Self - Soothing

Last Monday morning I woke-up knowing something was off. It didn’t take long before I realized it was me. I didn’t want to get out of bed. I didn’t want to face my morning workout. Ever since I had the stroke and lived through its long, difficult aftermath I have had bad days. In more recent years I have come to refer to these dark days as “grief days.” When I have one of these emotionally painful days everything gets more difficult, and I feel the weight that presses me to the Earth.

I had a lot of depression in my early life, but I found all of that disappeared when the stroke changed my life. Everything I knew changed, and depression became grief. Since then, in lieu of chronic pain, I’ve had chronic awareness, and that has resulted in me occasionally being overcome by grief. Monday was one of those mornings.

It was hard to get out of bed. I only aroused myself, because I had my Monday morning call with the members of what I call my WOW group. I didn’t know it, and this reveals how Lucky I am, but a miracle was on its way to me.

I had the good sense to be honest about my situation, to the old people who phoned in, for our volunteer conversation through the Senior Center Without Walls (SCWW). We have been talking with each other for nearly 2 years. I knew most of them were disabled too. I also know they are old like me, shut-ins too, people on the margin, looking for a little companionship to relieve the isolation most of us experience. I spoke to them about having a grief day, and assuming they had bad days too, asked them what they did to soothe themselves when it happened?

It was a stroke of genius, landing on this topic, because the conversation it stimulated was so poignant and touching, so profound and meaningful that I find myself moved to share some of it with you.  Remember, these are some of the most marginalized and neglected old folks that exist. They are in their 80’s and 90’s, and yet unknowingly they practice some of the purist coping mechanisms that we humans are capable of. For most of these old folks this was the first time they had ever talked about anything like this.

The conversation quickly turned to the issue of connecting with others or not. For many people, a bad day, defined differently by different people, led to withdrawal. For some it led to reaching out for contact. Other strategies emerged; these included food, chocolate, praying, reading the Bible, family, gratitude and humor. Not everyone could practice all of them. Some of the most poignant sharing came from those currently living on the edge and teetering from the heaviness of great uncertainty.

It was a good discussion about a significant difficulty. But, then it veered off and became a compelling, even inspiring conversation about self-love. One women spoke up, somewhat apologetically, and recounted a recent fall. She told of laying on the floor, checking herself out to see if any part of her was broken. She felt the wave of fear break over her. She managed on her own to get up, and go on with her life. What she wanted to share was what happened later. At some point, she stopped, and felt for herself, and began the most significant part of picking herself up. She spontaneously visualized herself laying on the floor, and extended to her broken fearful self, all the love and compassion she could find in herself. She reported that she had mobilized her own heart, and the love she had received from others, on the behalf of her own human-ness. The silence on the line indicated how much the group was affected by what she shared.  She reported holding herself, and captivated all of us.

This recounting can never capture the poignancy and vulnerability of that resonating moment, but it served to remind me, that I had known such a time in my own coming to terms with my fragility. Being human can sometimes be an ordeal — a loneliness so profound, a hardship unendurable, a blessing disguised as a difficulty — a challenge that obscures the opportunity. Her fall brought her heart home.

We all need to know, given this dark time we are living in, that there is always someone to love in the darkness. We all need to know, that the most heartbreaking and fearful circumstances, can mobilize what is best in us. Caring deeply and compassionately for oneself is the heart breaking open for Life, it is Creation carnate. She was apologetic — afraid she was revealing some selfishness — whereas we, the speechless listeners, only wished this kind of love was available to all of us.

It is. There was a time when Xan and I thought this capacity, self-compassion, was the hallmark indicator of elderhood. Since then we recognized that self-loving, of this kind, essentially differentiates the journey from a kind of arrival. Many of the old have discovered this is one of the gifts of aging. It is available to anyone, at any time, but it is those who have borne significant hardship, significant life, who are most likely to know of the effectiveness of self-love as a self-soothing capacity.

An Emergent Strength

I’ve noticed something. A capacity that is important. I completely missed it a couple of years ago, when I was writing The Evolving Elder. Now I think I was hasty, or not yet mature enough, to grasp what strength it takes, and that is available to some, to open up, and meet the world as it is. Because I can experience it now, perhaps I have grown. I want to reflect upon the way vulnerability becomes a strength. Of all the unlikely developments that occur, it seems the most unlikely would be the emergence of strength from a sense of weakness.

