Free (Blog #1086)

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Ugh. I’ve spent all day reading, first a book about energy medicine (weird even for me), then a book about quantum physics and healing (fascinating), then a book I’m editing for a client (lacking commas, but that’s why I’m here). All the while our world has been going to hell in a hand basket. Because of COVID-19, many of us are on self- or government-imposed quarantine. This is confining and, therefore, scary (nobody likes to be pinned down; well, some people do, but I digress), but perhaps it’s for the best. A friend of mine in Alabama who has the virus has had a fever for ten days (and plenty of people are dying), so this virus clearly doesn’t fuck around. Drastic times call for drastic measures. Still, it often scares the shit out of me.

Which is a problem because I only have so much toilet paper.

Earlier today a friend of mine who’s both a mom and a therapist posted on Instagram about how to talk your kids about their feelings about, well, let’s face it, the end of the world as we know it. Her suggestion was to use notecards with blanks on them and have your kids fill in the blanks. For example, I FEEL (BLANK), ABOUT (BLANK), BECAUSE (BLANK) could be filled in as: I feel SCARED, about COVID-19, because I THINK I’M GOING TO GET IT. Of course, we as adults can do this too, especially since so many of us have trouble identifying and/or talking about our feelings. Personally, I feel ANXIOUS, about COVID-19, because I DON’T WANT ME OR ANYONE I CARE ABOUT TO SUFFER OR DIE. And because I’M LOSING MY FREEDOM (to go wherever I want when I want, to eat out, to make money like I have been).

Alas, many of our fears are coming true. Businesses are closing. Cities and states are on lockdown. Most people with the virus are getting better, but no small number are dying. As one of my friends just messaged me, it’s like we’re living in The Twilight Zone. And yet, at the same time that so many things are falling apart, people are rising to the occasion, offering online courses for entertainment, education, and morale-boosting for cheap or free. Companies aren’t charging for their services for the next month or the foreseeable future. Churches are offering to bring food to shut-ins. To borrow and bastardize a famous line, it’s the worst of times, it’s the best of times.

I realize “best” may be a stretch.

Pandemics happen.

One thing about this whole pandemic business that’s got me fuzzed up is the fact that it’s happening just as this blog is coming to an end. Not to make a worldwide crisis about me and my little writing project, but I only have eleven more posts left (including this one), and I’d personally like to be talking about other things. And going out to eat after my last post to celebrate three full years of daily writing and introspection. But as my dad said earlier, “Looks like you’ll be celebrating with your family.” (They’re real partiers. Thank God we have peanut butter and jelly sandwiches.) Alas, this is the way of it. Shit happens. Pandemics happen. And as for the content on this blog, my goal from the beginning has been to sit down at the keyboard every day, meet myself, and share as honestly as possible about whatever happens to be on my heart and mind. Lately, it’s been the virus. And if it’s the virus for the next ten days, so be it. I’m not going to change my format now.

I’ve talked before about how healing is 1) a non-linear path and 2) messy, and so is a blog like this. What I mean is that although I’ve written every day, every damn day for a damn while now, there have been a lot of peaks and valleys, posts that I’ve considered glorious, posts I’ve considered not so glorious. As I begin to look back on the project as a whole, however, these labels mean less and less. That is, good days and bad days don’t really matter. What matters is this project as a whole and, more importantly, me as a whole, how I’ve grown as a result of sticking to this thing. What matters is the encouragement, support, and information others have taken away as a result of that sticking. The mystics would say it like this–what helps one, helps everyone.

This concept is difficult to understand from a human, mind-only perspective, but I think it’s something we all know intuitively in our hearts. Currently people are getting upset when their neighbors don’t quarantine because they know they’re not just exposing themselves. They’re exposing all of us. So we get that we’re connected. The good news being that we’re not just connected when someone acts foolishly, we’re also connected when someone acts wisely. Meaning that I truly believe that as you work to deal with your shit, heal your past, and connect with and act from your own good heart, somehow the entire world is changed for the better. Not to put any pressure on you (like, the entire world is affected by your actions), but just to remind you that you’re a powerful being. Call it The Butterfly Effect. Just remember that just as a virus can spread around the world, so can a good idea. So can love and healing.

Mother Teresa, Gandhi, and Martin Luther King, Jr. understood this. We think of them as extraordinary humans, but in fact they weren’t. Rather, they were simply souls living up to their full potential, souls acting out of the conviction in their hearts rather than out of fear. This is the benefit to going inside and knowing thyself, the benefit to becoming familiar with and expressing yourself, the benefit of The Path. For one thing, you know what’s in your heart. You learn what power it contains. For another, having met even the scariest parts of yourself and your life with compassion, you’ve learned that there isn’t anything to fear. Or at least that there isn’t anything you can’t face and handle. This is what true freedom is about, not whether or not you’re stuck at home under quarantine, but whether or not you’re free in your spirit. Wherever you are. Whatever your circumstances.

