This morning I woke up a full two hours before my alarm went off. Feeling crappy. And whereas I thought it was probably due to the fact that I was fasting and hadn’t eaten in over thirty-six hours, I convinced myself I had COVID-19. Oh my gosh, y’all, it was awful, just imagining going into the kitchen (and touching every doorknob along the way) to take my temperature, discovering I had a fever, then spending the whole day aching and hacking. And giving “the lung eater” to my elderly parents, of course. If they die, my sister will kill me, I thought. Anyway, not wanting to find out I’d won the coronavirus lottery, I just lay in bed for over an hour. In terror.

Finally, I convinced myself to get up and take my temperature. Y’all, it was 97.1. Not even close to a hundred.

So I celebrated (and broke my fast) with coffee and oatmeal and a banana, and shortly thereafter felt fine. Just like any other day. When I told my sister about how terribly this virus is affecting us hypochondriacs (not the mention the people that actually have it), she said, “Boo for paranoia.” This afternoon I saw my chiropractor who works with emotions, and when I told his wife about my scare this morning (I, along with the rest of the world, clearly don’t have much else to talk about these days), she said, “Isn’t the mind a powerful thing?”

“Yeah,” I said, “it can really scare the shit out of you.”

God knows I’ve scared the shit out of myself so many times it’s not even funny. (Okay, it’s a little funny.) What’s the Mark Twain saying? “I’ve lived through some terrible things in my life, some of which actually happened.” Amen. For all the physical illnesses I’ve dealt with over the years, no illness has been as bad as my fears about how long whatever it was would last, or if it would come back again. Well, okay, that stomach virus I had for ten days was pretty awful. But still, even at the worst of it, there was a part of me that was okay, that knew what to do. That’s the thing, we always have an inherent wisdom that knows how to survive in times of crisis. Cancel your appointments, it says. Drink lots of fluids. Get some rest and try not to shit the bed.

The good news is that as I’ve consciously worked to resolve and heal my past dramas and traumas, clean up my relationships, and cultivate peace, self-awareness, and self-acceptance, my tendency to awfulize has seriously decreased. Not that I can’t get worked up at times, especially during, I don’t know, a pandemic, but it’s not as often and doesn’t last as long as it used to. I’m just more calm.

Honestly, I imagine this is one of the reasons people don’t work on their interior more. (I’ll explain.) It’s jarring. What I mean is that when you’ve spent decades being nervous, anxious, worried, fearful, frightened, and distressed, you start thinking that’s who you actually are. Not that it’s particularly fun, but it’s familiar. Comfortable. If you do happen to catch a glimpse of peace while praying, meditating, receiving Reiki, or even skydiving (no kidding, it’s way peaceful), you pass it off as a fluke, never imagining that kind of stillness could be your new normal. But if it were to become your new normal, of course, you’d have to say goodbye to the old you, the false you, and that’s a tough thing to do.

Because we like our personas (a word that originally meant “mask”).

As far as I can tell, The Path, the personal growth path or the spiritual path, is largely about stripping away that which is not true, all the false layers we’ve added to ourselves over years in order to keep ourselves safe. The problem being, of course, that because many of the layers get put on by us, or even for us, at such an early age, we truly don’t know any different. We feel or act neurotic and think, This is just the way I was born. And yet it appears that this is another lie we tell ourselves, another fib we construct to keep from seeing whatever world we’ve constructed tumble and fall.

For me, a lot of growth and progress has come from the thought, Maybe I was wrong about that. In other words, maybe the world isn’t such a scary place, and maybe people, and God and the universe, are kinder than I ever imagined. Likewise, a lot of growth and progress has come from the thought, Maybe I was wrong about myself. Maybe I’m more talented, strong, courageous, beautiful, important, and necessary than I ever gave myself credit for. Maybe we all are. Granted, there are those whose egos are TOO inflated who might not benefit from this line of thinking, but even in these cases it seems that the real issue is the lack of awareness about one’s true and inherent value. (Thus all the posturing.) Accordingly, it’s my encouragement that if you have a judgment about yourself or the world that’s causing you pain, that you become ever more willing to be wrong about it.

What’s the saying? I’d rather be happy than right.

Something I’d like to be wrong about, and indeed am in the process of trying to be wrong about, is the idea that my body isn’t capable of relaxing, feeling good, and healing. Said another way, I’m hoping to find out that the fear I have around something going wrong or catching a worldwide virus is unnecessary. Granted, I’ve made a lot of progress on this topic. I’m not nearly as high-strung as I used to be. But, as with all things, it’s a process. Ugh. We imagine that our futures HAVE to look like our PASTS. But this is ridiculous. Because what would be the point if we simply STAYED THE SAME from womb to tomb? That’s right, dear reader, there wouldn’t be a point. And so it seems we’re meant and intended to grow, evolve, change, and transform for the better. This is the way of it. However slowly, however reluctantly, we march forward.