The wind blew around me. My body was sore from sitting on the dirt road. The sun enveloped me in what should have been a welcome embrace. But my mood didn't match the weather. It should have been storming.
I let the tears fall. I let my body respond without reserve. I was racked with sobs and something resembling hiccups. I got in my car to drive, to hide from my happy family. I had to pull over because the road was blurry and treacherous in my state. My broken heart no longer sat silent.
This. This is what so many avoid. This is what alcohol covers up and food silences. This painful emotion that the world runs from.
It will eventually find you.
When I was in trauma counseling after the near death of my son, one of the exercises was to experience the trauma in your "safe place". The idea is to allow your brain to unlock the hidden pain in the place where you are free from hindrances and fear. A place where you can be fully yourself and fully accepted. My safe place has always been my parents' living room. Regardless of what house they are in, country or city, this is where I feel most safe.
During this quarantine, I have been in my safe place. For 5+ weeks, I have let my soul rest and heal. The deep anxiety that I have with me so heavily in New Orleans is on retreat. Here, I am safe.
But there is no place safe from pain in this life. It will find you. Even if you're in your "safe place."
True self-discovery comes only when you allow yourself to feel your pain. To fully submerge yourself in the stickiness of the grief until your fingers are all pruney...that's when the truth of who you are emerges.
I have spent the years since my divorce on guard. I have had multiple superficial relationships with men that walked beside me for a brief time. They were satisfied with the little I gave them. They didn't require me to be vulnerable. They only wanted someone to enjoy their free time with. And that suited me just fine because I did not want to experience any more pain.
But my most recent relationship was different. He saw through my tough exterior. He pushed until I opened up. He saw the side of me that very few have seen. And eventually I became vulnerable. The tough girl sat on the bench.
And homegirl cried. Openly. Ugly. Frequently. I cried.
I didn't love this new side of me. I fought with her often. I've equated vulnerability with weakness for as long as I can remember, so this show of tenderness was not a welcome party. I wanted to tie her up and stash her away in a closet.
But once you've experienced vulnerability in relationship, you are not satisfied with small talk ever again.
So maybe instead of running from the vulnerability, it is smarter to embrace it. And eventually the storm that we used to equate with pain becomes the sunlight.
https://youtu.be/i1HkUf0tXLU
No comments:
Post a Comment