Smokey Mirror

It has been over 3 months since I wrote my last entry. I’m kind of shocked it has been so long, and at the same time, it feels like I wrote it in an other lifetime. And I guess I did. My life has changed in ways, I could not have imagined if I wanted to.

In the first weeks after healing my lifelong wound, strange things happened. As I was planning on making 4 visionboards to help me focus on getting my life back on track, I was looking for paperboard. Out of habit, I was reaching for a  beautiful dark grey, because to me it is so esthetically pleasing, when my hand slided past it and rested on a very bright yellow for the ‘Energy’ visionboard, and I caught myself thinking: ‘that is just the right color, it is so energizing, it is so full of vitality. I love it.’ I was shocked. Struck silent may be a better description. I pinched myself in the arm to see if I was still really me, if I had not been overtaken by aliens. Whose hand was that, reaching for yellow? It surely could not be mine, as for as long as I can remember I had really abhorred that color. In my mind there was no color more yuk, except for perhaps orange, which I noticed next and thought would make a perfect color for the ‘Play’ visionboard. By now, I was reaching for my phone to call my husband to make sure that I at least still sounded like the Hermien he had known for 22 years. I don’t know if I ever made that call, but I do know that I got the giggles, the unstoppable giggles. And then I knew this was my new normal.

Healing my aloneness has changed me and my life in inconceivable ways, from funny to amazing and awesome.  For the first time in my life, I really love being around people. It doesn’t drain me, but energizes me. In interactions, I’m not hyperconscious of me anymore and it is so much easier to listen to what the other is saying. I don’t have this overwhelming need to be alone anymore and I certainly don’t get mad when someone ‘steals’ the time I need to ‘recuperate’ from social activities, which is far less anyway. I am amazed at the still rising level of energy and how easy it is now to make wholesome choices and create wholesome habits. I am much more relaxed, as I don’t chew on the past and fret over the future anymore. I love that I now get all the things I learned in the past 10 years. It feels like everything is coming together. I understand things at a level that was unaccessible to me before, it is as if I went from worm’s eye view to bird’s eye view. I have this calm and peaceful feeling that life is unfolding perfectly, that clocktime only is a string of nows, or more accurately a string of choices I make now, and somehow it is easier to be a conscious choice maker. I feel that I am perfect as I am and that my life is where it needs to be. I can relax my body any time I need to and tap into the undercurrent that connects us all, all I have to do is close my eyes and take a deep breath. I feel where I’m heading and I know the only thing I can do in this moment is live with intention, do what I’m doing consciously and with love. The need to be somewhere in the future is gone, I am doing all I can do now, and that is enough.

There are still moments when I slip back in old behavioral patterns. Usually, I get stressed over something so small it is completely absurd. I will always immediately feel off. And most of the time, I can identify and snap out of it easily. Other times, it takes some more time and last week I even had a full meltdown, which felt completely off and perfect at the same time. I guess that’s the biggest thing: I don’t beat myself up anymore, I distill the lesson from what happened and move on, a bit wiser and more compassionate. It seems like this Libran has finally found her balance.

Last week, I faced the biggest monster in my closet. I’m going to share that experience, because I believe we all have to face our monsters at one time or another and I believe that process basically is the same for everyone. At the same time, this is an extremely personal experience and I hope that you will treat it that way. You’re standing on holy ground, this is my soul at its barest, please tread gently.

I was watching a comedy drama  film with my husband. Or better said, my husband was watching the comedy, and I the drama. The pain in this film resonated so deeply with me that I couldn’t stop crying. The monster in my closet was roaring. Because my pain was out of proportion to what was actually going on, I recognized it as old, unresolved pain. I was terrified for what was in the closet, but at the same time I could not pretend it wasn’t there anymore. I could sense the presence of my monster and I knew it would come out again and again if I did not face it. So I decided to put the door ajar and simply wait for my monster to come out one last time. The pain already being active, I figured it would just be a matter of time.

Although I had braced myself for impact, I was not ready for the pain that engulfed me when that door opened. The pain and fear were so real, so raw, it felt almost unbearable. I had met my monster of aloneness.  I felt as if I had this hole in my chest, so big that it almost didn’t fit. I could see right through me. Out of it poored the deep knowing that I am alone, all alone. It felt as if I was cut off from everyone, as if there was no one who loves me. I was all by myself, an outcast. The hurt was overwhelming. This monster in the closet represented the pain of my baby self. This pain was born at almost the same time I was born. After I was born, I was put directly in an incubator. For six weeks, I lived in that incubator and my parents were only allowed to view me from behind a window. I did not hear my mother’s voice, I was not rocked, not consoled, not anything except handled functionally and mechanically through the openings of the incubator.

