On Anxiety, Myths, and Divine Timing (Blog #841)

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It’s eleven at night, and I just turned on my “blogging music.” This morning started off slowly–I slept in, ate breakfast, then read over a hundred fifty pages in The Cry for Myth by Rollo May. It’s fabulous, about the idea that life is inherently anxiety-inducing and that myths help us not only make sense of our world, but also alleviate that anxiety. Too much anxiety in your life? You need a different myth, a different viewpoint, a different psychological construct from which to see things.

A different set of glasses.

Honestly, I could have spent the entire day reading. I can’t tell you what a sense of accomplishment and joy I get when I finish an entire book in one day. Alas, this was not to be. For weeks I’ve been telling myself that I’d put down my books and finally do a few things–respond to emails, go to the bank and the post office, shit like that. Well, I finally did these things this afternoon. And whereas I started to give myself a hard time for not doing them sooner, I didn’t because recently I’ve been thinking about divine timing.

I’ll explain.

Byron Katie says that when you argue with reality, you lose–but only one hundred percent of the time. This means that if you think you SHOULD be running errands (and you aren’t) or that you SHOULD HAVE run errands sooner than you did, you’re going to experience stress. Why? Just one simple reason–it’s not the truth. The truth is you’re not running errands, or that you didn’t run them sooner than you did. This is what I mean by divine timing. Things happen when they happen. We can SHOULD and SHOULD HAVE all day long, but that just produces anxiety. This is the myth of I’m not doing things right, the myth of I did something wrong, and the myth of I’m a bad person, I’m a worm.

Going back to divine timing, I can’t tell you the number of times things have shown up in my life at just the right moment. For example, not too long ago I got an unexpected check for nearly three hundred dollars in the mail, the result of one of those silly class-action lawsuit postcards that I fill out now and then (and usually result in a check for $2.87). Well, that three hundred bucks totally saved my ass. The same thing happened over Christmas this last year when I needed to pay some bills but couldn’t work because of my knee injury. Someone bought a gift certificate for dance lessons. Of course, this miraculous timing doesn’t just apply to money. My therapist showed up at just the right time. Books and information continue to show up at just the right time.

One of my points here is–How do you know? That is, how do you know you should have said something or done something sooner–or that you should even do it at all (if you haven’t already)? Having been on the receiving end of multiple (hundreds of) perfectly timed kindnesses, it’s not a stretch for me to think that I can play a part in the producing end of perfectly timed kindnesses in someone else’s life. What I mean is that I can beat myself up for not sending a letter in the mail sooner, but maybe the person getting that letter didn’t NEED it sooner. Maybe they needed it LATER. Likewise, I can (and do) beat myself up for not working more on writing my book(s), but again, perhaps it’s just not time. How will I know it’s time to write my book(s)?

I’ll have my butt in a chair and will be writing them.

It’s that simple.

Gosh, we like to complicate things. I like to complicate things. And not that I’m encouraging procrastination or not listening to your inner nudges to act, but I am suggesting that most of our self-flagellation is just that–self-punishment. As if we won’t get things done unless we constantly berate ourselves. I’m not doing things right. I did something wrong. I’m a bad person, I’m a worm. Please, we need a new myth–the myth of I’m doing things just fine, the myth of I did something right (a lot of things right), the myth of I’m a good person, not a worm.

Living by a new myth, of course, is more than simply changing your perspective or putting on a new pair of glasses. For a myth to really make a difference in your life, you have to internalize it and you have to let it change you. May says, “We seem to think that we can be reborn without ever dying.” This means that our old personality structure must be completely torn up (or torn down) in order for a new one to be planted, take root, and grow. This is why Noah was in the Ark, Jonah was in the whale, and Christ was in the grave. Chaos always precedes order, darkness always precedes light, and death always precedes new life–and change always takes time. For me, this is where the myths are most helpful. Knowing that “destruction comes before creation,” rather than be filled with anxiety whenever my life is falling apart, I can be filled with hope. I think, It’s just a matter of time before things start coming together.

Quotes from CoCo (Marcus)

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Our burdens are lighter when we share them.