Mind you, I don’t think that this particular strength, the ability to meet reality in a vulnerable way, is restricted to elders. I do believe it emerges in response to life experience, but I don’t assume that the rare combination of hardship and the sensibility it engenders comes only to the old. Life is profuse and diverse enough, that anyone can be cast into a situation that grows this attribute. Since, I do think it is a product of life experience, I suspect it is more likely to occur to those who have been around the block most. But, I know Life is capable of generating it anywhere.

Why is this important? Well, first of all, to counteract the assumption that vulnerability is a sign of weakness. Then, more importantly, so vulnerability can take its place in the pantheon of Life’s gifts to we humans. In this case, I’ve come to see vulnerability as an essential quality of emotional, maybe even spiritual, maturity.

The ability to walk into threatening places is not fearlessness — it is rather the capacity to bear pain, fear, and anxiety for the sake of growth. That which grows one, is fraught with these difficulties. Maturity comes with a cost. Initiation always contains its ordeals. If there isn’t enough pain and death anxiety around then only pseudo-initiation occurs. The process might feel good, the words around it may seem on-target, but nothing of genuine spiritual and emotional significance is really occurring. If one doesn’t experience the vulnerability of potentially perishing then one can know that the risk factor is not high enough to generate genuine results.

When I think of how Life has grown this capacity in me, all I have to do is think about the apprehension that rose in me the first time I held, and looked at, my daughter. Then, I knew my heart was overcome with love for what could die.  I felt elation, love, hope, and a painful sense that Life was changing my orientation forever. As a first-time parent, I was thrust into a more exposed, and complex world.

The vulnerability I felt then was very different than the vulnerability that I experienced earlier in my life. Like everyone else I had very human parents, imperfect and sometimes insensitive. I have experienced the vulnerability of being exposed, of being unseen or unheard. All of these conditions cause pain, they leave debilitating holes, and they rain havoc upon relationships. They create a kind of susceptibility, a cliffhanging feeling of immanent peril.

I call it the vulnerability of being small. It takes another kind of vulnerability to be big.

Lately, I’ve come to see the enlarging power of grief. Connecting with the larger process of Life is an audacious thing. It means accepting so much. The pain and vulnerability of existence rushes in, and Life vibrates with uncertainty. A kind of radiant fragility, a fiery susceptibility emanates from the core of it all. What exists, in an explosion of energy, passes from existence. What is, is lost, to make possible what follows. The gains of new life are intimately linked to the losses that make them possible. This is a kind of magnificent vulnerability that is an innate strength. It is in us, a power of the Universe, coursing through our lives, just waiting for the recognition that comes to those who dare be big.

Grief and praise are linked in some cosmologies. For good reason. The vulnerability that is a strength, is derived from an experiential realization of this paradoxical relationship. The hardships of Life sensitize one. They bring home the deepest purpose of suffering — what one losses carves out a gain. Stepping toward this kind of awareness is a courageous act that takes strength, not the kind infused with certainty, but the kind that aches with the uncertainty. Vulnerability is the price of playing in the big league.

Maturity, as I have gotten older, isn’t what it used to be. Vulnerability is an ability, one that amazes me, and infuses me with pleasure.

Forced Growth

I am indebted to a woman who has suffered for many years with M.S., and who is now old, disabled and shut-in. She gave me the words that title this piece, and described an amazingly poignant experience I now want to focus on. She was reflecting, with a group of old people, on the difficulties associated with self-care. She spoke of taking care of oneself in the midst of the very conditions that age and infirmity thrust upon us, then she mentioned how these things had “forced her to grow.” Being the kind of person I am, I heard her, and began to reflect upon what all she meant by that comment. I want to share some of these reflections with you, because I believe they reveal the painful, miraculous and paradoxical nature of human life.

As an older person, I have slowly become aware that things I used to assume, are not the way I had made them out to be. This is one of those learnings, I experience from time to time. Because she was able to give voice to her awareness of forced growth, I was able to take it in. And what I am taking in —  is changing my awareness; awakening me to just how complex and incredible existence is. She basically shared her burgeoning awareness — that the tragedy that befell her — was the very same painful and shocking experience that had forced her to grow.

“Another fucking growth experience.” How often have you heard that expression? How often have you used it? We have the awareness that growth experiences can be uncomfortable and unpleasant, but do we really know that even tragedies like illness, disability and accidents have that same growth potential folded within them?  Out of the fire and ashes, a transformation can occur. That may seem like an abstract possibility for some lucky few, but is it really a possibility for the rest of us? Yes. And here’s why.

