Sometimes I have the expectation of myself that I’ll function like a robot. That no matter the circumstances, no matter how I’m feeling, I’ll be able to accomplish XYZ regardless. And if I’m not able to accomplish XYZ, then I beat myself up and make meaning from it like, “You’re so lazy.” This may sound silly, but what I often forget is that I’m a human and human beings are not robots. We aren’t able to show up the same way every day.
Something my therapist says is, “Everyone is doing the best they can at every moment and sometimes their best sucks.” Yep. I’m doing my best every day and sometimes my best sucks. Sometimes my best entails lying in bed under a pile of blankets watching terrible television because I can’t motivate myself to contact potential new clients. Sometimes my best means my bathroom mirror has flecks of toothpaste on it because cleaning it feels like too much effort.
I see this lack of respecting the natural ebb and flow of each person reflected in society. The other week I wrote about how people are turning into small children, throwing tantrums in grocery stores, and yes, it’s because many of us struggle with feeling our feelings, but I also think it’s because in the U.S. anyway, we forget we’re human and instead we’re being asked to function as if we aren’t. Your kids are home from school? You should be able to accomplish as much work as if they weren’t! Your colleague is out sick with Covid? You should still be able to meet that deadline! Um, no.
They’re cute, but let’s not aspire to be like them. Photo by Eric Krull on Unsplash
The expectation that life can or will continue as normal even when circumstances change is absurd. We are not robots and it’s not feasible to “power through” everything. Furthermore, maybe we’re not supposed to power through! Maybe we’re supposed to be smart, adaptable human beings that fluctuate day by day. This is something living with a chronic illness teaches me over and over again. Some days I can go for a swim, write for hours, clean my house, make dinner from scratch, and connect with friends. And other days I’m only capable of getting dressed and heating up a premade meal. Both happen and yet I beat myself up on the days I don’t have energy to do as much as I’d like. A lot of it has to do with internalized capitalism, but it’s also because of the expectations I place upon myself.
What if instead I treated myself with compassion and understanding? What if instead I recognized that at some point the bathroom mirror will get cleaned and inspiration will strike to contact potential new clients? Because that always happens. It reminds me of a quote from the late, great, Thích Nhat Hạnh who said, “No one is more worthy of your kindness and compassion than you are,” and also, “Real love means loving kindness and compassion, the kind of love that does not have any conditions.”
Real love for myself and others means recognizing we each have good days and bad days. It means understanding there’s a natural rhythm and cycle to life. It means acknowledging as much as society wants us to be robots, we aren’t. We’re human beings and human beings fluctuate, make mistakes, and have limitations. For better or for worse, we show up differently every day and not only is that OK, it’s natural, normal, and to be expected because again, we’re not robots.
I dream of a world where we treat ourselves with love and compassion. A world where we reduce the expectations we set for ourselves. A world where we understand our best will change from day to day. A world where we remember we aren’t robots.
Another world is not only possible, it’s probable.
Can we take a moment and acknowledge how hard it is to be alive? And in particular to be alive right now? I keep thinking about this New York Times article detailing how in the retail world, adults are acting like children because they are unable to cope with the stress of life. Grown men are screaming because the grocery store is out of the cheese they want. Women are becoming inconsolable because their packages are delayed. In the U.S., and likely other parts of the world, we are not doing well, emotionally speaking.
Many of us don’t know how to handle our feelings and instead turn to something external to cope. For instance, at the start of the pandemic, Forbes posted an article about how people are consuming more alcohol, smoking weed, playing video games, eating a lot of junk food, binge-watching Netflix and adult films more than ever before. But that trend hasn’t stopped. More recently in September 2021, USA Today shared that nearly 1 in 5 Americans are heavily drinking. Heavy drinking is defined as four or more drinks per day for women and five or more drinks per day for men, twice in a single week.
When life feels hard, give us something to feel better. And I get it, I really do. I’m an addict in recovery. I know all about turning to something external to feel better because I did it for years. But does repressing or suppressing emotion work? Ever? For anyone? Or instead are people turning into small children because they’re no longer able to be instantly gratified?
