Utterly Alone (NOT a Depressing Tale...)

My online buddy, fellow Fish and one of my esteemed writing heroes and I are jogging a parallel, painfully confusing path that is so universal it hardly warrants mentioning. And yet, if it is a struggle for you, it can be all-consuming. Since it is universal, it means many of us are wrestling with it.

Loneliness.

This beasty can nag even when you are coupled, at a gathering or surrounded by loving, generous friends.

So confused am I as to how to manage my own non-coupled self (I've been in committed, co-habitating relationships for 27 out of 30 years!) that I started my first real piece of fiction ever (not unless you count the teenaged, self-conscious love story I wrote for high school English class). It is sci-fi, a world where I find myself with no companions or fellow humans, but with animals and a never ending supply of goods, mysteriously replenished by unseen forces. Money? Not needed. Paid employment? Not necessary.

Oh. In case you are wondering, in this story, I can neither off, nor numb myself. It just won't work in this fantasy scenario. I know myself too well.


After I slept for awhile, and got a dog, or two, and gorged a bit on great food, I'm confident I'd get bored and start looking for the perfect, little place (or raw unfinished space-I'd get to choose freely!) that would allow me to feed my gardening fetish.

Then what...????? (At least I wouldn't be fighting off zombies).

What would matter? Would writing? Would art? Do we do it for the sharing or for the doing? And if it is for the doing would we still actually want to if we were the only ones to see it?

Obviously, my life is never going to be like this. I've got great family and friends.  But it has been a good exercise to explore what type of meaning my life would have if I never, ever found romantic love again...

I am fascinated as I patiently "watch" how I would handle A-L-O-N-E when the "what the F&*K!" wore off. Just repeatedly pondering this hasn't been as helpful as actually writing it down.

Is life worth living if there is no one to observe any of it with you? What do you think?

Pretty

The Challenge of Opposing Truths

Sometimes we fall in love before all of the information is in.

Actually, that's usually how we fall in love. We fall in love with the best parts of someone, with our eyes squeezed shut, with our own garbage standing right in front of us or with the other person saying "you do NOT want to do this!" and, being the fallible little beings we are, we ignore it all. Our hearts get wrapped up in the other. And, once wrapped, we find it difficult to accept all of those things we should have paid attention to up front.

Despite all of this, we sometimes fall for someone who is good for us, enjoyable to us, fulfills us so much that we cannot extricate ourselves despite THE ISSUE(S).

Oh. We try. Over and over again. But it is no good because either the scale tips severely back and forth (very very good to very very bad) or it is balanced just enough in favor of the relationship that not being involved is more painful than being involved. There are so many good things...

It can become very easy to start blaming yourself (or feeling that your friends and family are blaming you) for a lack of willpower at this point. Or blaming the other for not having the willpower for you. To. Just. Walk. Away.

If only life and love were that simple. When you are looking deeply, soulfully into the eyes of someone you are so connected with (or laughing maniacally over something hysterical you just read), walking away feels absurd.

Luckily for me I have a sage, an oracle, a guru, a spiritual director all tied up in my therapist. God love her. I told her last night that she got therapist bonus points and could advance to the next level. Because she challenged me on this self-blame, love addiction theory. And said,

How is this any different than a woman who falls in love with a great, great man only to discover later that he doesn't want children...and she really does? Or falling deeply in love with someone and connecting with them on social issues and literature and nature and passion...only to find they don't believe in God and have no desire to deepen a spiritual connection?

And, while these are huge impasses and very painful stuff, no one in these scenarios is to blame. Life is full of really tough choices and dilemmas. That's just the way life is.

I don't have an answer. I'm not sure either of us will ever feel fully resolved. But I'm incredibly grateful to have met someone with whom I have such a deep and abiding respect and love for and who loves me in return. Today's agenda? Nothing more than gratitude.

Expanding...

 
I am expanding.

Well not like that. Actually, like "that" I've shrunk a bit. The two may or may not be related, but I recognize a hunger in me that has nothing to do with food. And no, I have not read the much heralded, Oprah-anointed Women and Food by Geneen Roth , but I did read her Feeding the Hungry Heart in my 20's.

I do believe 90% of our hunger for more: food, sex, relationship, shoes, chotchke has something to do with our understanding that we have a hunger and craving for a need that simply cannot be fully met. We have a cavernous pit of longing and we are trying to fill it with something, anything. It's akin to tossing golf balls into the ocean in an attempt to make a difference somehow.

It's been a pretty powerful few months for me. A serious of books have landed in my lap, no doubt for a purpose. I am calmed and in an intense period of emotional and spiritual learning and growth. The Restless Heart changed my life significantly. Pema Chodron's When Things Fall Apart is teaching me to reframe everything and An Altar in the World guided me safely and lyrically back to where I'd been in the past. Finally, Donald Miller's A Million Miles in a Thousand Years reminded me of what my life could look like and provided me with my newest mantra:

I am a tree in the story of a forest. 

i.e. it isn't all about me, the tree. There's more going on than my little pea-brain human self can envision.   

I've experienced lots of change and challenges. I didn't want ANY of it. I wanted to keep deluding myself that I was living a perfect life. Anyone else, who knew the whole story, would see that it was swiss cheese. Since that time I've become more patient (though one would hardly call me "patient" exactly), more loving, more forgiving and far more appreciative of what I do have.

I know now I don't know the story and I can't and won't until I live as long as I do and have as broad a view as possible of the whole big story-and not just mine. I know I touch and have been touched (no giggling) by many people, that my friends and family are of equal importance as a partner and that I'm an ok sort of person, flawed as I am.

Mostly I just feel centered. I hope you do too. If not, grab one of those books. Seriously. And if you are centered, read one anyway. They are that good. 






Photo: via Creative Commons license, courtesy King of Herrings.