Unappreciated Thresholds
Today, I am feeling a lot of grief. When I filed for divorce almost one and a half years ago, I knew I was crossing a threshold. I had no idea what was on the other side and that is a good thing. I would never have had the courage to do it had I known. Never.
I woke up today to take my computer in to the shop early, hoping that it was an easy fix. Then, I headed to the mechanic’s to pull the code on my car, which has been acting up. Then, to the lawyer to sign yet another paper.
The car was “safe” to drive home and would get in the next week. The paper got signed. The computer was a simple and cheap fix. But, the water pump went out on the drive home. The tow truck came and took it away just as my 14 year old came down the stairs asking, “Why is the water not working? I need to get a shower.” Are you tired yet, just reading this? I am!
It seems time does not exist. We are surviving one disaster following another and life has become simply damage control. The small victories feel small, because I am fairly confident there is just another disaster around the corner. I hold my breath for moments that seem like I am allowed to breathe, only to have more heaped on top of me as I wait.
Liminal spaces, such as these, are timeless. There is no way to know when they will end and the threshold of completion will appear. Is it around the next bend, or the next? Is it going to be a really rough three or four years as some have told me. It seem unfathomable, if so. Today, it is all too much. Tomorrow…well, I have to live that long to know what tomorrow will bring.
To find peace in the wilderness of our lives is the challenge of a lifetime; when we feel most weak and tortured, most alone and destitute. I know this, and yet, I cannot find it today. Beating myself up about it won’t solve the problem either. Having people remind me that I can find “peace in the storm”, that I need to “keep” my “chin up”, that “things will get better”, and that “perspective is everything” does not help. I already know all of that. But that does not help me today.
To be lost is essential. I need to be lost right now, as much as I hate it. I need to feel destitute and alone, anxious and stupid. I need to feel it all right now.
I know what it is like to feel loved and appreciated. I know what it is like to find peace in a shift of perspective. I am grateful to have those memories. Those will keep me going because I know the cycles of life well. And those cycles don’t get stuck, or at least don’t stay stuck for long. There is an eternal flow and I fit into it somehow.
But I won’t find peace because I am trying to.
Trying will never produce what I need to experience while in this place of suffering and growth. It will come from letting go of trying. Allowing myself to sink into all of the spaces that feel like I am losing myself anyway, allowing any agenda to slip away, and make space for self-love to emerge…that’s what I need to do.
I learned a new word today. It was hierophany. As a seminary student, I am learning new words every day. But today, this one matters. Its definition is “the manifestation of the sacred”. So, tomorrow, I will ask myself another question other than, “How are things going to fall apart today?” I will ask myself, “Where will the sacred reveal itself today?”
That seems like a more productive question. It seems that question might be what I need to open myself for the emergence of the self-love I need to push out the Titanic-sized self-hatred inhabiting me right now.
And maybe that’s enough.
