Born Philosophy

 

Silence. Sitting. 

There is a level of sadness that can break a person if felt. One just survives it, however that looks. The feeling, the processing, of it will all come later, when ready, when stronger. There was a time I couldn't sit in silence and be alone; I had to be doing- doing something always, and it was best if I were accomplishing. The reality of the things that had happened were too much to feel. I faced them; every day I faced them. I dealt with all the external consequences, met needs, did the next thing, but the feeling of it, I knew I wasn't letting in. That I could choose. That I could control. 

This was a survival skill. I kept out what couldn't be processed yet, and instead started with the things that could. I grieved in stages, situations and experiences years old, while in the midst of new trauma and suffering. I didn't concentrate on the fact that it seemed to be piling up, all the pain. I concentrated on working through that which was at the core, deep down, in the back of the closet, at the bottom of the pit. I grieved it, 5, 10, 15, 20 years too late to have made better choices after a thing broke, or a relationship ended, or a world fell apart. And I met a woman impressive as she was strong, courageous as she was unaware that she didn't have to try to be incredible or intelligible or anything at all. She just was- to have kept at it through it all, and began to unpack all that which was within, and in the end, have faith, still. 

Solitude can be excruciating or it can be illuminating. The light is there regardless, but what we see and how it feels depends on where we're at in our unpacking, where we're at in our acceptance, where we're at in terms of truth and reality, and whether we've ceased all the work to make ourselves something we believe is important or matters. All that striving is vanity, grasping at the wind. We don't arrive. We just hide. When we can't repent, or admit, and be humble, and be wrong- when we can't see we are the monster from which we run, we work our fingers to the bone, and become the zeros and ones of our own demise. Everything we do works against us in our desperation to be right or the one without guilt. That's why all major world religions point out the futility of it- the human obsession with success, wealth, prestige, power. We have all fallen short of a glory we can't replicate. It is our fate, and we will eventually face it. 

Letting go and accepting what is radical to the person ever creating him or herself, but once I let go, and after many years of unpacking a myriad of years of unprocessed grief, emerged a self who saw she endured and discerned, ever learned and grew. I can sit, in the silence, not in need of distraction or pomp and circumstance. I can sit in the light, stand if I like, and breathe free. I can love others, and I can love me. 

Happy Thanksgiving. I pray you find rest in your soul whatever you may be doing today.