These eggs! So expressive. Photo by Hello I’m Nik on Unsplash
Emotions are meant to be felt. They are a form of energy in our bodies that must be moved, must be expressed. When there’s a loss, the best thing to do is to cry, not get drunk. Tears literally make you feel better because they release the chemicals oxytocin and endorphins. If you’re angry, don’t scream at a grocery store clerk, express it in a safe way by yelling at an empty cup that represents the person who crossed a boundary, or writing a letter you never send, or whatever. Taking out your anger on someone as collateral damage is not OK.
We’ve forgotten how to feel our feelings in this culture because we have so many quick fixes at our disposal. But this pandemic is doing away with those quick fixes, at least some of them. Are we crying about that? Are we weeping for our losses, not only deaths, but the loss of certainty, connection, freedom, normalcy, and more? I know for some people it’s hard to cry or it may not feel safe to cry. If that’s you, you’re not alone. I highly recommend checking out the Westfeldt Institute for Emotional Hygiene because this is what they specialize in – emotional regulation. You can also listen to season one of the podcast “The Healing Feeling Shit Show.”
Feeling your feelings not only helps you, but it helps others. The world needs more adults. We’re witnessing what happens when inner children are at the helm and it’s not pretty. Being an adult is not only about making money, it’s also knowing what to do when you feel scared, angry, or sad. I have zero interest in being screamed at because I looked at someone funny and I have zero interest in retail clerks consoling a customer because the shop ran out of dish soap. Can we not? Can we instead feel our feelings? It’s not always easy but it’s worth it.
I dream of a world where we practice emotional regulation in healthy ways. A world where we feel our feelings as they arise. A world where we take care of ourselves and each other by acting like adults when life gets challenging. A world where we know what to do when we have a feeling.
Another world is not only possible, it’s probable.
If you’re anything like me, you’ve heard something to the effect of, “It only takes one person to feel grounded and safe in a crowd to change the atmosphere for everyone else.” It’s a nice sentiment, but is it just a bunch of hokey-pokey b.s.? Can little ole me really have that kind of effect on other people? It turns out, yes.
Emotions are contagious just like colds and scientists think this “emotional contagion” is due to the mirror neuron system. Essentially, when you do something yourself and watch someone else do that exact activity, the same neurons are firing, aka, mirror neurons. Pretty cool right? So how then do emotions catch on? According to this article in Healthline, it happens in three stages: mimicry, feedback, and experience.
Mimicry is just what it sounds like: mimicking someone else. If I smile at you, chances are you’re going to smile back at me. However, typically your reaction is not conscious. It’s happening automatically. But that mimicry has a ripple effect and creates feedback in the brain and body. For instance, if you’re mimicking my smile, even if originally you felt cranky, just by smiling, you’ll feel happier. And that feedback will create a response in you so that you actually are feeling happier. That’s the experiential part of emotional contagion. You mimicked me, created feedback for yourself, and thus “caught” the emotion I’m expressing.
I don’t know about you, but looking at these folks makes me smile! Photo by Siviwe Kapteyn on Unsplash
What fascinates me about this process is not only the one-on-one contagion, but also the group contagion. We see this with mob mentality, or herd mentality when people are influenced by their peers to adopt a behavior or viewpoint on a largely emotional basis. What we’re all creating is a collective mind. We’re syncing our minds up and this happens whether we want it to or not.
The question then becomes, what to do about that? My spiritual teacher says, “The collectivity is yours. The collectivity is not outside you – your future is inseparably connected with the collective fortune. You must take the entire collectivity with you and move toward the sweetest radiance of the new crimson dawn, beyond the veil of the darkest night.”
Later on, he says, “Now, changes will have to be effected in the mental flow of this collective mind; you will have to create a new wave of thought in it. Because of the manner of human thinking thus far, the pace of human progress has been painfully slow. If it is given a new direction, the speed of progress will be greatly accelerated.”
Frankly, I’m all for moving toward the sweetest radiance of the new crimson dawn and accelerating the speed of human progress. And that means how I feel, how I act, matters. How you interact with other people has an impact. It transmits something and together we create something that wouldn’t have been there before. We are each contributing to a collective mind. But what are we contributing? Is it something that will move humanity forward to a state of equity, justice, love, and respect? Or is it something that creates more discrimination, inequality, and division? Knowing about emotional contagion, what will you choose?
