices and precious family unit had vanished. George had been taken away, and with him my innocence, my ability to dream, my felt freedom. My survival depended on a change of thinking. Continuing to believe I was entitled to my dreams would have felt defeating at best and crushing at worst. I didn’t know how to create a future for myself out of the ruins, and I didn’t feel I deserved to. I’d had it all, and I’d lost it. Surely there was a hidden message in all of this. You lost it because you didn’t deserve it.  When a caterpillar is ready to fly, it binds itself into a chrysalis and the body dissolves. This glob of undifferentiated cells is no longer a caterpillar, and not yet a butterfly. It is in between identities, released from its past and awaiting its future. 2016 has been that kind of year for me. I am hitting a wall of doubt, uncertainty, fear. My head is full of questions, my energy feels stifled, and I’m experiencing the kind of mind-spinning overwhelm that makes me want to disappear. I am feeling grateful too, to have this summer to reflect and work things out and be with my family, but it’s marred by my constantly questioning mind, scouring itself for answers, wanting to know where my life is headed.
Here's the short list:
I look at this list, and I don’t know how to tackle it. My mind is in overdrive, skipping from one topic to another, trying to make sense of my inner workings, waiting for that Eureka! moment when everything (or, at least, something) starts to click. But the spin continues, and I do what I can to stay in the center of it, breathing and observing and leaning into uncertainty. Reminding myself that the answer itself is not the point; how I get there and my open-hearted exploration of this human experience is where the richness and the real answers lie. And, I realize, I am grateful to have questions. I am glad to not know all the answers. What kind of life would that be, to stand in complete certainty about life and its mysteries, to know exactly where the road leads, never seeking and never scared, never challenged or stretched? I choose to ask these questions. Even if they haunt me, even if they scare me. The road ahead seems to jog and branch and disappear into darkness, but I invite myself to stand tall with the discomfort of not knowing, to walk into fear with love and compassion, to continue seeking with curiosity, and to let go of urgency. When we are uncomfortable, when we are scared, when our expectations are shattered and we choose to keep moving, this is the hard part. It is also the place from which we can thrive. I believe I can create something great. And in this moment, that is the only answer I need.  After spending the last 3 days semi-permanently fixed to my couch, I am feeling more tender and humbled than ever. There is nothing quite like the vulnerability of lying face down, unable to move, while your child patiently brings toys to your bedside in the hopes that you’ll find your way back to her. Then, impatiently, screaming for food, while you manage to piece together a peanut butter and jelly sandwich, peel a banana, and pour some water, all the while trying to dissociate from the extreme nausea and discomfort that reminds you of your fragility. In those moments, time is lost. You move literally minute by minute, focusing on survival.
I am not exactly sure how we got to Thursday. The last time I remember feeling normal, I was sitting in the sun, poolside, drinking a post-brunch mimosa with good friends while Nova napped in the house. That was Monday, Memorial Day. There is nothing particularly damaging about this, in fact it sounds quite fabulous -- a beautiful afternoon with cocktail in hand and our toes in the pool -- but even at the time, I kind of knew that I was pushing my limits. Some may recall a post I wrote last October about my unhealthy relationship with alcohol. I’d had a rather eye-opening epiphany when I realized that perhaps my then- struggles were not all about George's death, but that my continued reliance on alcohol was also a main contender in how I was able (or unable) to show up. This was a defining event for me -- taking responsibility for my choices, acknowledging my weaknesses, removing George as the crutch and putting my habitual drinking on trial. Calling the kettle black. I really thought back then, that I would never have a drink again. It’s amazing (and yet entirely comprehensible) how the mind can rationalize itself back to a state of -- Hey, no problem here, as long as we fall into the same pits with eyes wide open, we won’t get hurt, right? Hm. Now I’m not saying that the mimosa I had on Memorial Day gave me the stomach flu, but perhaps that on top of the drinks I had at our neighborhood brunch on Sunday, on top of the drinks I had visiting friends in the east bay on Saturday, on top of the beer I had with dinner on Friday and the wine before bedtime on Thursday… all of that on top of the fact that in the core of my being I know that I have ultimately failed in my attempts to either extricate or recreate