TEARS DON'T MEAN YOU'RE LOSING

LCpod

Over It by Joe Purdy
Falling Slowly by The Vitamin String Quartet

Not much has changed since moving to Toronto four years ago.  I live at the same house (with one change of roommate).  I have the same morning routine.  I still watch and laugh at the squirrels outside my kitchen window.  I attend the same church.  I attend the same gym.  I buy from the same fruit market.  I have the same dentist, the same grocer, and the same hair stylist.  It all sounds very monotonous but it is because of this predictability that I was able to feel the ripple of a change, a change so small that I almost missed its clue.

Never before did the ear drum damaging screeching of the subway train pulling into the station affect me.  Never before did I almost drop all of my belongings to block the sound from penetrating my ears like a child refusing to hear the commands of a parent.  Up until now that is.

From tolerable to intolerable, I couldn't help but wonder:  why the change?

Thoughtful analysis brought me to this:

A few months ago, a family crisis took place and the very foundation on which I stood cracked and crumbled beneath me.  Instantaneously, I sank to my knees.  I was robbed of my identity because I only ever saw myself through my family.  That fixed part of my equation was replaced with an unknown and as a result, so became my entire life and I lost all sense of belonging.

My family was my barrier.  They were my filter, the mechanism between me and the troubles life can bring if you make the wrong choices.  What was I to do now that I didn't have that concrete strong reinforcement?

Like a computer stricken with a virus, I became highly susceptible to attacks.  I felt pain on a minute to minute basis.  I was assaulted with daily sobs, emotional outbursts, loss of activity, increased hyperactivity, decreased stamina, frustrating insomnia, severe loss of appetite, excessive spending, and excessive drinking.  My bubbly attitude fizzled.  A once charismatic personality was now lackluster and introverted.

Friends and family came forward with careful pressure, sensitive hands, understanding ears, and capable shoulders.  Without asking, they stood, waiting to carry the load of my sorrow.  Their grave concern is what jolted me from my coma and their dedication is the reason for my resurrection. 

I said to a friend that this was all bigger than me and that I accepted defeat.  She quickly slammed my comment and said that I was not defeated.  I was simply not yet equipped with the proper tools to deal with what was before me.  I was drowning in this problem and all I needed was a noodle, and in due time, I would rescue myself.  

So, I started unloading the stories, one after the other, and as they were uttered, they came out like sharp knives.  My heart sank and my future further blurred with every spoken word.  But while the pain I felt was excruciating, strangely enough, the release was intoxicating.  Soon, my emotional burden lightened and the insurmountable hurdles became surmountable; their intimidation lessened and my confidence strengthened.

There, in the eye of the storm - a place of great vulnerability - I was able to breathe a sigh of complicated relief.  The exact crisis that stole my voice and rendered me speechless somehow also gave me the fortitude and the strength to word my deepest, most serious thoughts and feelings.  

The introverted now became the extroverted.  My insides became my outsides.  I wore my heart, and plenty of tears, on my sleeve.  Entire nights were spent crying, sometimes never knowing when the outpour would cease  Constantly feeling the crisis clamping down on my lungs, I couldn't take those deep soothing breaths to relax.  But those flood gates needed to remain open and so opened they remained.

It took months to perform this emotional reconstructive heart surgery, from which I am still healing.  I continue to be fragile in many ways, but in others, very strong.  Tearing my heart wide open generated such tremendous pain but it released so much more. I started to expend the same energy on sculpting my inner self as I did my physical self.  They work in tandem you see, the physical and the emotional, and one can only go unattended for so long before the partnership comes under tension.  To become stronger, I had to let myself be weak and in that exhausting process, I started to feel, see, and hear change.  I was able to see that what I had been doing for the past three months did nothing but tire me out, deplete my funds, and misrepresent who I am.  I was now aware of my heart's desires.