For many years she dwelled in the heartache of having her normal life snatched away from her. It was a long time of deep and agonizing loss, of loneliness, of anger and hopelessness. She didn’t know it, for all she could experience was the ache of grief and hardship, but something else was also happening. The very burn of painful loss was delivering a sensitizing awareness; a world was opening, as her familiar one dissolved. The scalding reality of loss carved out a new consciousness.

It took her awhile to recognize it, to believe that something good could come of something so bad. Then, she thought she was crazy for a while. But, eventually, she adjusted, and came to accept the fact that she had become more aware, sensitive and compassionate. Being broken down, by Life, had made her more whole.

What impressed her the most (and me, having gone through my own phoenix experience) was that the changes that took place, had occurred, without any effort or intention on her part (or mine, for that matter). She didn’t change deliberately; rather, she was changed by what she had gone through.

In reply to the question “why,” comes this answer.  There is a kind of molting that human beings go through, sometimes dramatic (like the traumatic experiences we had) but mostly just inconvenient, dismaying and uncomfortable. These “fucking growth experiences” mostly are accompanied by an experience of dread, but they turn out to be blessings in disguise, molting human-style.

Knowing this, which most of us begrudgingly do, doesn’t make the experience more pleasant or endurable. It doesn’t lead to praying for hardship, nor does it mean truly embracing those undergoing this kind of struggle. But this kind of awareness could provide a balm to the fear that haunts human activity. There is a maturing aspect of who we are. We don’t have control of it, but we can rely on it. It is human to molt into shape.

It might be useful to remember this tendency, this aspect of human nature right now. Life has our backs. Sometimes (maybe times like this) things have to get worse, before they get better. Everything has to be in doubt — the possibility of death brings about the possibility of Life. Nature regularly and faithfully forces growth, not out of malice (though it looks that way for a time) but out of a terrible kindness. Forced growth is that terrible kindness, or as Ram Dass calls it, a “fierce grace.”

Considering the possibility that evolution is at my back brings ambivalent feelings.  I like the idea that I may grow just because I am alive, but I am chagrined when I face the existential fact that I may be grown in ways I would not choose. I am always surprised that I am equipped for such vulnerability and adaptation.

Beauty by Lucky

A few days ago someone I hadn’t seen in a long time came to visit me. We were catching up. We noted how we had both grown older, and we began comparing notes about how that had gone for each of us. One of the things he told me about was how much more beautiful people had become. I realized, with his words, that my idea of beauty had changed too. That started me on a train of thought that I want to share with you.

I have been delighted to discover, that one of the positive elements of getting older, is that a person can become, more and more, themselves. I have always related to this movement as one of becoming more and more unique. The advent of personal uniqueness has been a hallmark of aging, in my perspective. For him, this kind of development meant people became more beautiful! I like his perception, because I think it is true, and because I also think it represents an important evolution in my concept of beauty.

I have grown up in a culture that primarily conceived of beauty in the young female form. Setting aside, for this moment, what that has done to women, I want to explore what this notion of beauty has done to older people. I suspect some of the invisibility that many older folks experience is related to this way of seeing beauty. I also think some of the revulsion about aging has its roots in this very limited concept of beauty.

Beauty has for too long been primarily considered an external phenomenon. It has been an aspect of appearance. Sure, there has been some acknowledgement of internal beauty, like a beautiful personality, but there hasn’t been a wide-spread realization that beauty could be an innate quality that comes out with life experience and uniqueness. Beauty then is more like a diverse eco-system, a quality of Life’s devotion to profusion and diversity. Beauty, in this later conception, is a combination of internal factors and a relationship with more of the whole of Life. This notion seems more organic, humane, and lasting, than something that involves a winning a genetic lottery.

The evolution of my sense of beauty is also helping me perceive beauty outside the skin –encapsulated world I’ve formerly lived in. Now, I’m much more likely to see the complex beauty of something that has both an internal and external ability to find a certain kind of alignment. This has been especially true in my experience of those people and places that have endured the rigors of existence. I’m finding I’m growing more partial to scars, marks, wrinkles, and the wisdom derived from heartache. Beauty has become something marked by Life.

It seems to me one of the greatest gifts of being human has been the gift of being able to perceive the complex poignancy of Life. There is beauty in suffering the unknown for the sake of the whole. I can’t describe that kind of beauty, I think it can only be experienced. Beauty can be an inexplicable experience — a way mystery has plucked a gossamer heartstring — that resonates into every cell of being. Beauty can be a particular poignant moment, a flash of meaning colliding with attention. Beauty can be a state of mind that is revealed with showing up and being present. Beauty can be seen everywhere, if one is willing to embrace it all — especially those places where the darkness and the light combine.