Quotes from CoCo (Marcus)

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For all of the things life takes away, it gives so much more in return. Whether we realize it or not, there’s always grace available.

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The Butterfly Effect (Blog #129)

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A couple of weeks ago during a conversation about the number of per-day visitors to my blog (which is good, I think, but not astounding), my friend Donny said he thought the blog’s impact could be like a butterfly effect. If you don’t know, the butterfly effect is a theory that says the flapping of a butterfly’s wings can influence weather patterns, cause something like a tornado. In other words, small actions can affect big changes.

In terms of the blog, I hope Donny’s right.

Because of that conversation, that phrase–the butterfly effect–has been popping in and out of my head lately. Then a few days ago I noticed somewhere that the author Jon Ronson (who’s delightful) had released an audiobook/podcast on Amazon by the same name (for free!) So I downloaded it, started listening to it last night, and finished it today. All together, it took about three-and-a-half hours and was worth every minute.

The Butterfly Effect is subtitled Who Really Pays the Price for Free Porn? and starts with the story of the man responsible for PornHub and several sites like it, which are basically YouTube for pornography and are grossly filled with copyrighted material that has been illegally uploaded by users. So Jon explores that one decision–the decision to offer free porn–and its consequences. Along the way, he interviews porn directors and porn stars, as well as a number of people outside the industry directly and indirectly affected by free porn. Without saying too much, The Butterfly Effect talks about a man whose porn fetish (gremlins and Wonder Woman) goes back to when he was a child (a gremlin) and his mother (Wonder Woman) walked out of his life forever, a former porn star who lost his job as a nurse because of his past, and the fact that more and more eighteen-to-forty-year-olds have erectile dysfunction than ever before (because their penises have become so picky).

It’s fascinating.

Today while I listed to The Butterfly Effect (for over two hours), I stretched. In yoga sometimes the hips are referred to as the emotional junkyard, and mine are super-duper tight, so I spent a lot of time there. There’s a pose or stretch called Double Pigeon in which you basically sit on the floor like a child would but you put one ankle top of the other knee. Ideally, your legs should rest on top of each other, but mine almost always have a big gap in between them. I mean, big enough that Zac Efron could put his head in there, although I don’t know why that example comes to mind. Anyway today was no exception. Here’s where my right side started.

Before long, things relaxed and I completely closed the gap between my legs. This was a huge victory, since I think that’s only happened once or twice before–ever. (See the picture at the top of the blog. Way to go, Marky!) HOWEVER, the left side wasn’t really having it. Check out where THAT side started.

I don’t know if you’ve ever tried a stretch like this, but it’s extremely uncomfortable, sometimes painful. But for over twenty minutes this afternoon, I just took deep breaths, tried to relax, and forced myself to hang in there. And I ALMOST got where I wanted to be. Here’s a picture taken just before I quit that pose for the day. (Also– I’m sorry–I didn’t mean for this blog to be filled with so many pictures taken at crotch level.)

This evening my dad told me a joke he heard from my aunt Carla. What’s the difference between a northern tale and a southern tale? A northern tale begins “Once upon a time.” A southern tale begins “Y’all ain’t gonna believe this shit.” Well–

Y’all ain’t gonna believe this shit.

After I finished Double Pigeon, I did some other stretches and finally lay down on my back with both feet on the ground and my knees in the air. (This is where it gets weird.) Then my legs started shaking. Like, not a little–A LOT. I mean, I’ve had muscle spasms before, but this was a whole new level. My thighs were visibly vibrating. Well, I’ve read a lot about how the body can heal, and one of the ways is through shaking and trembling. Like a duck that flaps its wings after a squabble, it’s a way to release trauma. So I just let it happen. There I was on my back listening to a story about pornography, and my legs were going all “shake, rattle, and roll” for fifteen minutes solid.

It was fascinating.

There’s no such thing as a small action. There’s no such thing as small progress.

Eventually, things calmed down and I let my legs sink to the floor. During the entire stretching and vibrating process, I felt both frustration and release, sadness and joy. When it was all over, I thought, This is a big deal. This is progress. Something definitely happened today. However, before I started writing tonight I went for a walk and was acutely aware of a pain in my mid-back and another in my right leg. For these reasons, there’s part of me that wants to discount all the stretching and releasing that happened this afternoon. I’m getting nowhere. Nothing happened today. Hell, I probably made it up.

When Jon Ronson finished his research about the consequences of free porn, he went to the man who pretty much started it all. For the most part, the man didn’t take responsibility, even though Jon pointed out that not all the consequences were bad. Some of them were good. But what’s interesting to me is that–most definitely–there were consequences. There was a butterfly effect. So I have to remind myself that whether it’s in regard to my writing or the healing of my physical body, there’s no such thing as a small action. There’s no such thing as small progress. Rather, whatever the journey, each step is important and makes possible the one that comes after it. And since one life touches another and that life touches another, who can say where their journey ends?

Quotes from CoCo (Marcus)

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Life is never just so. Honestly, it’s a big damn mess most of the time.

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