I hear you
My constant companions
Some whispering, some insistent
All desperate to be heard
Reaching from behind to steer me
Safely through the world
A world you did not survive
I hear you
I do
But I must find my own way
Must live new mistakes
And leave this world
Having lived new ways of being in it
I hear you
I do
And I say
Thank you
And I say
Goodbye
I have finally come to terms with Life
We’ve come to a compromise
Instead of me wanting a different one or mine to end
I’m giving myself fully to this one, no holding back
In return, Life agrees to continue to be fully what She is
(And to let me think it’s a compromise when really, She has won me over)
Well, it happened.
I thought I published yesterday’s post, but I just saw that I did not.
There is a part of me devastated by this error.
I call this part of me “Perfectionista.”
If I am not vigilant, she drives me. She wants to get things right. She wants to be the best at whatever she does, all the time. To be seen as the best. Perfect.
She hates making mistakes.
So breaking my daily posting streak of many months? Not going over well with her.
I try to reason with her. Technically, I did write it yesterday, and though clearly I messed up and only thought I published it, I created it yesterday. And after all, the point of me doing it daily is so that I do at least one creative act daily to stay connected to my creativity. That’s it.
So cool. I did that. Yay me!
But that part of me, Perfectionista, she wants more. And what she wants has to do with what she thinks others think of her.
And she is loud.
She creates suffering for me. She is going to incessantly remind me of this flaw, trying to create a very unsettled feeling that will saturate my system.
“You blew it,” she says.
Hers is a world of extremes, of black and white thinking, of a self-generated pressure to meet somewhat randomly selected standards and performance deadlines and levels or else…
She lives in world with an almost life and death internal pressure to seem perfect to others.
I cannot live from her world view. It’s too exhausting, too exacting. And empty.
I. Just. Can’t.
My world? I try to simplify these days. What a waste of precious time, worrying what others will think about me missing a randomly-decided goal.
More and more, it’s about doing my best on any given day and letting that be more than enough.
Don’t get me wrong: I still strive to be “the best.”
The best I can be on any given day.
As for what others think of that? No longer my business, thank you very much.
Who’s there, yearning, in pain
In the dark of my past
I look behind and see
The silhouettes of the many
From whose dreams I was born
I feel their unrealized needs
In the needs of my present
What they have not let go of
Holds me now, outside of my life
I see you, I say
I’m sorry, I say
This is yours, I say
I lay their burdens at their feet
Look them deeply in their eyes
Thank you for dreaming my life
I’ve got it from here
Lay me down on a bed of pine needles
Remove my clothing, piece by piece
Place twigs and moss in my hair
And put daisies on my eyes
Evoke the spirits of the trees
Invite my ancestors to be in attendance
Sing from a place within you that has no name
Leave me knowing I am free now
Let my body return to the earth
Mingle with the leaves and the forest life
Know me, leaving, that I am everywhere
Mightn’t I just lay down now
I’m so tired
Passed bone-weary last year
Let me just go to sleep
And never waken
Wish my beloveds a sweet farewell
There’s never been a moment of peace
I think I’ve earned some at this point
Maybe this has all been a random experiment
And my cell, never one that was expected to live
Maybe I beat the odds having come this far anyway
Maybe the Universe will sigh a sigh of relief when I let go
Maybe
Today I bid thee farewell, my special unhappiness
You have been a steady companion lo these many years
You have held my hand and held me back
Kept me safe, yes, but also kept me on the outside
Looking in at my own life
I thought you were a force beyond my grasp
I thought you were put inside me
That I was a host and you had taken root
Turns out that like Dorothy in The Wizard of Oz
I have had the key all along
All it takes is this: my decision to let you go
I am sovereign over my own self
And I no longer want you here, in the driver’s seat
So farewell, my old friend
I am sure you will raise your voice now and then
But I choose to no longer recognize your power
So you may wish to find a new dwelling
My heart is full of other things now
There is no space for you here
I was raised to be mild
All the wild in me tamed
Strong desires in me shamed
Made an adult while still a child
Now at mid-life, the end in sight
I’m awakening my wild
Reviving my inner child
Letting loose my appetite
I am often torn.
Making decisions is usually difficult for me. (See Cutting the Cord.)
I don’t know if it is because I am a Libra or what, but I can always see the benefits of all sides to a decision, and it makes it very hard to choose.
I do not particularly enjoy this part of my personality, though I do appreciate my ability to see more than just one side.
I also think a large contributing factor is my fear of making a mistake. What if I screw up my whole life because I choose wrong?
Yikes. Pressure much?
The past few years, I have been realizing that even in the past when I have made decisions that I felt were “wrong,” later on, they turned out to be “right” in some way. Even through what seemed like a real mistake, something necessary came from the experience.
The black and white thinking that a choice could have that much power over my existence…not sure where that comes from. But I know that I cannot – no, I will not – live like that anymore.
