Cardboard Image

Like a bomb exploded on the structure of my life and I was left standing in the rubble with a cardboard image of myself. I can't hide behind it any more and am taking it to the recycle bin. After 100 days without work, any indulgent foods, a boyfriend, much exercise, my own apartment or anything else I'm used to having in life, I woke up feeling depressed today. Not suicidal, or anything, just not inspired to get out of bed.

I felt a little better when I was meditating and thinking about writing. My meditations are often filled with prose or new art I would create if I had energy. This morning, in my head, I wrote about how alone I felt. What was most terrifying was the sense that I have no idea who I am or how to relate to the world anymore. I've stopped calling my friends because I have nothing to say right now. When I thought about posting these feelings, I started to cry…right there on my cushion. Why was I crying? …Because I've always tried to hide the dark side of myself, the Yin. I always hated to cry, hated being weak, sad, feminine, quiet. I've spent my life trying to hide it from myself and the world. Instead I got years of suicidal depression and now a sickness that has no cure and causes me to be so Yin that I lack the energy (Yang) to walk or speak sometimes. Intellectually, I know that true enlightenment is accepting each moment as it is. Accepting who I truly am, a manifestation of Divine Spirit, awareness, emptiness, God…all words that do a poor job or describing the unfathomable. I can't write about it because my human mind cannot grasp it. My human mind has been running my life and trying to convince me that I am that cardboard image of strength and sassiness.

I cried because I didn't want to put the dark side of me out in public for all to see. Why not? ...Because I never have before and it's scary. What if nobody loves me? ...Well, I already know that's a ridiculous idea. What if I'm totally alone? ...I already know that is true and impossible. We are all one. We are all separate manifestations of the same infinite.

After meditating I was reading A New Earth. Eckhart was talking about how to be yourself.  He writes, "Just stop adding unnecessary baggage to who you already are… If you can be absolutely comfortable with not knowing who you are, then what's left is who you are--the Being behind the human, a field of pure potentiality rather than something that is already defined." I'm scared because life as I knew it, including who I thought I was, has crumbled and now there just a void. What gives me solace is the un-manifested creative potential that now has room to blossom.

So, here I am, being the dark, sad, cold, quiet, helpless person that I always despised. Now, how can I accept this person and love her? ...The same way I accept those qualities in other people. It's what makes us human. We cannot have light without dark, happy without sad. It's about letting whatever emotion arises wash over me without fighting it. The shore doesn't get frustrated when the tide is out and cry that it'll never rise again. The trees don't lament their leaves falling and try to hold onto them for fear they won't return. I just need to feel what arises and not let it define me…watching it wash away.