I dream of a world where we recognize how we feel, what we express really does matter. A world where we allow ourselves to be authentic, but also understand we affect and even infect those around us. A world where we are conscious about what we’re contributing to the collective mind because we understand emotional contagion is real.
Another world is not only possible, it’s probable.
Sometimes I think the expression, “Don’t just do something, sit there,” was made for me. I’m not prone to inertia and people often describe me as “tenacious” and “hard-working.” That’s true, and it means I have trouble with the reverse: giving up.
I don’t know when to let go, not only of people and relationships, but also situations. It’s confusing because the message society sends over and over again is, “Don’t give up! Keep going!” Except, that’s not working for me. To give a small example, I’ve queried 55 literary agents since February 2020 for a romantic comedy I wrote and thus far, every single one of them has said, “No.” I’m still waiting to hear back from three agents, but I don’t feel all that hopeful. At the moment, I don’t have the energy to keep pursuing an agent for this book.
Instead of telling me, “Try harder!” my therapist recommended I take a break and let myself feel what arises when I do so, which is disappointment. He says it’s important for all human beings to deal with disappointment, to cry, and not keep trying to “fix” whatever is causing the disappointment. After shedding those tears, then perhaps there will be a new energy, a brainstorm for approaching the issue differently. Regardless, compulsive trying only results in frustration for me. That makes sense when you consider the five Buddha families, also called the five wisdom energies, which are Buddha, Vajra, Ratna, Padma, and Karma.
There’s power in pausing. Photo by Lukasz Saczek on Unsplash
Each person has a predominant Buddha family with strengths and weaknesses. For instance, Vajra family people have an aptitude for mental clarity and the ability to correct any distortions. They are scientific, logical. But when they are encumbered, when their energy is bound up, they can become angry, judgmental, and critical.
All of the Buddha families speak to me, but the one I align with the most is the Karma family. Karma family people are hard-workers, they know how to get things done. When their energy is encumbered, they become envious, comparing themselves with others and finding themselves lacking. (Did you laugh upon hearing that? I know I did because the description is so apt.) The meditation for a Karma family person is to be in the flow, to think about the wind picking up a sail so that it moves with ease, not force. In other words, the practice for people like me is to take inspired action, not compulsive action.
I’ll admit, that’s so freaking hard because my compulsive doer is strong, but taking inspired action seems to be the message I’m receiving over and over again. The universe seems to keep telling me, “Pause, my dear. Just pause.” This is also in alignment with my spiritual philosophy because my teacher says, “[M]ovement through speed and pause is an essential factor for each and every animate or inanimate object. Wherever there is existential factor there must be this pulsation. An entity acquires strength and stamina during the pause phase, and emanates vibration during the speed period. There cannot, however, be any absolute speed or absolute pause in the created world.”
In other words, I’m paused now but it won’t be permanent. I just have to wait for wind in my sails.
I dream of a world where we recognize the power of pause. A world where we understand constantly doing all the time is a recipe for burnout. A world where we learn to take inspired action and until that inspiration strikes, we rest easy, knowing our time will come.
Another world is not only possible, it’s probable.
Anger has been on my mind lately. Frankly it’s because I’m fuming. On Saturday, I came home to my apartment and found the workmen charged with replacing my bedroom window left my place a mess. Furniture was not returned to its rightful place, area rugs were askew, and pictures lay on the floor. Not only that, I was gifted with dust in every nook and cranny of my bedroom and random paint splatters on my floor. I literally spent an hour and a half vacuuming, scrubbing, washing, and putting things back where they belong. Minus the paint splatters. Those I couldn’t get rid of.
Suffice to say, I am NOT a happy camper. Quite the opposite in fact. As a deeply spiritual person, am I doing something “wrong” by feeling angry? With so many messages in the world about how anger is unnatural, destructive, something to avoid, etc. am I harming myself in the long run by feeling this way? In short, no.