my relationship with alcohol… I mean, it’s possible that my body was trying to tell me something. It’s also possible that I just caught the stomach flu. Regardless, these last few days of involuntary fasting have given me a few things to think about. What exactly happened there? Why did I fall back onto my daily ritual with alcohol? Last weekend was only one of a string of examples. I had returned to the safety net months ago. During that time when moving out and moving on and having to make what seemed like a million decisions about my life and the stuff in it, made my brain scream: Please, turn it off. I turn off, tune out, with alcohol. It lessens the overwhelm. (Of course, I know there are much healthier ways of doing this, but I have neither the time nor the patience to dust off my meditation practice.) And alcohol is one of those things like sugar, or caffeine, i.e. highly addictive substances -- once a pattern is established, it takes a shit-ton of willpower to cut the cord. Additionally, my association with alcohol has its place in the happier moments in life -- celebrations, holidays, sunny days, park days, lunch with friends days -- and so it becomes a social staple, making happier events even happier. But how can one substance be responsible for both decreasing negative emotion and increasing positive emotion? It doesn’t quite make sense. Something I will need to dig into when I’m feeling back to my normal self. But what screams in my head now, is not -- turn it off -- what screams in my head now, is -- How am I still, at 38 years old, struggling to untangle myself from this attachment to alcohol? The untangling, I now realize, is more complicated than a declaration of abstinence. There is something about the way that I use alcohol that is so deep-rooted -- a way to fill in some emptiness within that I didn’t think existed anymore -- and until I expose the truth I will not be free. Because either that emptiness is false and my brain needs a rewire, or that emptiness exists, and I need to fill it with love. Either way, alcohol no longer fits into the equation. I am no longer that girl who needed alcohol’s social lubricant to have meaningless conversations with strangers, and even friends; whose insecurities ran so deep that I needed a drink in my hand to numb the pain; whose own identity was largely a mystery well into adulthood, masked by the identities of those that I followed, trying to find a safe place to fit in. I am no longer that girl. I am a grown woman now, and I am carving out my place in this world. The excess energy I have spent to maintain this toxic relationship is no longer available. I have better things to do. Here begins an investigation within.  Wow. What an extraordinary few days. Last week I was anticipating an upcoming interview with Google, and today I am embarking on an entirely new venture altogether. I am going to finish my book. I am going to expand my blog. I am going to dedicate myself to helping those who are suffering (that's all of us) find grace and healing through vulnerability and self-expression. I am going to teach. I am going to coach. And I am going to raise my daughter in the way that feels right for me, for us. I am a million times grateful to have the resources to do this. My main fear about going back to work was putting Nova in preschool 50 hours a week. She is not yet two, and though she is a flexible and social child, I felt our relationship would suffer after I'd just figured out how to open up and accept this single parenting thing, which has me running towards instead of away from her. I know a lot of kids, kids younger than Nova, are away from their parents full time. And I know that some of them only have one parent. Parents need to work, financially we must provide for our family. But somehow I manage to find myself in a situation where the surviver's benefits we receive from social security are enough to cover our rent and fixed expenses, and give us groceries and gas money, and the other basic necessities. It's not fancy living, but it's enough. And no, I'm not saving for the future (which my parents are quick to remind me of), but I need to make this decision in the present. I gift myself this possibility. I have a window of opportunity here -- a space where the light shines in -- this moment in which we have found ourselves a new home and it feels like the road stretched out before us is beckoning: What will you make of this? Will you step into your power, follow your calling, and offer your gifts to the world? I have decided to go for it. I have so much to share. I am scared to death, but that's the whole point, isn't it? Do what you fear, and you will never fail. You can only grow. I must thank every single person who is reading this and every single person who ever read anything that I wrote. You were -- you are -- instrumental in my healing process, in my transformation, and in the courage I have to move forward. Thank you thank you THANK YOU. Let's do this. |
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