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I'm typing this from a weird inner place today - what I deem my Twilight Zone - which sometimes I get sucked into - unfavorable feelings arise every now and then in the form of great despair, sadness, and intense worry. I wake up in a complete panic - for absolutely no reason that I can discern. Anxious sweats come over me with the familiar clammy feeling - like I've been holding scallops in my palms all night. This happens to me a lot when myself or someone very close to me goes through something significant. But sometimes, I just wake up this way with no sign of where it came from or why it comes on...and it's scary as hell. I debated writing in this state but I guess I'll give it a shot, because if it helps my anxious state a bit or helps someone else who may feel the same way, then score a little point for the universe. Check.
Since I began daily meditation, I know that immediately doing a guided meditation helps to relieve the anxiety enough to function during the day without feeling like a high speed wobbler (you know those tiny cars that drive on the highway but they're not really made for those speeds so you feel like they'll lose control at any minute and wobble all over the road?) Yeah, you know what I mean now. That. Before meditating I would have the high speed wobbles for a few days at the very least, but I find with having meditation as a tool, it drastically cuts down the time in an anxious state. Any minute less feeling like a trembling chihuahua during a major fireworks show is a plus in my book. So this morning, I meditated right away, and fell back into a very peaceful sleep. Sleep that's honestly been evading me lately.
I've been trying to listen to the innate cues of my body and letting my spirit guide me to what I need at my core. I've honestly been napping if I can/absolutely feel the need to. I've been trying to be more mindful about what I ingest and put on my body. (Keto journey begins again next week if not today - so far so good with bulletproof coffee and healing bone broth - but nighttime brings stress eating to me lately, so we'll see what Monday has on the books.) I've been immersing myself into new things and trying not to let fear hold me back from living. I've realized lately more than ever how much I miss out of fear. Moments, things, events, memories...it's like a fun-suck.
Last night I gifted myself attendance to an interesting collaboration - a yoga nidra class blended with sound healing. I'm not sure if anything of the sort has been done around here, and if not statewide. It was nothing short of magical to attend such a session for the very first time with about 30 other beautiful humans - including my very own youngest brother-in-law who I love dearly - many of whom never experienced the sounds of Tibetan singing bowls or sacred gongs. There is one thing I did realize last night into today that I feel may be playing a part in my recent Twilight Zone experience: maybe it's something that I need to experience to be able to be comfortable with being uncomfortable, if that makes any sense.
See if you can follow me here - I RUN like a wild pony when things get uncomfortable. Then I get anxiety about the discomfort, and before I know it I'm in this downward spiral and the uncomfortable thing is now life threatening (even if it isn't) but it is now and WebMD is the devil and I can't find words in uncomfortable situations and I feel like I'm so worked up that I short-circuit and I'm looking for the right words to say and shit...did I just start speaking in numbers? It's like that. I hate discomfort. But maybe the hate is a signal to me that I need to work on my perception of uncomfortable and use it as a teaching tool for myself rather than something to avoid constantly.
I firmly believe that a lot of people don't meditate because they can't shut their brain off long enough to try, even beginning with just a few minutes a day. I was there. But I also think that a lot of people are uncomfortable sitting in the depths of their minds out of fear of what may come up. I was there, too. And let me tell you, after just 4 moths of meditating daily, stuff. comes. up. Old stuff, hard stuff, scary stuff, stuff you forgot, stuff you want to forget, stuff you don't want to think about...it 's all there ripe for the picking. But alongside all that stuff is good stuff...happy stuff, stuff you're thankful for, you're proud of, you dream to do, creative ideas...I feel as though last night's session (although unabashedly brilliant and lovely) brought up some hard feelings at one particular point, and in the end, the instructor asked us to sit and put our left hand over our hearts and our right palm over our left hand. I do this with a guided meditation I love with Sarah Blondin from a podcast called Live Awake (go. subscribe. now.) Every time she mentions to do this and whisper to yourself, "I love you", I cry. I. cry. hard. Neck-wetting cry. So naturally, last night, after a cornucopia of emotions and thoughts, my chin started quivering as soon as my palm touched my heart, and then the warm tears slid down my cheeks, and I began to cry like I haven't cried in weeks (although I probably cried the day before at a commercial that reminded me of how much Lucy is growing - I'm a pansy now that I'm a Mom.) I felt such a release, and I still feel it today, but I also feel like I'm stewing in all of those mixed emotions still today and that maybe my anxiety this morning was an after effect of all of that emotion and energy release.
I feel this with daily practice, sometimes I go into a place inside me where I think of things I may need to face later in my life - such as finality and death - but instead of intense fear, I am starting to feel like maybe I need to look at life differently. I can't live every day scared to face the finality of those close to me or my own death, but I can live my best days every day so that when my time does come, there are no regrets. I think these things are important lessons to learn in the depths of your own inner self. What I was doing wasn't working for me - constant worry and anxiety about my well being and the well being of those around me - that serves nothing. I was/may be still a major high-speed wobbler. But living mindfully and making even the smallest difference in someone...anyone's day...that's a game changer. With meditation I feel like I'm constantly learning about myself and about the world around me - I'm learning tools to face my fears and to lessen my worry. Anything that makes you deeply examine things inside of you, where yucky things do come up, but you work through them and still feel collectively joyful, hopeful and dare I say - a bit at peace - then sign me up, I'll still play game if the end result is far greater than a few winces along the way.
The class itself last night was very moving for me - I did have a lot of mind chatter I have to work through...like "what should I pick up for dinner?" "What is on the docket for this week?" "Do we have clean towels?" "I wonder where that soft t-shirt is from years ago, I know I didn't throw it away." Heavy mind chatter is a big work in progress for me - like Verot School Road roadwork - it feels like it takes forever to get through and you wonder when and if it will ever be over with. In the class, I was brought to a place of tranquility and vibration and at one point I felt like I actually didn't have limbs...I twitched them to make sure they were still there - all accounted for...like I was barely a body lightly positioned on the floor, but able to rise up at any minute. It was almost ethereal. I've found with sound healing that the experience is different for everyone and each sound healing session I've done has been different - no two are the same. I am looking forward to the next one more than I'm looking forward to the end of the hurricane season that hasn't even started yet (see- that just came up - yet another fear I need to work on - but then flu season comes with the colder months...soooo...yay anxiety! We need to work on you, big time, girl.)
My apologies if today's writing feels like alphabet soup - that's kind of what it feels like to me today - but I just know I wanted to share my experience - bottom line - experience new things that force your mind and heart open - take advantage of rare and unique classes like these that we have locally at the Yoga Garden and with Fran Clarke with Sound Healing Academy (both on facebook)- we are so lucky to have all this expertise at our fingertips - and if they somehow help us to be better humans, then we should all give it a good-hearted try. And don't be afraid to start meditating - don't be afraid of the silence...or the thoughts - cause in the end if you're working through them and you're 1% better today than you were yesterday, you know what you'll be in 365 days? 365% better.
*giving credit where it's due, my friend Tim brought to my attention I can sometimes be a high speed wobbler - he then explained what it was - we laughed together knowing he was ever so right - my husband confirmed.
*The 1% every day is something I've heard Jared tell his students time and time again and I guess sitting at the desk facebooking at the time, I absorbed it. <3