First of all, anger shows up when there’s a boundary violation, as in the case of my apartment. Boundaries help us determine what we are and are not OK with, and if someone crosses the boundary line, that’s when anger often appears. From a nonviolent communication perspective, anger is a messenger notifying me about unmet needs. In this case, unmet needs for consideration and care.
Sometimes it’s good to “see red.” Photo by Alex Mihai C on Unsplash
The other thing I learned about anger recently is even in my own spiritual tradition anger isn’t a villain the way it’s often portrayed. Don’t get me wrong, my spiritual teacher talks at length about how anger can become a bad habit and even says, “The tendency of anger harms the body, stuns the mind, and creates obstacles for spiritual progress. Shiva, the great yogi, was well aware of this truth, and thus he clearly stated, Krodha eva mahán shatruh – ‘Anger is a great enemy.’”
So yeah, my teacher calls anger an enemy, BUT later on he also makes a distinction between sentient anger and static anger. He says if anger takes control of you, it’s static anger. But anger when it’s used for good, to stop the unholy activities of people in society for instance, is called sentient anger.
What does that mean? My takeaway is that anger cannot be an unconscious controller. The emotion is harmful if it’s unregulated and instead it requires training. A dear friend of mine uses this analogy: Anger can be likened to a guard dog. If it’s untrained, it may bite the mail carrier. Alternatively, the dog may wag its tail and let burglars stroll in and steal your stuff. Neither situation is how you want a guard dog to behave. The same is true for us humans and our internal guard dogs. We don’t want to get angry at the wrong times nor calm when it behooves us to be angry. When spiritual traditions advocate non-anger, they’re focused on static anger. But there is a place for anger, even in spirituality.
One more point: Until we’re all enlightened, omniscient beings, we have no idea what other people’s boundaries are. Anger, along with communication, are how we communicate that. Anger provides important information and that means for us spiritual people too.
I dream of a world where we recognize the value of anger. A world where we work on training anger so it doesn’t control us. A world where we understand anger has a rightful place and can in fact, even be something good.
Another world is not only possible, it’s probable.
A few weeks ago, I wrote that I feel sad regarding this pandemic. Now instead of sad, I’m angry. I hate this freaking pandemic. I hate that I haven’t been in the presence of another person without a mask in MONTHS. MONTHS. Yes, I’m going on walks with people, yes, I’m doing a lot of socializing virtually, but I just want to sit in the presence of another person and see their whole face. Is that too much to ask?
Frankly, I understand the appeal of the anti-masker, “plandemic” philosophy. It’s much more appealing to believe the pandemic is a completely made up thing that the government created in an effort to control humanity rather than the alternative. Because the alternative is this – not getting together with friends and family for the holidays, not seeing smiles on the faces of people you love, not touching each other. It SUCKS.
I purposely chose reddish paint swatches. Photo by Brett Jordan on Unsplash
So heck yeah I’d like to pretend none of this is real. Why am I sharing this? Because I ascribe to psychotherapist Michael Eigen’s philosophy. He wrote in his book Feeling Matters:
“As long as feelings are second-class citizens, people will be second-class citizens. Experience is an endangered species. An important function of psychotherapy is to make time for experiencing. Psychic taste buds really exist and rarely rest. They feed us each other, gauge states of being, states of spirit. We taste each other’s feelings and intentions.”
This is me offering up my state of being, my state of spirit. It’s not fun, it’s not pretty, but it’s real. And if anger remains unexpressed, it can turn into depression, which explains how I’ve felt this week watching holiday movies and realizing I will not have any of those experiences. I will not be at a holiday party. I will not be opening gifts with my siblings. I will not have a big indoor dinner with anyone. At first it depressed me but now I’m mad. I’m giving a big middle finger to this pandemic because it deserves it.
At the same time because life is complicated, I’m also grateful for the pandemic. This weekend I organized a Zoom call with the young people in my yoga and meditation group and we had attendees not only from the U.S., but also Mexico, Brazil, Portugal, Italy, Germany, and Denmark. I’m not sure that would have happened if we weren’t forced to socialize over the internet. Similarly, I’m seeing several of my college friends every week as we gather for a virtual Shabbat service. That also wouldn’t have happened without this pandemic.