I like Leonard Cohen’s realization that the crack is where the light gets in. My way of saying it, is that hardship is the hand of artistry. Beauty, on the way.

It helps me feel better about being involved in this transitory soup when I think that the experience of beauty evolves, and that as my eyesight grows dimmer, it also grows sharper. That also seems beautiful to me. Maybe death, which is part of Nature’s design, is really, as the poet Hafiz suggests, “a favor.” If so, that’s incredibly beautiful.

“Not‑Knowing” Wisdom

It’s Christmas! I’m staying in, actually I’m a shut-in, celebrating in my own way. This time of year — add being sick, and alone, amounts to slowing down. This is a wondrous time to reflect. My mind could go back to the year I’ve just lived through, or travel further back to other Christmas scenes, but instead it is riveted upon this moment, wondering what all the uncertainty I feel portends.

This is ostensibly the beginning of a New Year. I wonder, will there be anything truly new about the New Year? The election continues to resonate. There is a lot of uncertainty in the air. The emotional tides are high. It seems that many of the old horrors are being warmed up. It is a time rich with feelings, fears, anxieties and apprehensions. There is an aura of teetering that colors the yuletide cheer. Going forward or going back, over the cliff or around it, becoming closer or more divided? — the moment quivers.

I’ve heard so many times this is the moment to stand up. Values are on the line, possibly the planet, certainly how we feel about each other, and ourselves. So much seems to be at stake.

I feel peculiarly out of step with the times. I am nervous, like many people, but I feel a sense of expectancy, like I’m participating in some kind of birth phenomena. The unknown, I sense, is delivering to us something unimaginable.  I don’t know what is here. I don’t have a name for it. I don’t know how to greet what is taking shape. Strangely, I can feel it happening in the midst of all the rehashed actions that are being called for. Evolution is taking the mess we (humans) currently are, and working us into a different shape.

It is times like this that I find myself wanting to pause, like this holiday season is helping me do, and turn to that rarest of wisdom’s for guidance.  Here, I’m not referring to the wisdom of the past, the wisdom of tradition and what we know, but the unknown wisdom of the present. It is the degree of bafflement in the air that arouses in me a sense of wonder, expectancy, and a desire to be open and wait. I am poised at a vibrating threshold. How I comport myself now will determine in some way what I will meet. This is a quantum moment, what I find, will be determined by my expectations, thus I want to be as open and as free of assumptions as possible.

It is at times like this when I feel so strongly the pull of not-knowing. There is such a spaciousness in the unknown, a darkness that is rich with possibility, a creativity that is guided by the formless. This is what I want to stand for.  There is a miraculousness afoot, which doesn’t depend at all upon the election results, but becomes palpable when one opens up to the larger Mystery — of what is going on here.  Let’s stop pretending we really know what’s happening. All of the certainty, ideological nightmares, and historical references are apt, but insufficient to this time. They are good for stirring up fear, anxiety, and hatred, but not very good for soberly leaning into the moment.

I am growing old. I’m not as interested, as I once was, in chasing my tail. Now, each moment has grown more precious, and I want to meet it, as it is. In being dragged around the block by Life, as many older folks have been, I’ve learned to open myself to each moment, to spend some time with it, to let it be, and to relish what is unknown about it. Life has introduced me to a whole set of unforeseen possibilities, I would have passed by many of them, because they looked familiar. Now, I come to this moment, with continued reverence for the Mystery that brought me here, ready to be surprised anew. Not-knowing releases me into the moment, it allows me to experience what is, and shields me from the tides of emotional upheaval that I am surrounded by.

There is one other thing I want to be sure to mention before I stop for this Christmas day. Not-knowing isn’t only good for calming the emotional waters, but is essential for re-enchanting the world. Magic dwells in the spirits of those, most generally elders, who are savvy enough to know, that they know enough, to know, they don’t know very much. There is a form of elder innocence that forms late in life. It isn’t like the innocence of childhood, based upon an ignorance of the world; in elder life it is giving up on relying upon adult like certainty, and meeting the world naked in a different way.

The miraculous nature of Life is obscured by too much knowing. Not-knowing wisdom frees the imagination, releases potential, and honors what does not want to be changed by fickle human emotions. To recognize the blindness knowing brings, means liberating all that has suffered the slavery of human hubris. The world is enchanting, and so is this uncertain moment in our nation’s history. Something is happening, and let’s wait and see what it is.