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After the Breaking (Blog #516)

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Last night after flying in from DC, I slept at my Aunt Terri’s house in Tulsa, and this morning while trying to figure out her damn espresso machine, I broke the handle off one of her coffee cups. SHHH–don’t say anything. She’s currently at work, and I haven’t told her yet. Anyway, ironically, the cup said, “Life is good.”

Is it? I thought, staring at the broken handle. IS IT?!

Fortunately, unlike me and many of my past relationships, the cup and its handle made a clean break. Also fortunately, I happen to travel with super glue, which I keep in my lesbian toolbox in the back of my car, Tom Collins. So after I scrambled some eggs, made coffee in ANOTHER cup, and ate my breakfast, I glued the broken cup back together, temporarily holding the handle against the cup with a couple of rubber bands I found in a drawer.

There. That was easy.

This morning before waking up, I had a series of dreams. Having chewed on them a good part of this afternoon, I’ll spare you a lot of the details and focus on what I think is most important. First, I began backstage at a theater. I was up high in the shadows, watching. Then I was on the ground floor in a rehearsal space that was brighter and was practicing a cartwheel-type move with a woman. Then I was outside on a large deck in the full light, practicing the same move with a man, who was more powerful and confident than the woman was. Because of his strength, I was concerned he was going to flip me off the deck into the mud–or the unfinished yard–below. Finally, I was in my friend Mary’s kitchen, next to a refrigerator (a common dream symbol for me).

At first glance, I took this dream to be about my work life and being prepared, since first I was watching in the shadows (learning by watching), then I was rehearsing (learning by doing, gently), then I was literally “on deck” or getting ready to do (with power). As for the mud and rocks, I see them as representing the unknown, the unfinished, or that which is to come. Since I relate refrigerators to stored energy or potential, all this would make sense and is probably true. But as dreams can have multiple meanings, I’m considering another possibility, largely due to a statement I read in a book yesterday that said both dreams and life communicate with us through REDUNDANCY. In other words, the universe repeats itself.

In other words, the universe repeats itself.

As I understand it, the idea behind this concept is that when your subconscious is wanting to get a point across, it will bring it to your attention through multiple avenues, including dreams, symbols, experiences, and bodily sensations. With this in mind, I now interpret all of my dreams last night from the viewpoint of “things coming together.” First, the dreams were filled with images of opposites–shadow and light, male and female, inside and outside, confidence and concern. With all these pairs there was a joining, some sort of stage or platform where they–what’s the word?–played together. Even the mud can be seen as a “coming together” of the opposites earth and water. Likewise, a kitchen is where ingredients are joined, and all the more sense that the kitchen in my dream belonged to a woman named Mary–or rather–Marry. (Dreams often speak in puns.)

According to the book I’m reading, since the universe speaks in redundancy, it sends us the same messages in our waking life as it does our sleeping one. If this is true (and I believe it is), it would make sense that immediately after having these dreams about “coming together,” I would break a cup–where?–in my aunt’s KITCHEN and then join the broken pieces back together. Of course, this whole affair is even more stunning for me, since that’s what I think this blog is about–repairing those parts of myself that have been broken off along the way.

Aunt Terri, I’m sorry your hopefully-not-favorite mug had to be sacrificed in order to serve as an illustration of the process I’m going through.

If all this isn’t weird enough, things have gotten even weirder as the day has gone on. For one thing, as I was cleaning up after breakfast, I noticed a bag in my Aunt Terri’s kitchen that said, “Bring your table to life.” And whereas the actual meaning, I think, has to do with bringing LIFE to your table (by putting the company’s food or products on it), I like the slogan literally just as well. Bring YOUR TABLE to life. In other words, start exactly where you are, with all your shadows and broken pieces, then find a way to animate yourself. Find a way to JOIN your shadow to The Light. Find a way to put your broken pieces back together.

I spent this afternoon here in Tulsa looking for books at a fabulous bookstore. And whereas I didn’t find anything I was looking for, I did find two books I WASN’T looking for. Anyway, when I finished book-looking, I went to a Panera Bread (where I am now), since I really haven’t felt superior today and figured coffee would help animate ME. Well, I’ll be damned if I wasn’t just about to get out of my car when I looked over and saw a business named RESURRECT. (It’s a resale store.) And maybe some would call it a coincidence, but I choose to see it–once again–as the universe communicating, since RESURRECTION is what happens after THE SACRIFICE of your old life. It’s what happens after THE BREAKING. Resurrection is the coming back together or The Joining. It’s your new cup. It’s your new life.

