When things rupture, the mind can do two things. It can grasp, or release. Both are healthy nervous system responses. We can work with both. In stillness, the vitality animating us is right there, expressing itself moment to moment. Even if how this manifests is uncomfortable. As we stop and stillness arises, the fluidity of the body becomes knowable. This is health. Even in fever or illness, even as we approach death, this expression of life and health can’t help but radiate.
How are you doing?
Fear arises. Scoop it up and hold it in your palms. Thank you fear, for protecting me. Hello tension in the neck, hello tight jaw. These reactions are health too, they are important programmed safety mechanisms. Thank you fear, for showing me how fragile I am. How much we all mean to each other. Call friends, offer support, even ask for it, trusting that the web is simply a mirror of your own capacity for love. You are good enough to be cared for.
Look around the space you’re in. Is the room safe? If not, can you find a place where you feel safe? What might you need? A bath? A forest? A digital break? When you do, when you’re sure you’re safe, see if your skin softens and your muscles relax, if only for moments. Let yourself feel your own aliveness. Enjoy it and welcome it. It’s there, as constant as the horizon, and it’s even there in the rituals of fear.
Today the kids and I stood in line at the post office. An older man walked in behind us, slow and heavy on his feet, his breathing laboured. I had coached the kids on keeping their hands in their pockets. And not touching anything. Noticing how challenging it was for me to make sure the kids kept their hands to themselves, the man gave us extra space. Hearing him behind me, working through each breath, I cried. Life, continuing through this pandemic, through the risk of simply being an older person, and through the responsibility of being a younger person; a potential vector. We are a community of many retirees. 65% of the population is considered to be ‘at risk’. After the post office, we went to buy hand pump soap, hand sanitizer, and zinc lozenges.
Like many, at the beginning of the outbreak, I naively felt like the media was overreacting. Just the flu, I thought. Now—my parents are cutting off physical contact with their grandkids. I see people constellating 6ft in all directions. The web of us is vulnerable. The way is skillful, grounded caution. Distancing has become an expression of intimacy and care. Take care of your own health, and take care to protect the health of others. Maybe some of those old wives tales are worth employing now? When I get a light chill, I put on an extra layer of wool socks. When it gets deeper I put on two.
As I wash my hands, and coach my children on how to carefully wash theirs, it is a metta practice. It’s a gesture of love. Scrubbing knuckles and cuticles I imagine all the elders I love who need protecting. All the organ transplant recipients who may be on immunosuppressants. Those living with aids and HIV. Folks living on the streets. Families with special needs who are already isolated and lean on outside support.
I feel this vulnerability deeply. When I notice worry beginning, I work with finding a balanced state of awareness, a craniosacral therapy technique. I check in sequentially with my inner spaces- with my chest, abdomen, and cranio-spinal space. I tune in to their dimension and fluidity. I let the breath settle around each of these spaces. The breath has character here. I hold this inner awareness gently, as I widen out to include the external space directly around my body, then the space in the room, and then I imagine as far as the horizon. The simple line of the horizon. Its constancy.
Rupture is familiar to me. In the days after Michael died, the felt sense was of losing my reference points. Like being lost in familiar woods that I should know my way out of, but can’t piece together. The ground that formed, instead of finding my way back exactly, was gratitude. Just gratitude for the life around me.
Can you see the sky? Can you feel wind on your skin? What is the texture of the couch or floor or chair? Is the screen on your cell phone or computer mouse smooth?
I can find myself busy, easily, in one way or another. This virus is asking me to stop. It’s making everyone stop. Now I can see how I’m doing, what parts in me need gentle holding and tending. What if we do this now, all of us, as a culture? When we stop like this, what do we learn? What have we been so busy with?
As my fear lifts, what surfaces is love. And that makes me cry. This life is so beautiful in all its magically mundane ways. I don’t want to lose you.
The night my water broke, and labour started for our first child, Michael bustled about the house gathering supplies and calling the right people, while I lay in the bathtub trying to relax into early contractions. In a lull, he came in with his laptop and set it up for me. And played me this.
I think of this now. In all these big moments, here we are, humanity, holding together, even 6 ft apart. A tensegrity structure is stronger with distance. This is a strength. Each of us is an equal and critical point in the web. The tenderness of that. What a lesson for us all on privilege and power. How much we all count on each other. Do you see that our leaders are no more important than you? Let’s be humble now. As you shop, take what you need. For now. Leave what you don’t need for the web.
An interview I did with Rosie Acosta on her podcast Radically Loved was released last month. Here’s the link. We talked about Michael’s latest book The World Comes To You, and life since his death. In the end she asked me how I feel Radically Loved. It was such a good question. I really had to think! I answered by saying that I experience life as a fabric made of joy and love. It moves around a lot, and various things move it around. I feel loved by the fabric.
This remains true.
Checking out at the grocery store today with hand pump soap, zinc lozenges and hand sanitizer, an older woman stood ahead of us in line. Probably in her late eighties, she moved slowly and with care to coordinate her movements. She wore clear plastic gloves on her hands, and kept a careful eye to maintain enough distance from us and others. She was buying just one thing. A fresh bundle of orange tulips.
In Michael’s latest book, he wrote, “we are all going to die. Or, knowing each other is really precious. At the moment of death the only thing that really matters is the condition of your heart.”
Let’s be open-hearted helpful people. Let’s engage our health and vulnerability. Make something beautiful that won’t last. Keep the energy in you moving. Your subtle body is fluid. It’s part of a wider resiliency that includes nature. Boil cedar and let it fill the room. Look to nature with curiosity. Can we simply sit with plants and mushrooms and feel their wisdom? They’ve lived a long time in relationship with viruses. Be useful. Bring groceries to someone who is ill. Check on the new mom next door, who’s already isolated. Maybe they need diapers? Or maybe you can take their garbage to the curb or dump their compost? Put a note on your door saying you need help and trust someone will come.
The whole point is the temporary beauty of our connectedness. This is how we wake up because it is our original self.
On retreat, Michael would encourage people to be mindful of doing things with both hands. Really taking care. Let’s practice this.
Carina