How I Go from Pitiful to Happy
Yesterday, I was on the phone with a social worker answering questions designed to discover whether I am eligible for services. The woman I described to her is quite pitiful. That woman has to rely on others to help her with nearly everything. She can’t get out of bed, brush her teeth, eat a meal or turn on the television without help. I am that woman. We’ll call her woman #1.
Later this month, I will speak to a group of people who have advanced chronic illness. The woman I describe to them will be wonderful. She finds ways of turning difficult situations into transformative ones that enable her to celebrate a sacred, compassionate and creative life. I am that woman too. We’ll call her woman #2.
My challenge is to love both those women and to allow them to appear and disappear in my life without judgment or attachment.
Woman #1 is often accompanied by feelings of sadness, vulnerability and anger. Historically, I haven’t dealt well with those emotions. I thought they Meant Something Awful About Me. I am good at spinning stories that begin with phrases like “I’ll never…” “I used to be able to…” “I can’t handle…” Those stories set out to prove me right and inflate those simple emotions into large and long-lived monsters. Sadness becomes depression. Vulnerability becomes despair. Anger becomes rage.
I am learning to treat those monsters with tenderness and understand that the stories that create them are not The Truth. I don’t spend time arguing with the storyline. I simply pay attention to my physical experience in the moment. Breathe in. Breathe out. Notice a color, an aroma, a taste, a texture, a sound. Make a piece of art. Be in my body in this moment.
The stories frequently begin again. These are old pathways and it is easy to fall back into them. I am learning to mercifully and gently return to this moment… And return… And return. I have released the story that having stories begin again Means Something Awful About Me.
Robbed of the energy of their stories, monsters deflate Emotions arise and fall. Woman #1 transforms into woman #2. Life gets more fun. I get happy.
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