Worth It (Blog #1000!)

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Phew. Here we are. Blog #1000. We made it. I made it. Two years, eight months, and twenty-six days ago I began this journey honestly not knowing what I was doing or where I was going. And whereas I’m not sure I know now (does anyone ever know what they’re doing or where they’re going?), I’m nonetheless here with–as of yesterday–892,141 words more than I started with. Granted, not every word or every post has been brilliant. How could it be? And yet all together these words and posts have provided a container, a structure in which something brilliant has happened.

To be clear, I’m not referring to this body of work, this blog, as brilliant. Granted, I’m proud of it, but more and more I don’t have to label it. Recently I’ve watched a couple documentaries about The Sphinx, and one scholar dates it as old as 36,000 years. My point being that over the centuries countless numbers of people have looked upon this sculpture and issued their opinions about it. It’s magnificent, it’s glorious, it’s weird, it’s crap. Whatever. I’m sure those who built it had their thoughts about it too. It’s not good enough; we should probably redo that nose. Meanwhile, the creation itself has existed as it is, quietly knowing that our opinions are powerless to change art. Art, however, is more than capable of changing us if we let it.

This is the brilliant thing I’m referring to, the fact that somewhere in the midst of all these words and posts a glorious, necessary, and humbling transformation has taken place–mine. Now, I know this is a bold claim–look at me, I’m different!–but I’m just stating facts (and I’m not ASKING anyone to look). Even if I were, I could write until I’m blue in the face and not be able to PROVE to another soul that my soul is any different today than it was 1,000 days ago. But it is. Specifically, it has more of a voice in my decisions, my moods, and my relationships. Because I’m more in touch with it. THAT’S what this vessel has provided–a place for me to meet myself. Time and time again it’s given me a space–a virtual therapy office if you will–for me to be my own listening ear, my own compassionate shoulder to cry on, my own caring counselor.

For those of you who have in any way watched, supported, or shared this space and this journey of mine, I am deeply grateful. Truly the path to one’s self is often and by definition a lonely path, and yet–paradoxically–we never walk it completely alone. More and more I’m convinced: both here and “elsewhere,” we are surrounded by a great cloud of witnesses.

Witnesses who happily cheer us on.

Transformation requires more than a charge card.

Perhaps one of the reasons the path to one’s self (the journey of personal growth, the way of spirituality, the royal road) is lonely is because so much of it is internal (where you are, where God is, and where other people aren’t) and not external (where the world is, where people are, and where stuff is). If it were external, it’d be easy to prove to other people how you’ve changed or transformed. This is how most of the world operates. We get a new car, house, or haircut and think that changes US. Unfortunately, it doesn’t. Despite what the advertisers and marketers want us to think, it’s not that easy. Transformation requires more than a charge card. At best our outward changes affect others’ PERCEPTION of us, and–as you know, dear reader–the perception of others is a fickle mistress. One day someone approves of us and what we do, wear, and say, and the next day they don’t.

Where’d their approval go? we think.

Well, in the words of the warden in the movie The Shawshank Redemption, it “up and vanished like a fart in the wind.”

Tonight I concluded Christmas at a dear friend’s house, where we ate dinner, toasted each other, and exchanged gifts and stories. Y’all, more and more I believe that a good story is one of the greatest gifts you can give someone, especially if it makes them laugh, comforts their heart, or challenges them to think in a new way. Well, my friend gave me such a gift tonight. They said they once hosted a large fundraiser, and the band for the event showed up–what’s the phrase?–high as a damn kite. And whereas most the musicians managed fine, the bass player either accidentally or on-purpose kept playing DIFFERENT songs than the rest of the band.

“I think he just didn’t give a shit,” my friend said.

Thankfully, the man (the genius) running the sound board turned off the bass player’s microphone, and no one in the audience ever knew the guy was completely stewed. My friend only knew because the sound technician put a pair of earphones on their head and said, “Hey, get this shit.”

