Before the pandemic (odd that this will likely become a new marker for time) I wanted to explore something that has always plagued me (no pun intended).
I, like many people I know, have a lot of hopes and dreams. From the time I was very young – honestly as far back as I can remember – I’ve had this fire deep inside me that told me I’m not normal and that people may never understand me. Heck, half the time I don’t even understand myself.
I’ve dreamed of being an alien, waiting patiently for my home planet to find me or return for me (maybe I was lost, maybe I was left here). I’ve filled journals with my own spells. Believing deeply that I have powers that I just haven’t figured out how to harness yet. I wished and prayed that I’d one day discover my gifts and finally fulfill my purpose. I’d sit, alone in my room as a child, staring at objects around me – willing them to move like Matilda.
As I’ve gotten older, life of course has jaded me. I used to make up stories all the time. Now, I’m often stuck on auto-pilot. I no longer allow my mind to wander into a fantasy land I created. Instead I go through the motions of daily life, sometimes letting the days, weeks, and months slip by me with hardly any connection to them at all.
OR, I’m overwhelmed and anxious and thinking about everything at the same time but not really thinking about anything also. It’s as if everything I realize I haven’t been doing/feeling/pursuing shows up at once to remind me and I am shaken and frozen. I cannot move forward.
Either way, my state of being is often not one of hope, wonder, curiosity, whimsy, or confidence.
What happened?
Where did it go?
I still have this tiny burning ember that somehow hasn’t been smothered and put out. It’s there and it does, on occasion, flare up. And then there’s this spark that if it would only land on a piece of tinder, perhaps that fire would once again burn fiercely inside of me.
Instead, it’s as if I’m completely devoid of oxygen and everything has been rained on. There is no tinder and there cannot be any fire. The ember persists but as the time passes it’s weakened and one day, it may finally turn to ash. A memory of what once was and what could have been.
Before the pandemic, I became really fascinated with the question, “Why do so many of us feel we cannot do what we want to do?”
An often used, and often valid, reason many people give is TIME. I don’t have the time to do what I want to do because there is too much I have to do.
Then the pandemic hit.
And while yes, there were people making loaves of banana bread and sour dough and discovering their voice on Tik Tok – and yes, there are numerous examples of people using the timeout so many of us were forced to take in a truly inspiring way, I think it’s fair to say the overwhelming majority of us are looking back on the past 10 weeks or so and feel as if it became a void. A blank space on our calendars. A weird limbo where nothing significant happened. We just were.
Mental health must have something to do with it? But what else? Why did I have more time than I will probably ever have again (reasonably speaking) to pursue whatever it is I’ve been wanting to pursue but still fall so short? Stores and venues were closed and travel was limited – but that’s not necessarily a show stopper.
There are plenty of examples of individuals who got creative and had back yard bar crawls with just their spouse or recreated their planned trip to Disney in their living-room or decided to finally put their art out there online for the world to see.
I didn’t do any of these things. In fact, I retreated.
I’ve heard and read that psychologists want us to know we are collectively experiencing trauma right now and this will impact each one of us very differently.
I don’t discount this but there is something bigger going on here (as minimizing of the pandemic as that may sound – not my intention).
Humans create rules so that we can coexist. There are laws and there are social norms that most communities end up creating and following. But what if some of those “rules” are actually completely imaginary? They don’t exist.
We tell ourselves things like, “I can’t wear hats.” We scroll through our feeds and scold ourselves for thinking we could ever be as beautiful, or as talented, or as funny, or as successful as those who seem to just naturally have it all. We laugh at ourselves for imagining being in our dream location, living or even just vacationing where we feel we should really be – even if it’s just once for a long weekend. We wake up, every day, sick to our stomachs over the job we are about to go to or the significant other we’ve woken up next to and we swallow it. It goes down like a rock, but we carry that rock with us into our day. We don’t question it. Rather we question why we think we deserve something else. “How foolish,” we think to ourselves.
WHY? Who told us that we aren’t worthy? What happened that made us decide to abandon our wants and our needs and our passions? Where did the child that believed in themselves – that explored the world because everything was new and therefore anything was possible – go?
I have a distinct memory that I allowed to change the trajectory for quite possibly the rest of my life. I’m sure you do too.
Someone told you that you couldn’t. Someone mocked you when you tried. Something stunned you and shook you to your core and you decided, I’m not going to put myself in that vulnerable position again. I don’t want to fail.
There are those among us who have somehow escaped this, but more realistically they chose not to listen to the doubts inside their head or the doubters outside of it. They recognized that failure is a chance to grow and that consistency means more than any natural gift you could be given. Consistency creates change. Consistency grows skills, grows knowledge, creates tracks in our brain that then create habits which form into a lifestyle. For these unique souls, it no longer feels like they are chasing something but rather have become aligned and it now flows from them naturally.
I don’t have a definite answer to any of the questions I’ve proposed but I want to explore this more. If you have any thoughts you’d like to share or know someone who has done research or has education around this subject, I’d love to hear from you!
Emily's Esoterica 