This week is a difficult time for me but I’m appreciative of how much I’ve grown in a year. I’ve graduated from the person I used to be. Though I remain an anxious person, I’m more emotionally stable even when I’m not— I can move on, cope, gain control over myself from the hands of panic and shame.
I still have panic attacks and meltdowns but my handle on them is more nuanced than even six months ago. Watching myself travel through time is fascinating as I disprove solid beliefs and reinvent how I engage with myself. I always considered time as enemy, unreliable and almost fictional in how we’ve constructed it as a concept. As a child I couldn’t fathom the present moment as soon as I understood the basis of all measurement, that if a portion of time could be infinitely small how can we be conscious of a constantly elusive ‘current’ or ‘presents’ time?
I’ve worked to be less critical and more curious. We experience the present by simply choosing to be aware of the past and future simultaneously. I don’t avoid either and I’ve found my present moment.
At the moment I’m sad, somewhat mournful, but in the same listless breath, I’m hopeful and excited. I must allow myself to grieve but do so as my current self in this precious moment of awareness. Awakeness.
I’m tired and my energy levels are very low. I’ve been battling a bout of depression but I’ve been consistently pushing forward while giving myself space. Forward, soft, gentle and patient momentum. This is why I’m still awake in my most primal sense. Even my depression, even hitting hard and playing dirty, is nothing like the fog of dissociation I lived in for almost twenty-two years.
There’s no point in working against time. The past haunts us because we feel like we can’t leave it. The future frightens because we believe we can’t, or don’t deserve to, have it. Time is consistent even when it isn’t. What goes around comes around and if we choose to believe in the present moment, we receive it and much more.
I had one of my worst meltdowns yesterday while trying to get ready for dinner with my soon-to-be-in-laws. After sending my fiancé on ahead after sobbing until I vomited, I decided I wasn’t going. After about ten minutes of calming myself down and addressing the trauma responses which told me I was useless, ridiculous, pathetic neurotic burden, I was given a second chance and found a pair of pants that wouldn’t bother me, and I got out the door and went to dinner. I was ok, I wasn’t the life of the party but I showed up and I proved myself that I wouldn’t ruin the night by being there. Sometimes all we have to do is just take a deep breath and show up.
I accepted my present moment and made the most of it. This is the journey of time and I, until very recently I never could have made it to that dinner.
Though this week has been difficult, I’ve managed to make things simple.
Sustaining Practice 