I realized that this emotional purging was the reason for my sudden hearing.  The concept is simple really: You can' expect to fill something beyond its capacity without it either getting backed up or its contents spilling over.  By accumulating so many thoughts and feelings in my head, my mind had now reached its full capacity.  I had figuratively clogged my own mind.  I was busting at the seams and the only thing that was holding my personal garbage together was my unwillingness to unleash.   Once I became willing, once I took out the trash, so to speak, I started to hear things.  So can I really deny the link between a busy mind and a heavy heart?

And if I can deafen myself to the sounds of every day life, can I actually make myself deaf to the sounds that my soul is trying to make me hear?  Absolutely.

As awesome and supernatural as the brain may be, if you are not careful, it can wreak havoc.  It works as a collection agency in two ways: by collecting knowledge and garbage.  With respect to the former, there aren't any downsides to having too much of it.  Knowledge invigorates, stimulates and expands our minds.  When it comes to the latter, however, an excess of it is problematic.  Feelings of negativity, hurt, sadness, anger, loneliness, anxiety, if left unattended, will plague your mind.

I am of the belief that our experiences, thoughts, and sentiments, especially the negative ones, should follow a flow chart.  It starts with the experience, that experience then turns into a thought, that thought then turns into analysis, questions (answered or unanswered) and conclusions, and then those should be spoken.  Communication plays a central role in the health of every relationship you foster, the most important one being the one with yourself.  To communicate is to have a soundboard off of which your thoughts bounce and if need be, it can pull the reins on your thought process to slow it down to a comfortable pace.

Sadly though, all too often, people opt against this last step.  They choose solemn silence over shameless revelation.  They hold their tongues thinking that one day their problem, thought, or desire will subside and it will finally stop biting away at their soul.  But this isn't the case.  This person, and those emotionally invested in them, will learn the hard way. 

If you close off the only exit your thoughts have, they are left with no choice but to remain enclosed and to circulate your mind over and over again, creating a dizzying effect.  The more thoughts circulating, the higher the chances of getting tangled and creating confusion.   This is all further irritated by you trying to make sense of your emotional knots by yourself.

Emotional restructuring is a hard task.  Human nature is strange in that you can have all the information laid before you about how your habits are negatively affecting you, yet you choose to continue.  It is like quitting smoking in a sense.  The negative health effects are made known, but people continue anyways.  And further like quitting smoking, the person inflicted has to make the executive decision to enact change.

Charles Dickens wrote:  It was the best of times, it was the worst of times.  It was the age of wisdom, it was the age of foolishness.  It was the epoch of belief, it was the epoch of incredulity.  It was the season of Light, it was the season of Darkness.  It was the spring of hope, it was the winter of despair. We had everything before us, we had nothing before us.

I write:  It was the most devastating of times, it was the most cathartic of times.  It was the age of insight, it was the age of fears.  It was the epoch of faith, it was the epoch of uncertainty.  It was the season of clarity, it was the season of gloom.  It was the summer of closeness, it was the winter of sorrow.  We had everything going for us, we had nothing before us.

I implore you to not dismiss that final step of the flow chart.  Bruised and battered you shall stand undefeated if you just speak.  That is the beginning to a fruitful end.  You will be open to so much more of what life is trying to tell you.  Those gut feelings and basic instincts are just the tip of the iceberg in terms of the messages that are sent your way.  These tiny callings are meant to be heard and specifically meant to be heard by you.  You know you best and your heart knows your heart best.  You owe its uniqueness the care and compassion you extend to others.

Even if your knees buckle, you collapse, and you have to teach yourself how to walk all over again, unveil your inner most thoughts.  Empty out your mind, release some pressure, in small increments if that's all you can handle.  This will give you some wiggle room to think and then you too will be able to breathe that complicated sigh of relief.

Do not fear your fears.  Do not fear that you will be alone in this struggle because as I have learned, someone will always be there to fall and rise with you.  You would be surprised at how many people will fight the fight with you - if only they knew what the fight was about.

LCxo