A lightness of being

by tamarjacobson

This morning I woke up thinking that my mourning days are over. Just like that! Am not quite sure just how long it is that I have been in mourning. Definitely a few years. There were blatantly obvious reasons for grief, like losing friends to cancer or my darling Molly over the summer, and giving up my job in Buffalo and moving to Philadelphia.

On a more psychological level, though, I have been bidding farewell to the old me, letting go of ancient pains, of the ties that bind. Realizing that holding onto my youth, old paradigms and especially grudges, I have been bound to the past, weighed down, wrapped up like a cocoon inside the inner child repeating familiar patterns over and over again.

This morning I woke up lighter somehow. Now I know you might be thinking that it is just something hormonal, a mood swing, or that I just had a good night’s rest, a happy dream or something like that … I thought that too for a moment … but, no. I have noticed that this lightness of being has accompanied me for a few weeks now.

For instance, I love going to work lately. I look forward to the drive, enjoy talking with colleagues and love teaching. I am excited to be out on the circuit presenting, traveling, consulting once more. Have become passionate about critical thinking and education again as I collaborate on a new book project with a colleague of like mind. T and I seem to be talking a lot, working out differences in a lighter, more loving … mature? … way. And more than all that, I am sensing a feeling of joy threading softly, gently through it all.

My poor, old, sick, abused mind often sends signals of danger and sorrow to remind me where I come from. It makes me pay the price, niggles and teases me back down towards the abyss of victimization and shadowy pain. But just as I verge on falling in, something happens and I pull myself back and away, stepping out into the light, breathing a sigh of relief and, sometimes, even, smiling to myself.

I recall how Patti, our receptionist at the University at Buffalo Child Care Center would smile and say quietly, "It is going to be a good day," whenever she would hear me humming as I watered the plants. I have found myself humming a lot lately and, at times, even laugh out loud from a humorous thought.

If I would be seeing Bob the therapist today I might say, "Hey, Bob! I’m getting there. I’m being the most me I can be. Am shedding the fear, breaking away, letting go …" I look over at the framed Martha Graham poem he gave me before I left Buffalo almost two years ago:

… You have to keep open and aware of urges that motivate you. Keep the channel open …

"Hey Bob," I whisper to myself, "I’m getting there …"

A year ago at Tamarika: The Good Body & Needy Meme