The intimacy that arises in listening and speaking truth is only possible if we can open up to the vulnerability of our own hearts. Breathing in, contacting the life that is right here, is our first step. Once we have held ourselves with kindness, we can touch others in a vital and healing way.
Tara Brach
It is so beautiful out there. I close my eyes and I just get lost in the sound of the breeze rustling through the oak tree leaves, the pear leaves, and the apple tree leaves surrounding the front of my house. I hear robins singing some beautiful chorus. It is so heavenly. I could get lost in this. I want to get lost in this. This is my moment. This is my realiy. This is where I want to be.
My mind has been struggling to pull me away from my moment since Saturday...I feel like I am tangled up in some brush being pulled down a thought stream current related to my health-seeking trauma. I just can't seem to do anything but go with it. Memory after memory, thought after thought, emotion after emotion. Sometimes I just find myself standing staring into space with tears streaming down my face as I remember. Trauma triggers like the ones I encountered by simply walking through the ER doors ...have that way of pulling us away from the present into the past. Don't they?
Trauma? Why do you keep calling it "trauma", crazy lady? Are you not overexaggerating?
For you or anyone else, it might not have been so but for me it was "trauma". Why and how this has been traumatic for me is hard to explain. All I can say is that my experiences have led to so much suffering and loss, I will never fully recover from it. Body, mind, and life situation has been irreversibly damaged. Oh, I can transcend it but whatever part of my ego that is left behind will be tangled up in residue from this experience for the rest of my life. And that is okay, I understand that. I can live with that...all a part of being human. I also know now that I can use it as something that will take me to a higher level of understanding and peace where I so want to be, where there is no bruised and beaten ego or body to contend with. For that reason, I am grateful for "my perceived" experience of trauma.
Despite what may be believed by others, I am really not all that concerned about what is happening to my body. I am not afraid of ineveitable illness, inevitable death of form. I am, however, committed to taking care of it because I know I need it to take me wherever it is I am meant to go from here. Yoga has taught me to be in my body, to "hear" my body, to listen to it, to use my body wisely, to appreciate it, and to look deeply into the messages it is telling me and others. This pain I have in my side right now as I write this is one of those messages. That's all. All the "many, many" bouts of pain I have experienced over the years were all communications from a wise body to the mind. That's all. I did not enter the ER on Saturday because I could not handle the pain. It is not even that bad...a 5 may be on the scale. I can handle pain. I have a remarkable pain tolerance but I know I also need to listen to these messages from my wise and amazing body. Getting other people, who may or may not have preconceived ideas about me, to hear these messages is another matter. I have spent time, so much time and energy, trying to convince others of my truths, to get past assumptions and judgments, so my poor body could be heard, I burnt myself out. I gave up.
And I have come to the conclusion that it is really not that important if they do hear me, believe me, I suppose. I mean, in the big scheme of things, it isn't important. I am not their opinion of me any more than I am limited to this form I am in. What is important is that "I" believe me. That I realize, own, and express my truth. My ability to trust myself and my body got all tangled up in that brush as well. And that is the saddest part of all this. I stop knowing what is true for me.
Writing was my saving grace. Recording and working through the events, the memories, and the emotions have allowed some major healing to take place and that healing is just beginning. I am healing now, with every bout of memory-induced tears, I am healing. I am opening up to that which I stuffed down and locked away in my pandora's box. Every time I tell my story, without anger, malicious intent or a desire for revenge, I am healing. When feelings of compassion come up for me and what I endured, and what my loved ones endured because of this experience, I am healing. And man oh man, I am even having genuine feelings of compassion and forgiveness for all involved...that is real healing.
Hmmm! I know my recent entries have me far too "self-centered" and I apologize for that but in order to be there for others, I need to be there for me. This trauma is calling for me to sit with it, breathe through it, feel whatever it is I have been stuffing and heal...so I can do my small, probably insignificant, part in helping to heal the world. That's what we are all here for right.
Namaste!
All is well.
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