Quotes from CoCo (Marcus)

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Our struggles unearth our strengths.

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My Gargoyles, Edward and Bronius (Blog #461)

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Two days ago while cleaning out my closet, I found the instructions for a lava lamp, a piece of my childhood that I got rid of long ago in a yard sale. Lamps were a big thing when I was little. I had the purple lava lamp, a red twirling “siren” lamp, even a lamp that tossed rainbow-colored lights onto a whirling string (and is hard to explain). As an adult, I’ve collected mid-century modern lamps, lamps of unusual shapes and sizes, swag lamps and chandeliers that I used at my dance studio and old home, The Big House.

There’s always been something about the light.

When I had my estate sale, most of my lamps and chandeliers found new homes. Two lamps I couldn’t part with, however, are now in my newly redecorated room. Three chandeliers and three swag lamps I kept by default–they didn’t sell. For over a year now, they’ve been collecting dust in my parents’ garage, and no one on Craigslist or Facebook has wanted to pay what I’m asking. So I’ve been working on getting them inside the house this week. One at a time I’ve been cleaning them up, and if I haven’t been able to use them in my room (there’s only so much space in here), I’ve been hanging them in a spare closet.

This is something I’ve been hesitant to do. For the last year, anytime I’ve seen the chandeliers in the garage, part of me has wished they were gone. It took a lot to have that big sale, and their being around has served as a reminder of all the things that I no longer have, the place I called home for three years where I no longer live. Still, I’ve been making peace with where I am and have recently thought, At least for now, Marcus, these lamps belong to you, so let’s use them and take care of them.

In the process of cleaning up my lights this afternoon, I decided to hang one in my room. Because of the way it’s constructed, I didn’t think it would work at first, but my dad encouraged me to try, and it did. (Thanks, Dad.) Anyway, it’s antique–French, I think–with a heavy alabaster shade and a handful of hanging crystals. Atop two gargoyles have been attached. They’re not old, but they have that feel. I originally found this chandelier on eBay after days of searching for gargoyle lights. I just got obsessed over them because of their history and what they represent.

Technically, “gargoyle” means “spout,” as they were often used to decorate drain pipes in medieval architecture. However, depending on the history you read, gargoyles were also seen as guards and were placed on churches to keep evil spirits away. (What demon would want to go near something so ugly?) Plus, there’s something about them representing our shadow, that dark part of ourselves that we push away to the corners and refuse to look at or dance with. What with all my work in therapy, I figured gargoyles were the perfect creature to have around, a symbolic gesture that I was willing to embrace all aspects of myself–the good, the bad, the ugly.

For me, decorating is quite psychological.

As gargoyles can be thought of as guards, I named the two gargoyles atop my chandelier Edward and Bronius, both titles that mean “protector.” I don’t honestly believe that they kept me safe while living in The Big House, but I also never had a problem while the three of us resided there. (I’m just saying.) Plus, this is something I like to do, name my inanimate objects, especially the ones with faces. It makes my world seem more personal, more magical. I realize I’m almost forty, but–

why should I have to stop imagining?

We are surrounded by the light.

So now Edward and Bronius watch over my bedroom. A few of their crystals broke, apparently, while being moved, but–so what?–life isn’t perfect. And whereas all my favorite lamps and lights used to be spread throughout one big house, now they’re concentrated in one single bedroom–mine. I’m surrounded by their light–the light–and I love it. Maybe more now than before, since I’d mentally “lost” some of these objects, and now they’re “found.” This is the way I’ve come to think about myself–lost and now found–not because of some religious experience, but rather because I’m learning to love all parts of myself, to feel protected and at home here, in me, where the light and the dark dance together.

Quotes from CoCo (Marcus)

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You've really got to believe in yourself and what you're doing. Again, it comes down to integrity and making something solid of yourself, something that's so well-built on the inside that it can handle any storm.

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