It’s been a very long time since I’ve written anything on this blog. Finding my way back, even electronically, was difficult as I struggled to find my writing platform, to log in, and even to find the “writing” area. I dug out some inspiration from somewhere within myself after years of having nothing to say. I think I have been thinking for several years.
The pandemic brought up a lot of “stuff” for all of us. It did for me anyway. For me, it brought everything that had ever bothered me to the surface. It surfaced as almost paralyzing anxiety. All the traumas of my life seemed to be replaying in my mind on a constant loop. All the messaging from others about who they thought I was got amplified and I felt like I really was failing at work. I couldn’t work fast enough, couldn’t adapt quickly enough. Was not calm like everyone else who seemed to be taking it in stride. When our leaders came to thank us for all our service and commitment, I stood amongst my peers and listened but there was a voice in my mind that kept saying, “They mean everyone else but me”. Where did that voice come from? The voice was telling me that I had been too slow, too scared, and not selfless enough. That I had in fact been more concerned about myself and how scared I was getting than I had been 100% committed to the tasks at hand at work. I had shown up, yes, but in way less capacity than everyone else. I felt like a fraud in comparison. I felt less than. I felt like I wasn’t quite enough. Not long thereafter, I went on a two-month leave of absence to deal with “my” mental illness of anxiety and depression.
I feel like I am still recovering from this and it has been a long, long journey. I have sought out help all over the place and I got some. Some help resonated for a time and then was no longer useful so I moved on. I have also learned a lot about myself. I’ve also learned that I can’t always believe everything other people try to tell me about myself. Because a lot of them are wrong. Some are even just trying to manipulate you into believing things that are not true about yourself. Whether they are conscious or not of what they are doing, it is still harmful messaging. So you start to hear a voice in yourself that you’ve ignored for possibly your whole life that is trying to tell you, “No, that is not at all what I am about. Let me tell you what I am about. Let me figure out more about me. The person I am. My spirit, my life’s purpose. The real and true me. My spirit and essence that got completely forgotten about”.
I’ve returned to yoga at a studio where everyone’s spirits are welcome, accepted, and respected in a very warm nurturing atmosphere. I’ve learned to accept my true introverted nature. And realize I need space and quiet time, and truly love being the homebody that I am. When I am at home, I allow myself, my spirit, to explore what it wants. To see where it will lead me. I’ve been eating differently, shopping differently, and watching movies and TV programs that speak to me in the day or moment. I’ve started hiking also. Short hikes. But a lot of the time, I am home. On the couch, deep in thought, connecting with me, my spirit. And this is OK. It’s what I need, what I have needed for years. It’s an incredible amount of “me time”. But I forgot myself probably from a very early point in my life. I lived for others and always thought they were more important than me. I was not important. I lived for their existence; to support them. But I deserved more from myself and from those around me who thought it was OK to let me believe this – whether they knew it or had no idea. Sadly, I didn’t even know it myself.
Learning about nutrition and how menopause affects your body in the most crazy way through reading books and listening to many, many different people speak on these kinds of transformative ideas and theories, has become my way of life. I feel like I am on the cusp of finally getting why I am here and what my contribution is going to be in my life. Reading about spirituality, and learning about other cultures’ perceptions of time, medicine, and healing is incredible. Learning about the Lunar New Year, learning about, Norse mythology, my ancestry, zodiac theory, and where they seem to meet each other, explain each other, relate and resonate with each other is fascinating.
As we enter into the time of Pisces, my birth sign, I have been reading about Pisces and our personality traits. I am profoundly Piscean. I love water and will always seek out the ocean, a lake a river, or a stream. Particularly rivers and streams. I have been reading about spirituality too and the idea of flowers came to mind. I like flowers. I wondered what the flower of Pisces was. Turns out there are many ideas of what the Piscean flower can be. But the lotus, water lily, seems to be the one that is associated the most. I do love water lilies. I love the lily pads and how sometimes animals use them as a raft in the middle of the water.
I also love how they grow out of the murkiest, darkest mud, where there is no light. How they endure their growing conditions, struggle to grow through water, seeking the light and air, and never give up. I feel like this is me, a lotus plant, struggling with all the perseverance, trying to find a way through the mud to the light, where I will get to be me. A beautiful, beautiful pink or yellow flower in a pond surrounded by fields of daisies. Finally, a flower amongst all the other flowers. A flower at heart.
microyogi 