In the last year, I have made it a goal to stress less around decision-making. To just make the best decision I can with the info I have at the time that I am making it and to then “let the chips fall where they may.”
Easier said than done, but I have made some headway.
When I find myself feeling “torn” over the different options I am deciding between, I just stop myself and gently but firmly make myself take the leap in one direction.
Sometimes it has been anxiety-producing. And sometimes, very liberating.
It is always better than staying stuck (and torn) between options.
What are some ways that you make decisions that you feel work well?
Hello?! This is your life calling!
Stop acting like you’ve got all the time in the world
That those that you love will be there forever for you to tell
That those people you think about reconnecting with will always be around to do so
Start doing those things you think about doing, dream of doing, now
Every passing moment is one less opportunity
Like that old Nike ad says, “Just do it!”
Just do.
– Me to myself
Today I went to the funeral of a very special person.
And as I sat in the church looking up at the stained glass, I was reminded of the many, many funerals of special people I have been to in the last twelve years.
Wakes and viewings in homes, memorials in gorgeous holy spaces and modest church rectories, wonderful music and laughter, beautiful heartfelt stories of love and life, stoic, structured religious services. Quite a spectrum of final acknowledgements or celebrations of the lives of special people.
The one thing they all had in common was that I was struck each time by how quickly such services end.
Something in me gets so angry: how can a person’s life end this way? It always feels so…inadequate. So lacking.
I want to sit and reflect. Linger. Always, I am shooed out before I am ready to leave.
Even the greatest memorials – which in my book are filled with laughter, love and grief with voices raised and tears shed in full view and community – are over much too soon for my heart.
I leave baffled and bereft, with the sense that something is missing.
Then it hits me: oh yes, something is missing. The special person is missing.
Having buried two parents, a brother, a grandfather, three dear mentor father-figures, and two beloved cats over these past 12 years, I have learned and bourn witness to the truth that literally all that remains after a special person dies, in the end, is how they made people feel.
Yes, it is true, they may leave behind other kinds of legacies too.
But really, all that literally remains is how that person loved the people they came into contact with, isn’t it?
My special person whose funeral was today was not a lifelong friend.
I’d drifted away from our friendship the past ten years or so, for reasons that made sense at the time but don’t now. He did nothing wrong to instigate this drifting – he was an innocent in a part of my life that became lost in a kind of wreckage that was indirectly a result from past events. Our friendship was felled by friendly fire in a war I was waging with ghosts. Yet another tally mark on the side of things I grieve, having lost them.
Because of this, I almost did not go to the funeral. I didn’t feel entitled to.
Then I remembered the old adage about people coming into your life for a reason, a season or a lifetime, and I realized that showing up for him as someone who had loved and been loved by him for any length of time is all any of us can do. That his current special people would surely only benefit from being surrounded by any and all of those who knew how special their special person was. That I could go for him, for me, for them, and be one of many who loved this special person for a reason, a season or a lifetime.
And there were many of us there. I have no doubt when I pass I will be lucky to have a handful of people. I have lived far too self-contained a life so far. I am still influenced by a deep-seated fear of people that shapes my connections no matter what I do, it seems. (Although I have been and am working to shift this, to be able to have deeper intimacies with people that I care for and who care for me.)
But my special friend was one of those people whose funerals reveal just how many people their life has touched. All kinds of people from all walks of life were there. And all had lost someone very special to them.
My special friend was my special friend for a season of ten or so very special years. He loved me dearly at a time I did not know how to love myself. He gave me unconditional love and support, and he championed my talents and dreams, and mirrored to me someone who had the courage to truly make their dreams come true.
I have so many happy memories of those years, and he figures prominently in all of them.
These years later, I can appreciate him even more with the wisdom of age. I thought of him many times through these years. Thought of reaching out. I foolishly kept putting it off, thinking I had the luxury of time. Hah.
In many ways, the way he lived puts me to shame. He found the courage to really put his talents out there for the world to see, over and over, no matter what anyone thought. I am still struggling to find that kind of belief in what I have to offer, that kind of courage.
He loved to sing so he sang. He loved rock and roll, so he performed in his own rock and roll cabaret shows. He loved what singing was to him, so he did all in his power to help others to be able to sing as well. He was a champion for many, and a power of example to all artists.
He died a senseless, awful death, one that seems ridiculously unfair and absurd for a man such as he was: one of the kindest, most generous souls I have known.
And so today, I leave yet another funeral, baffled and bereft.
But I carry the gifts of his life forever within me: how loved he made me feel, the memories of the music we made together, the inspiration he will always be to me as someone who just put it all out there for the world to see no matter the reception.
And the kick in the pants to “do it” already, no matter what.
There’s no time to waste.
I hear you, John. I get it. Thank you, my friend. I love you.
And I am so grateful we had our season.
Beyond the Skinny Branches 