Y’all, this is what this journey I’ve been discussing is about–turning DOWN the external voices in your life and turning UP the internal ones. In the last 1,000 days I’ve referred to these voices as your soul, your spirit, your highest self, your intuition, your guidance, your inner wisdom, your angels, God, the universe, the gods, and–I could go on. And whereas I don’t see all these terms as exactly the same, my point is–I just don’t think we’re alone here. Recently I had a friend comment, “I don’t believe in gods.” Fine. It has never been nor will it ever be my intention on this blog to change anyone else’s opinion about anything, least of all the higher mechanics of the cosmos. Changing someone else is NEVER the point of this work. Again and again and all day long until the cows come home, the point is changing oneself.

Transforming oneself.

Joseph Campbell said, “All the gods, all the heavens, all the hells, are within you.” To me this means exactly that–that the forces we read about aren’t outside but inside us, that if you can’t read about Sisyphus eternally rolling a giant rock up a mountain or Jesus hanging on the cross and put YOURSELF there and thus relate the story to YOUR life, you’ve missed the point. (Every story is about you. What is in all is in one. What is in one is in all.) People externalize their gods, their beliefs. They say, “Jesus loves the little children. God hates fags.” No, they don’t. YOU do. How do I know? You’re the one who said it; you’re the one who did it. This is what personal responsibility and accountability are all about–realizing that you no longer get to blame someone else (God, your neighbor, or a book) for YOUR actions.

This sucks, I know.

There’s an idea in The Bible about not building your house upon the sandy land but rather building your house upon the rock, where, as a children’s song says, “the storms may come and go, but the peace of God you will know.” And whereas I do NOT intend this as preaching or evangelizing, I DO intend it as SYMBOLIZING.

I’ll explain.

Recently I’ve been obsessed with a song by Maren Morris called “The Bones.” It’s my flavor of the week. In essence the song is about a couple’s relationship, the idea being that when two people have a home with a solid foundation they can weather any storm. Getting back to the idea of symbolizing or being able to relate any story, mythology, or wisdom to one’s self, my thought has been that if I–if YOU–have a solid internal foundation, we can confidently navigate the trials and tribulations of life. This is the path I keep talking about, the path therapy and this blog have been such a huge part of for me, the building of an unshakable inner base. Y’all, I wish I could tell you that the right therapist, doctor, doctrine, or god can and will protect you from life’s hurts and heartaches, but alas, this is simply not the case. Anyone who tries to tell you otherwise is selling you snake oil. What is true, however, is that if you’ve done the inner work and have your priorities straight, you can best any challenge. Granted, life may bring you to your knees (it will), but as Morris says, “the house don’t fall when the bones are good.”

If the last thousand days have taught me anything, it’s that any time you spend building a solid foundation or working on your interior structure is time well spent. Every minute and every hour, as uncomfortable as it may be, is gold. (Did I forget to mention that being born again is unpleasant? Well, it is. Ask any screaming baby.) Likewise, any time you spend searching for, sharing, or living the truth will set you free. Not just sort of, but really. Granted, the truth may turn your world upside down (it will). Things may get worse before they get better (they will). But if a house doesn’t already POSSESS a solid foundation or structure, isn’t it best to tear it down and start from scratch in order to have something stable, something that will last? Don’t you want something real? I’ve spent almost six years in therapy, nearly three years blogging every day, and countless hours self-improving, and I’m telling you–it’s exhausting. But I’m talking about you here. Aren’t you worth all the effort?

Quotes from CoCo (Marcus)

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So perhaps perfection has little to do with that which changes and everything to do with that which doesn't. For surely there is a still, small something inside each of us that never changes, something that is timeless and untouchable, something inherently valuable and lovable--something perfect.

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The Best of Things (Blog #146)

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To this day, one of my top three movies is The Shawshank Redemption, which–extremely briefly–is about a man named Andy who is falsely imprisoned and eventually escapes after years of slowly chipping away at a concrete wall. (If you haven’t seen it, I’m sorry to spoil it for you.) One of the final scenes involves the night Andy escapes. After crawling through the tunnel he’s made, he breaks open a sewage line, crawls through hundreds of yards of you-know-what, and eventually emerges on the other side of the prison walls. It’s pouring down rain, and as Andy stretches his arms out wide, the water washes over him. Finally, he’s free.