Life is weird and complicated. And that means I can feel profoundly pissed off as well as profoundly grateful. Both can be true. I think being a fully functional adult means holding the paradox over and over again. It means allowing opposing things to occupy the same place. It means recognizing nuance. It means seeing shades of gray. And it also means creating space for our feelings.
I dream of a world where we express our emotions. A world where we feed our psychic taste buds. A world where we allow ourselves to feel happy and sad and angry and grateful and whatever else arises. Because ultimately we know life is nuanced.
Another world is not only possible, it’s probable.
This past week I canceled a trip to Washington, D.C. I had planned for later this month. Way back in April when I originally intended to go, I figured by the fall surely everything with COVID-19 would be sorted. That we’d shelter in place for a few months and then we’d be able to go about our business as usual.
As you know, that didn’t happen and it’s quite likely the rest of the year will continue in the same fashion it already has. Canceling my trip was somehow the watershed moment for me as I’ve realized how much this year has taken from all of us. I’ve cried so many times this week. I’ve grieved my inability to travel abroad as well as domestically. I’ve grieved how I can’t be closer than 6 feet to my friends without worry. I’ve grieved that plans and parties have all been scuppered. This year has been rough.
It’s not only COVID-19, it’s all of it. It’s Black Lives Matter, it’s climate change, it’s Donald Trump and the circus he’s ringleading. It’s fear of the future as well as fear of the present. I watch television shows and movies filmed before the pandemic and I feel wistful and envious of life before. When we took physical presence for granted. When we shook each other’s hands without a second thought. When we didn’t feel alarmed every time someone coughed. I’m sad. I’m really sad.
I miss sharing moments like these with someone else. Photo by Matt Heaton on Unsplash
I posted on Instagram that I wish I could pull a Rip Van Winkle and wake up when the world is different. It’s true, I do. And at the same time as often happens with grief, the world becomes sharper so I’m recognizing what I truly care about. For me, this year is clarifying how much I miss my family and want to spend more time with them. It’s also clear to me if I don’t leave my bubble every three to four months, if I don’t travel somewhere, I lose my freaking mind. And because I can’t actually do that in the way I’d like, I’m dreaming more. I’m using Pinterest for the first time ever creating a board of all the places I want to visit. I haven’t made a list like that since high school.
For other people, the pandemic is providing clarity in terms of their living situations. They’re moving apartments, houses, states, even countries. They’re recognizing they don’t actually like where they live and doing something about it. The same is true with relationships: People are either breaking up or they’re settling down. This pandemic is shaking us all up like a snow globe, which has its pros as well as cons.
Something else this period is highlighting for me is how precious time is. It’s the commodity we can’t have back. I don’t particularly miss restaurants or going to shows. I miss lying on the grass next to someone else and watching the clouds go by, calling out the different shapes they make. I miss reading a book on the couch while my feet are brushing against my sister’s.
As a friend of mine says, this year is refocusing our attention on simple pleasures. Instead of worrying so much about achieving, progressing, and doing, in the U.S. anyway we’re slowing down, reconnecting with family and friends, and remembering what truly matters. In case it wasn’t clear, what truly matters is you.
I dream of a world where we remember what’s most important. A world where we value our relationships and connections over material goods. A world where we cherish the moments we have with one another as we recognize how finite they truly are.
Another world is not only possible, it’s probable.
I feel a little discombobulated. On the one hand, it’s Rosh Hashanah, the Jewish New Year, and a time for celebrating. I am celebrating – I’m celebrating that the sky has cleared, I can see the sun again. I’m grateful for my friends, family, and community. I’m taken aback but also profoundly grateful that my business is thriving. There’s a lot to be grateful for.
On the other hand, I’m deeply troubled by what’s happening in the world: the rise in fascism, environmental catastrophes, and oh yeah, a global pandemic, which has not only killed numerous people, but has also led to unemployment and food insecurity. There’s a lot to be concerned about.
I’m reminded here this is always how life has been. Joy is frequently mixed with sorrow and we see that even in Rosh Hashanah services. There’s a part called the Mourner’s Kaddish where the entire congregation holds space for those who have lost loved ones during the past year. People call out the names of loved ones who have died so everyone can bear witness to their grief.
