Have you ever had one of those open unscheduled days where you have some open time? You are excited for all the little household tasks, errands, projects, organizing, managing, resting and perhaps even a little entertainment or reading you might want to take time for?
Sometimes these days are called The Weekend. Or if not the whole weekend… Saturday.
The way my life has gone over the past several years is that the weekend is similar in many ways to every other day of the week. I work with clients quite often, I teach classes, I go to the gym, I catch up on email, I update my website, I do laundry.
Not long ago, I had a Saturday all free. No clients. No all-day workshop. Prep for the next all-day intensive was complete and registration full already.
Bonanza! About 5 free hours to do so many things calling to be DONE in the little recesses of my mental internal to-do list.
Wow, so many things…where do I even begin? What’s the priority?
Except something strange happened.
Soon after I awakened and completed my usual morning routine of green smoothie, little cup of French press organic coffee, meditation….I started feeling anxious.
An old feeling entered. It seemed there were no thoughts. Low-level worry. On a deeply grand scale.
Ahhhh, the Deeply Grand Scale. Like it’s way down deep in here in the psyche, not usually tapped into or addressed. Somewhere in a dark place, A hole.
It feels like something jogs loose where I become aware of my smallness. My limited nature. My finite period on this planet in this body. That I will die, that none of this really matters in many ways, that I am alone in my own unique weird journey, but not even really unique.
These are the core underlying beliefs getting triggered. Maybe for me, it was seeing the movie The Life of Pi where the main character lived through a horrendous experience but told the story differently than “the truth”.
Maybe it was listening on recording to one of my favorite teachers of This Spirit Journey and hearing him say that in the end, we are all alone on it.
My little secret scary underlying beliefs come forth when I think about being ALONE.
Being alone, I think (some part of me thinks) is Not Good.
I don’t wanna be in a shipwreck by myself for 3 months at sea! I don’t wanna say goodbye to my children (too late, they’re growing up)! I don’t wanna be disconnected from my partner, or my mom or dad! I don’t wanna wonder where the heck Whatever-Mystery-God is! I don’t wanna say goodbye to absolutely everything I’ve ever been attached to! I don’t wanna climb the ladder all by myself!
Empty space. Empty open life. Mysterious open ocean. Mystery. Unknown. Not knowing.
So what’s the problem??
THAT is where the most interesting investigation begins. I know something inside me believes there is a problem, because I feel the Problem Energy. So let’s look!
What’s wrong with being alone? With people coming and going? With life ending and beginning? What’s wrong with missing someone? Or longing for someone to be here now who I once knew, or perhaps who I don’t even know yet? What’s wrong with seeing beautiful art, and having only ME to turn to, to say “wow, do you see this?!”
When I really ask myself what the problem is with this Alone, Empty, Missing or Nothingness Situation…I can’t put my finger on it.
My mind says that not being able to put my finger on it is a problem! It’s just unknown uncomfortable unpleasant soup. Scary! Not just scary…terrifying!
So scary in the past that I wanted to put something in my mouth to shove the fear back down.
But is it actually really true that the wide open infinite unlimited expanses of reality and space and the ocean are SCARY?
YES! YES! IT’S TRUE! It’s weird! It’s unexplainable! I HATE not knowing! Too big! Too mysterious!
But can you absolutely KNOW without any doubt whatsoever from your greatest expansive broad wide self that you are afraid? That the Mystery is frightening, and that you are indeed ALONE?
No. I really cannot absolutely know that. At all.
This is fear that I’m feeling, is that true? Could it be readiness? Anticipation? Willingness? About-To-Jump-Off-The-Diving-Board Gusto? Surrender? I-Can-Die Now-If-That’s-The-Plan Openness?
Is Fear really scary? Am I sure I can’t handle the wide open magnificent omnipotent unimaginable power of the ocean? Am I sure I can’t handle death?
I mean. I don’t even know what it is, remember? I don’t even know what I’m afraid of, right? Oh tricky mind.
“Ordinary men hate solitude. But the Master makes use of it, embracing his aloneness, realizing he is one with the whole universe.”~ Tao Te Ching #42
This does not mean oh bad you for hating an experience of solitude. What is wrong with being ordinary? Nothing.
It is through recognizing this pain and fear of solitude that I look again, and go beyond ordinary.
As Byron Katie says, you either believe your thoughts, or you question them, there’s no other choice.
That day I remembered, through looking and investigating, that having wide open hours ahead and a long to-do list and big ideas and awareness of limits may not only be just fine (and not scary) but it also doesn’t seem to be 100% true.
Being alone might not be scary, in this vast universe….and being along might not be true.
Love, Grace
Horrible Food Wonderful Food Weekend In-Person Intensive Seattle January 12-13, 2013 Saturday 10 – 5:30, Sunday 1:30-5:30. $215. To register click HERE now and then send me an email grace@workwithgrace.com.
Mark your calendar for Breitenbush, the end of June 2013! We will be looking at all aspects of what we consider to be flaws in the body, and Un-doing our beliefs about them. Stay tuned if you’d like to join me and Susan Grace Beekman from June 26-30, 2013. You can change your internal beliefs about what you think bodies should be like….and change your entire experience of being in yours.
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