Finding the line between what's inside and outside, navigating the emotional extremes, and learning how to turn it over...and then turn it over again.
A friend called yesterday to say hello. After I answered and she asked how I was, what came out of my mouth was a guttural, non-sensical, "uuuuhhhh....yeegh...uuuh...ee......ok?" After a millisecond pause, she laughed and said, "That's about right, I think I'm feeling about the same way!" Which, for me, means I don't even know how to succinctly explain how I'm feeling or doing these days, it's all over the map.
There's optimism, gratitude (lots of this), relief, calmness, even joy. Then there's overwhelm, exhaustion, fear, pain, grief, sadness and depression. And then there's everything in between. Sometimes within the same hour. Sometimes within the same minute. Almost always at least within the same day. It's exhausting. Sometimes I feel like scrambled eggs that can't seem to get out of the pan.
“Sometimes I feel like scrambled eggs that can't seem to get out of the pan.”
I know I'm not alone in this crazy making dance between extremes. And I also know it's good for me. Partly because it is scrambling me. Because it's pushing me to stop and admit I just don't know. To accept the unmanageable nature of certain elements in my life. To then sit in the space between the clarity of what isn't working and the vision of how I'd like it to work...and...I think the word is, surrender...
Although I don't really like that word...surrender. I'm too much of a stubborn fighter - something in that word actually makes it harder for me to truly let go or ask for help the way this time is teaching me to. So, instead of surrendering, I've been learning how to turn things over at an entirely new level. Turning over whatever I can't manage anymore. Turning over everything I don't know and can't figure out right now. Turning it over and turning it over and then turning it over again (because I have this bad habit of picking it up again right after I set it down).
"Show me where it is working, show me how I am enough, show me how to do this differently, show me how to change, show me where to go next...I need your help"...and then waiting, which is the hardest part. This is the needle I am threading these days. Finding that line between me and everything outside of me, and then weaving the thread of my life right through those two spaces, so they can be woven together into a beautiful, more integrated tapestry than ever before.
So it's good. It's all good. But it's not easy, except when it is...
What needle(s) are you threading in your life these days? I'd love to hear in the comments below.
-Martha
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