Julia has a gift for reaching people's hearts, saying things that connect with where they are and for me most recently, gifting me with the perfect gift. I wanted to save so many of Shauna's words and started just putting stickies next to the pithy thoughts. Now you get to read them too.
"Everything has changed and also you still have work to do and dirty dishes in the sink, and where your future used to be, now there's a blank nothingness and you realize you have to build a new life. You have to paint the canvas of your future, because it used to be a well-developed, very specific image and now it's blank. This is terrifying."
That succinctly sums up my need to move. My canvas was destroyed when Russ died.
"A wise friend of mine says that true spiritual maturity is nothing more - and nothing less - than consenting to reality. HELLO TO HERE - not what you wanted or longed for or lost, not what you hope for or imagine. Reality. This here. This now."
I have been working hard on this concept for a couple of years so it was affirming to read it said in this way. I have options in how I make decisions or the words I use or whether or not I accept or give forgiveness, but I live in the here and now and can't change that. Russ is gone.
"And if you're in the midst of a painful season, don't feel guilty for catching yourself feeling happy every once in a while. That's not wrong. That's not betraying the loss. Let yourself be sad and then angry and then laugh really hard. Let yourself be tired and then anxious and then let yourself be surprised by a moment of beauty, of joy. This is how it is in the dark - confusing and circuitous and absolutely all the things... sometimes even on the same day."
That is a confusing part of my journey, the constant flux of emotions. I caught myself telling someone I was 'fine' the other day. I am fairly certain that's the first time in more than 2 years I didn't respond with 'good-ish'. I wanted to take back the words, but it was my HELLO TO HERE at that moment.
"I don't know when the dawn will break, for you or for me, but I know that the healing comes in the trying and that even in the dark we have to keep practicing our callings, whatever they are. We have to keep doing the things we were made to do, the daily acts of goodness and creativity and honesty and service - as much for what they bring about inside us as for the good they do in the world. Those two work together, and they both matter."
I got lots of comments during the last two years, people shocked I kept up all my small groups. Didn't it hurt to work with the Parkinson's group? How could I possibly take on a caregivers group of women? Why would I choose to work in an assisted living facility? Why didn't I take a break? Why didn't I get a 'fun' job? Why help a neighbor in need when I myself was so needy? Simply put, I needed to keep trying, keep serving and supporting and loving on others. I needed my work to be about something other than my own sadness.
"It's okay to let yourself change, to let an environment change you, a city change you, a season change you. You are who you are, and also it's okay to love one thing and then another."
I decided to choose change, to release all notions of where I think I need to be, who I need to be and how I need to live. My move to Tucson is a bit of a crash course on 'new' and 'change' and 'release'. My move to Tucson is an opening of my heart... a survival technique.
"...I was in the middle of a sea of grief, and I remember my therapist reminding me that grief is somatic, that it locates itself in our bodies and, therefore, needs to be worked out of our arms and legs and chests with movement."
I had become a total slug. Years of caregiving did not offer much time for things like exercise. Yes I could have squeezed in more inside biking, but I didn't. In Tucson I have added biking, swimming, hiking, exercise class and some on again, off again walking. AND... I just signed up to take beginners line dancing!
"I'm learning to put myself in the path of joy and beauty. I'm making my life small and simple. I'm building a shelter for myself -"
For me that means adding in, at the very least, one physical activity a day. If I have made it to the end of the day without being active, I walk the neighborhood.
"One way you realize you're healing: For a while, what you've suffered is the biggest thing you can imagine. In your pain and suffering, you twist reality around your own wound and you see the whole world through the lens of your pain. For a time, what you're facing really is the biggest, ugliest, cruelest thing that anyone could every be allowed to experience. And then, over time, as you fight to heal, as you move forward, one foot in front of the other over and over again, you begin once again to see other people's losses as weighty and real - as real, even as what you've lost."
I am just beginning to see this in my world. Seeing the idea in writing affirms for me that there is a chance this was a good decision, this move to Tucson. My pain is real and though still tender and awful, I see more than my own struggles.
"But like yoga and prayer, I've mostly experienced the healing part in the long term, in a sort of boring but worthwhile way. I write and write, and over time, I start to make sense of things. I start to see connections I didn't see before. I learn about myself and the world."
This is true for me as well...Morning pages, Monday cards, writing blog posts and lately poetry. New understanding shines through before I am even able to articulate the question.
"...I see spring - in all the ways - holding out her hand to me. I'm not there yet, but I see it. I'm inching. I'm letting this city and this springtime thaw my inner winter, wake me up, pull me into life and light a little bit."
Seriously, I was stuck in winter in Colorado. I embraced routine, but I had stopped learning. I needed change. I needed release from myself. Tucson has granted me energy.
"This spring I'm releasing so many things, especially things that are tied to memories of a self I don't think I'll ever be again."
...and I loved this line:
"If you want to be in control of a life story, write fiction."
But even after 10 years of Parkinson's and 2 years grieving Russ' death, I haven't learned that yet, I can't control how the story unfolds.
...my story today?:
"I'm going to keep walking, keep loving, keep writing, keep praying. I'm going to keep learning, keep forgiving, keep apologizing, keep moving forward. I'm going to keep inviting, keep listening, keep opening my arms to all life - terrible and beautiful."
I am slowly allowing myself to release and restart, to accept and move forward, to wish and hope and pray and let the shades of happiness back into my world. As I wrote last February:
the mix of life –
sometimes it makes itself know
shows itself strongly
whirling around me
i think i am fine
until i’m not
then life appears
demanding me to see what is
to accept
my very own mix of life
to accept its sharing
even though it all looks different to me
if i stoop low
inspect
engage
i see what i face
my new world
looking different
but mine all the same
begging me to understand
And as Shauna Niequist says: I am discovering new ways to live because my old ways weren't working any longer.
PEACE JOY HOPE LOVE PRAY CARE SHARE ACCEPT HEAL