Catharsis

The cool thing about feeling low is that even a little bit of lightening feels very dramatic.  And when the clouds part and you actually start to see the sun peek through...  There's nothing quite like it.

I've been carrying around a big heavy bag of marbles for a while now.  They were unwieldy and hard to manage, but they were mine.  And if there's one thing I've learned in the last year or so, it's to feel what comes as it comes.  Good, bad, ugly: it's all part of the growing.  It's all important.

Still, it gets old.

One of the things I've discovered that works to help clear the clouds for me is exercise. I run - slowly, and without grace, and not very far - but I do it.  I have learned that the act of putting one foot in front of the other does more for my soul than 100 hours of therapy.  (And that's saying something, because I LOVE my therapist!)

This morning I had one of those breakthrough moments.  I was chugging along, in the last quarter of my route. when a song came up on my playlist.  Heaven When We're Home by the Wailin' Jennys.  It's a sweet little song, with some beautiful harmonies, but it was the lyrics that washed over me today.

Don't know what time it is, I've been up for way too long

and I'm too tired to sleep

I call my mother on the phone, she wasn't home,

and now I'm wondering the street

I've been a fool, I've been cruel to myself

I've been hanging onto nothing

when nothing could be worse than hanging on

And something tells me there must be

something better than all this.

I've fallen many times in love and every time

it's been with the wrong man

Still I'm out there living one day at a time

and doing the best I can

Cuz we've all made mistakes

that seem to lead us astray

But every time they helped to get us where we are today

And that's a good a place as any

and it's probably where we're best off anyway

It's a long and rugged road

and we don't now where it's headed

But we know it's going to get us where we're going

And when we find what we're looking for

we'll drop these bags and search no more

'Cuz it's going to feel like heaven when we're home

It's going to feel like heaven when we're home

There's no such thing as perfect,

and if there is we'll fnd it when we're good and dead

Trust me I've been looking

bu tonight I think I'll go and take a bath instead

And then maybe I'll walk a while

and feel the earth beneath me

They say if you stop looking

it doesn't matter if you find it

And whose to say that even if I did

it's what I'm really looking for

It's a long and rugged road

and we don't now where it's headed

But we know it's going to get us where we're going

And when we find what we're looking for

we'll drop these bags and search no more

'Cuz it's going to feel like heaven when we're home

It's going to feel like heaven when we're home.

As I rounded the corner to my beautiful home and saw sweet little Mittens the kitty waiting for me on the front stoop, I realized - I'm going to be OK.  It's all going to be OK.  I can carry marbles if I need to.  They are my marbles after all.  And each one is a lesson that moves me down that long, rugged road - to a place that I know is going to be exactly where I need to be.

Despair

Despair is one of those things that affects everyone a little differently.  For some, it's a black cloud dumping rain down on them in a constant, drenching deluge.  Some experience it as the complete and total absence of light, hope, or joy.

For me, despair is a heavy load, unwieldy and hard to manage - like trying to carry 75 pounds of marbles in a plastic grocery bag.  Each marble is a memory - a piece of evidence in the case I build

against myself.  Sometimes, I sit and count them.  This one was the time I let down my guard and it came back to bite me.  That one is the memory of something that, when it happened, seemed magical, but now cast in the light of reality - is just another example of my foolish naivete. The bag itself is my thin veil of composure - the calm face that the world sees.  And there are many moments when I think I have it under control, until I move wrong - maybe too abruptly or with too much ease or worse, someone asks a question and it rips a jagged hole through that bag.  It splits, releasing a shower of hundreds of marbles: messy, loud, and public. After a moment of panic at being exposed, I shrug,  get another bag, gather up my marbles and keep trudging on.

As unwieldy as they are, they are my marbles.  I have earned them.

Yes, despair is a hard thing to get away from.

And logically, I realize that as long as I am carrying that bag, I am weighted down by those marbles.  There is no room in my hands for anything else.  At some point, I will have to stop counting and recounting them.  They will go on the shelf with all the other marbles I have accumulated in my life.  But in this moment, the marbles feel like all I have.  Everything else is slipping away, but the marbles?  The marbles are mine.  I cling to them because they are the only thing that makes me feel alive.

I Can Dish It Out, But Can I Take It?

I've written a lot on this blog about love of all kinds.  I've learned that I believe in a love that's different than the Hollywood, fairy tale version we were sold as children.   I've even spent some time working out a rubric for love. I spent a lot of time thinking about the process of learning to love oneself.  All the experiences and all of the learning again and again bring me back to that: loving yourself.

Not to brag or anything, but I think I've done a pretty good job of learning self love.  I'm much more gentle with myself these days: less critical, less judgmental, more patient, and way more forgiving. And I have seen direct evidence of how that impacts my relationship with others.  Being kind and loving to myself has deepened my relationship with family and old friends.  It has also, indirectly, brought into my life a whole new circle of friends.  Making friends as an adult is a strange and perilous experience.  It's hard to do, and when it does happen, it can often be shallow or short lived, based on convenience.  But when it works, man, is it awesome.

Except...

What happens when - as you start to love yourself and you become aware of the fact that you are surround by other loving individuals?  Nobody told me how hard it can be to just accept the fact that you are loved. Don't get me wrong.  The being loved part isn't new; I've been blessed to be surrounded by loving people my whole life.  But being aware of it, open to it and accepting of it?  That's more foreign to me than Differential Calculus.

 I see this as the next phase of growth.  I've learned to love myself.  I am able to love others.  Man, I can dish out the love like nobody's business.  But can I take it?  Can I sit back and let others love me?  It's a challenge, because to let others love you, you have to let others KNOW you.

To let others know you, you have to be willing to be known.  To drop the facades, to break down the walls, to show your heart and speak your mind.  That's a very vulnerable position to be in.  Anything can happen: rejection, withdrawal, ridicule, abandonment.  But...  if anything can happen, you can also get affirmation, connection, empathy, and acceptance.
Acceptance is a beautiful gift.  To have someone say, "I see your flaws and your shortcomings; I see your strengths and your gifts.  They are all A-OK with me."  That acceptance is a gift that almost seems too grand to accept.  But accepting that gift gives others the freedom to accept it as well.  And the beautiful thing is that it's contagious.  Those who feel loved are better able to give love. Those who give love are better able to accept love.  It becomes an upward spiral.

Opening ourselves up: to be vulnerable, to accept love, to be seen and known is scary.  But from what I've seen, in most cases, it's a good gamble with a high payoff.  And it's certainly more enjoyable than Calculus!