There can be beauty even amidst desolation. Photo by Nikola Johnny Mirkovic on Unsplash
As someone who is prone to black and white thinking, I presume my emotions will operate the same way: I’ll feel ecstatically joyful without any hint of sorrow. But again, that’s not true. This year as all of us are bombarded with one terrible piece of news after another, I continue to pursue joy and cling to it like a buoy in the sea.
I’m reminded here of a poem by Jack Gilbert titled “A Brief For The Defense” that seems especially relevant:
Sorrow everywhere. Slaughter everywhere. If babies
are not starving someplace, they are starving
somewhere else. With flies in their nostrils.
But we enjoy our lives because that’s what God wants.
Otherwise the mornings before summer dawn would not
be made so fine. The Bengal tiger would not
be fashioned so miraculously well. The poor women
at the fountain are laughing together between
the suffering they have known and the awfulness
in their future, smiling and laughing while somebody
in the village is very sick. There is laughter
every day in the terrible streets of Calcutta,
and the women laugh in the cages of Bombay.
If we deny our happiness, resist our satisfaction,
we lessen the importance of their deprivation.
We must risk delight. We can do without pleasure,
but not delight. Not enjoyment. We must have
the stubbornness to accept our gladness in the ruthless
furnace of this world. To make injustice the only
measure of our attention is to praise the Devil.
If the locomotive of the Lord runs us down,
we should give thanks that the end had magnitude.
We must admit there will be music despite everything.
We stand at the prow again of a small ship
anchored late at night in the tiny port
looking over to the sleeping island: the waterfront
is three shuttered cafés and one naked light burning.
To hear the faint sound of oars in the silence as a rowboat
comes slowly out and then goes back is truly worth
all the years of sorrow that are to come.
As we are all grappling with all the injustice in the world, all the destruction, all the grief, I encourage you to also have the stubbornness to accept your gladness. To find joy when and where you can because the world isn’t one way or another – it’s both, it’s all of it, it’s everything. I’m not advocating spiritual bypassing or whitewashing the horrors in the world. No. Instead I’m advocating feeling your feelings, recognizing it’s true life can be terrible, but also recognizing it’s true that there are babies laughing, flowers blooming, and lovers dancing. That life can also be joyful even in the most horrendous of circumstances. Life, and people, are complicated like that.
I dream of a world where we embrace delight. A world where we recognize joy can be mixed with sorrow. A world where we find the beauty in the world as a tonic to our hearts, reminding us there’s more to life than tragedy. A world where we celebrate as we grieve.
Another world is not only possible, it’s probable.
(First off, I want to say even though I’m not writing about Black Lives Matter this week doesn’t mean I no longer care or it’s not on my mind. It is. Being a human being means I care about many things all at the same time. In addition to everything going on in the world, things still happen in my personal world, and that’s what I’m writing about today.)
On Saturday, I stuffed cream, cashmere gloves into my jacket pocket in preparation for my trip to the grocery store. I like to wear gloves when I know I’ll be encountering high-touch surfaces because it saves me from washing my hands. About six minutes in to my walk to the store, I noticed the gloves had escaped my pocket. I stopped in my tracks and did an about face, retracing my steps while scouring the sidewalk and the street for my gloves. I found one and kept looking. I walked all the way back home and didn’t find my other glove.
Because I still needed groceries, I turned around again and kept my eyes trained on the ground looking for my glove. Didn’t find it. After leaving the grocery store, I once more swept my eyes left to right, constantly looking for my other glove. If you’re keeping track, that’s three times I searched for my glove to no avail.
The glove in question.
When I came home, I took a picture of my glove and uploaded it to Google for a reverse image search, to see if I could purchase the gloves again. Nope. Then I messaged three different people on Etsy to ask if they could make me a match. If that wasn’t enough, later in the evening, just for kicks, I searched the street two more times and came up empty. If it wasn’t obvious, I have trouble letting go. Not only of objects, but also of people and situations. Goodbyes are hard for me.