Being aware that this pain was out of context and untrue at this time in my life, helped me remain anchored. Being aware that in my mind it was happening now and that it felt just as real now as it did then, helped me be gentle and patient with myself. I held this pain as I would a crying newborn baby, with nothing than kindness and love. I breathed my way through the pain. With every breath, I would simply explore the pain, feel it without judging, without interpreting. I explored every corner of the hole in my chest. I felt the nausea where it touched my stomach, and the choking sensation near my throat. I felt the sharp and uneven edges, constantly cringing. And in the days and nights that followed, I relived every conscious memory of feeling an outcast, alone and unloved. With every conscious breath, the hole got smaller. And with the help of a therapist, I was able to close it. That was the strangest feeling, because how do you feel the absence of pain? You don’t. Zooming in on it, it actually felt like a severe wound that has just healed, when the reddish pink skin still feels new, not quite part yet of its surroundings and touching it feels at the same time somewhat scary and slightly surreal.

For the past 39 years, this pain has always been a part of me. It was my ‘normal’, I didn’t know any better. Although, I come from a loving family and have gathered a group of wonderful friends around me, I always felt immensely alone, as if I were standing behind a glass wall, not part of what was going on, wanting to play along, but unable to break through the glass. It has impacted my life in every way imaginable, from the simplest things like not even considering asking for help if I could really use some to being depressed for years and getting physically ill two years ago. Having finally been able to see it and feel it for what it was, is a testimony to my growth. I feel deeply blessed to have lived it.

Everyone’s pain is unique, as is its expression. Our bodies are not designed to store pain for long periods of time. Pain will come to the surface when it is activated, when something we live resonates with it. If we learn to deal with it in a conscious way, non-judging and loving, we will be able to face our fears as they come up, without having to accumulate extra pain. And we will be happier and healthier.

If you want to learn more about the monsters in our closet, I suggest you read We scare because we care.

Last week, on Twitter, I replied that “@ieniemienie *does not believe in chance* #therearenoaccidents.”  Unintentionally, I hit a very tender spot with a mom who lost her son through an accident. In this blog I’ll try to put into words what can not be said in 140 characters.

I don’t believe in accidents. I don’t believe in predestination either. So what do I believe then? Over the years, I’ve come to the conclusion that which makes most sense to me, on all levels, is the concept of ‘concurrence’. In Merriam-Webster’s Learner’s Dictionary, concurrence is described as ‘a situation in which two or more things happen at the same time.’

Have you ever watched ‘Aircrash Investigation’? This TV show, aired on the National Geographic Channel, examines plane crashes and near-crashes. Each episode is a recount of a (near-)crash and how it happened. It is a detailed investigation into what went wrong. Interestingly, it almost never is one thing that went terribly wrong. Usually, the crash is a concurrence of choices, a lot of seemingly small and everyday choices from a lot of different people that come together in a catastrophic plane accident.

We make choices, every day, all day. Most choices are automatic, because they’re habitual. But our choices, however small and insignificant, almost always affect other people. I guess the most famous example is the radius of a smile. My choice to smile is essentially nothing else than the choice to put my lips in a certain position. Yet, the consequences can be far-reaching. By putting my lips in the smile position, I change my physiology. What was but a pose, becomes a feeling. When I smile at other people, they reciprocate, an automated psychological process, and  in turn their physiology changes, making it very likely they will adress the next person they meet in a better mood, maybe even smiling. I believe all of our choices can be as far reaching as that smile. Our choices, however insignificant they may seem at the time can have enormous consequences, good and bad.

I believe every choice has an underlying intention or motivation which eventually determines the outcome. Our intentions can be rooted in fear or in love. Fear (the ultimate fear being ‘not being good enough’) creates painful experiences, while love creates constructively. In an episode of  Air Crash Investigation, there usually is a mechanic, somewhere down the line, who, because of lack of time, chose to do a small checkup when he actually needed to do a full checkup and not told anyone, thus missing a potentially catastrophic problem, or a mechanic who did a full checkup found a small problem, chose not to repair it at the time and forgot to mention it in the checkup plan, leaving the next mechanics who according to schedule only needed to do a small checkup unaware of the growing problem. I’m not pointing my finger at those mechanics. Their mistakes, however catastrophic, were human. I could have made them. Yet, I’m sure their intentions were rooted in fear. Fear of not being ready in time, fear of not being good enough, fear of losing a job, fear of – you name it. I know for sure that a healthy sense of self, a love for repairing planes, a genuine love for people, and the sense of meaning that comes from this combination would have led to different choices, creating a different outcome.

I don’t believe in accidents. I do believe in a concurrence of choices. And I believe the dominant intention of our choices determines the outcome. As a consequence, I believe life is about clarifying our intentions, and learning to make choices that are rooted in love. I believe that if we do just that, tomorrow will be a better day.