The movie concludes when Andy’s best friend, Red, is released from prison and breaks his parole to join Andy on a beach. (It’s very sweet in a heterosexual sort of way.) Previously, Red had told Andy to accept his fate, that he’d be stuck in prison for the rest of his life. He says, “Hope is a dangerous thing.” Andy’s later response is one of the best lines in the movie, maybe any movie: “Hope is a good thing, maybe the best of things.”

Last week I read a book called Scared Selfless by a psychologist who was severely abused and traumatized as a child. In short, her step-father used her as a sex slave and prostitute until she became a teenager. For several years, she dissociated, meaning her psyche seriously compartmentalized the horrific experiences, and she was able to go about her day-to-day life interacting with her step-father as if everything were “normal.” When she got to college she started having flashbacks, and although the shit really hit the fan, the good news is that she started the long road to healing. That road included a number of psychologists (at least eight), a diagnosis of multiple personality disorder (dissociative identity disorder), and discovering that she was a lesbian.

It’s a lot to process, I know.

Today I took the book to therapy and asked my therapist a few questions out of curiosity. There’s a comment in the book that “during prolonged trauma, denying one’s feelings can be beneficial and adaptive” because–why focus on your terrible life if you can’t do anything about it? So I asked my therapist if that was true, if it was “okay” to shut down sometimes, to put part of you in a box until you can deal with it later. My therapist said that in severe cases, it’d be hard not to. But–and she sort of pulled back the corners of her mouth before she said this–she didn’t think it was ever healthy to deny one’s feelings, to compartmentalize. She said, “I think a better response would be hope. Okay, this sucks, and maybe I can’t do anything about it now, but it’s only temporary. Everything is temporary.”

Although I’ve been through a number of traumatic experiences, I can’t imagine the level of trauma the lady who wrote the book endured. Still, I can appreciate anyone who shuts down or puts things in a box because I know I did that for the longest time. I remember being fifteen when Dad when to prison. I started paying the bills, driving myself to school, falling asleep on the floor at night while I was studying. I kept a four-point average, and after school I’d type up legal work for my dad and his friends. Looking back, I should have been mad as hell, come home crying on a regular basis from all the pressure. But I only remember crying a handful of times in six years.

I know enough now that the reason I fell in love with The Shawshank Redemption was because I felt like I was in prison too, trapped in a situation I couldn’t get out of. More specifically, I both knowingly and unknowingly took parts of myself and put them behind a concrete wall. In particular, I took one rather large part and put it in a concrete closet. For years I played the roles of the dutiful son, the teacher’s pet, and the nice boy. And whereas I can’t say that those roles were disingenuous, I can say that they didn’t represent the whole of me.

Here’s the deal–if you’re not whole, you’re in prison. 

My therapist says that hope is real, that she’s seen it change people’s lives. In my experience, it seems that hope has been, as Emily Dickinson would say, the thing with feathers. Some days it’s been right there, others so far away. And yet it’s always returned, sometimes in the form of a book, sometimes in the form of a movie I can’t stop watching, sometimes in the form of my therapist. When I consider the last twenty years, it’s amazing to me that I didn’t fully recognize the prison I was in. Like Andy’s friend Red, I guess I’d simply gotten used to being there. And yet part of me obviously knew there was more to life. Hey, get us the fuck out of here. We don’t like all this concrete. This place could use some color and a new set of curtains.

The last few years have often felt like tunneling my way through a thick wall–little bit by little bit. Like Andy crawling through the sewer, my therapist says she’s in favor of digging into and dealing with all your shit until it’s under your fingernails. (Then you can clean it up.) In short, healing hasn’t always been a pretty process. But I do think it’s been worth all the hard work. Even since starting this blog, I’ve felt like a lot of walls have come down. Yeah, I’ve been through hundreds of yards of shit, but I’m more complete now than I ever have been. Last night–at four in the morning–I went for a run, and it started to rain. Rather than go back, I just decided, I’m in this. So I spread my arms out wide and let the water wash over me like a baptism. I wish I could describe it better. My feet were hitting the pavement, my lungs were working overtime, my heart was beat, beat, beating. Several times I splashed around in puddles as if I were a kid again. It felt like every piece of me was there–it felt like freedom–it felt like the best of things.

Quotes from CoCo (Marcus)

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All great heroes, at some point, surrender to the unknown.

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