I try really hard to fix things so I won’t need to feel sad. In this case, if I found my other glove I wouldn’t feel sad or upset because the problem would be solved. I think it’s safe to say my other glove is gone. Tears are pricking my eyes even typing that. I don’t want it to be true but reality is like that. In real life, not everything can be fixed or solved. Even buying a new pair of gloves won’t truly replace the one I lost. A new pair won’t make up for what’s missing. I’m allowed to feel sad about that.
My therapist tells me frequently emotions are like tools and when they show up, use them. When sadness shows up it’s because of a loss. I’ve lost many things in my life and I don’t think I’ve properly grieved them all. I was too busy metaphorically combing the street trying to solve the problem to cry. But here’s the thing about grief – it doesn’t go anywhere. It stays in the body. It may express itself as lung trouble, or pain in the back, or weight gain, or something else, but grief sticks around until it’s felt.
This isn’t a profound post or fiery one or philosophical one. It’s a human one. I’m a human being and when I lose something, I feel sad whether I let myself cry about it or not. What I’m learning is life is easier when I let myself grieve. How much time and trouble could I have saved on Saturday if I had given in to the emotion I felt instead of fighting it? I don’t regret looking for my glove, but now that I know it’s not coming back, it’s time to grieve. Not only for my glove, but for other things too.
I dream of a world where we let ourselves cry when we lose something or someone. A world where we recognize emotions are not meant to be fixed but rather felt. A world where we let ourselves feel our feelings when they come up. A world where we embrace our humanness.
Another world is not only possible, it’s probable.
A month or two ago I heard on a podcast I listen to that the wound is also the gift. It’s a phrase that’s stuck with me because it rang true, but I couldn’t quite grapple how. This week provided me clarity on the subject.
I’ve always been a sensitive person but growing up I didn’t know how to handle my emotions. I tried to shut them down or numb out in a variety of ways. Those two strategies run rampant in our society and it’s why we see such high rates of addiction and insensitivity. Emotions can be scary for people, especially when the messages a person receives are, “Don’t be sad, don’t be scared, don’t be angry.”
Speaking from experience, it’s impossible for me not to feel sad, scared, or angry, and trying other means to NOT feel my feelings only harmed me. These days I’m taking a new tactic which is to feel my feelings and use them as information to guide me in my life. But because I’ve been on both sides it means I can use my wound and make it a gift. It means that now I live and breathe empathy. In fact, I taught an empathy workshop at a retreat recently. I never thought I’d be a person who is helping other people process their emotions when I was so unskilled, but now, people regularly call me when they’re upset or scared or sad. My emotional wound turned me into someone with high emotional intelligence, and my gift is now I understand how to set and maintain healthy boundaries so I’m not overwhelmed by emotions anymore. Not always, not in every circumstance.
I know it’s not a wound, or a gift, but I liked this picture. Photo by Lina Trochez on Unsplash
I still try to numb out sometimes, or push my emotions away, but the frequency is less and the duration is shorter. My own experience is helping others. Do I want to be a therapist? Absolutely not because I’m too introverted for that, but I’d love to ghostwrite for therapists. And even without parlaying emotional hygiene into a career, I’m helping myself and my community through modeling and acting as a resource. I’ve come to understand the only way out of anything is through, and that means my feelings too.
My spiritual teacher talks about this as well. He says regarding the innate propensities people have, for instance shyness or cruelty, “You shouldn’t check the flow. You may check the flow to check the flood, but you are to divert that water through different canals. Here also you are to check the flow of your baser propensities and divert it unto that singular propensity, toward the Supreme Self … The mind is moving toward so many unrighteous activities. Withdraw those activities and guide it toward the singular righteous Entity.”
You can’t direct the flow of something if you avoid it altogether. And you might find the things that hurt you become assets later on when helping others. We all have wounds and sometimes those wounds become gifts that foster connection, love, and support. You never know, but it’s an interesting question to ponder.
I dream of a world where we recognize sometimes the things that wounded us also become our greatest gifts. A world where we take what we’ve learned and use it to help others. A world where we come to terms with our past hurts and use them to propel us forward.
Another world is not only possible, it’s probable.