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(stop moving —toe-tapping, finger-biting,
skin-picking, face-scrunching,
floor-pacing— just for a moment,
and be still.)
Close your eyes.
(stop moving—all that flutter behind my vision:
racing worries about joy I imagine others having without me,
words that others might say about me,
layers of this-and-that thing not done and needing doing
to make my life better-than-here—
all those inventions in my brain.
Nothing “needs” doing in this universe,
where things just are,
and naturally will continue being.
So be still.)
Breathe in, and out.
(feel how refreshing this is — to be full;
so full I can let go.
To let go so far that I can
be still
and breathless.
To feel that emptied space and fill it up again. Without even thinking.
Thinking is overrated; wanting is overrated.
I have enough, I am enough—
in
this
moment.)
. * .
/ | | \
/ \
Let go the idea of “normal.”
(Name what I am pretending I lack. Think back:
Someone told me I was lacking that.
That I should want that accomplishment,
and that ability, and those friends,
and that appearance.
Someone gave me a scale for good, right,
successful, happy.
And so, where I am different
from that, I feel:
less- than {Good / Winning}
and not {Normal / Happy}.
But this feeling of distance
is not between me and Everyone;
it is between me and the Scale
I'm wearing— which was not made
for me.
Name "what is my scale?" What feels
most right in me?
Learn "what am I?"
accept "I am just so," and
choose "what feels right and good
to do with that I-am being?"
I am everything I am,
and that is good enough for life.
I fill my space with myself,
and nothing else—
no crutch,
no mask,
no measuring stick
but my own natural proportions.)
Let go the idea of “owning.”
(What am I chasing?
I "own" only those things I connect with,
and only as long as we are connected:
my food, home, friends, clothes, lovers, feelings, thoughts.
Money secures nothing— only gives me legal permission
to walk away with things that used to be near others.
Now they are by me. But as soon as I walk away—
those things are no longer my own.
Come a thief, they're the thief's;
come a fire, they are the fire's;
come dust and disuse, they are the dust's—
I have only that which is with me, now.
As a being, I own—I extend into— the stretch of trail I am on,
the air I am drawing off the trees,
the clothes I feel against my skin,
the friend I'm trading gazes with,
the sunlight my skin is drinking in.
Being connected,
I own everything
I
need.)
. * .
/ | | \
/ \
Dissolve the wall between “good | bad”
(I know, I encouraged you to make your own scale for what is good.
And you worked so long on that! ...
Now open that scale
to let in the reality
that every life
has its own
scale.
Each unique, and all at various stages of growing.
Think
about how much
you have destroyed,
in becoming what you are now;
how much violence you have let in, and joined in:
physical—
living things you have crushed with your teeth,
emotional—
pain you have thrashed roaring onto others,
spiritual—
peaceful moments in yourself
that you have shaken apart
with buzzing agitation.
This inevitable waste of growing,
we are all complicit in,
by nature;
by being.
There is no nook for carrying guilt,
no pitcher for pouring out judgment,
in a single individual;
all of us—commonly, collectively—are.)
Dissolve the wall between “me | you”
(I know, I said “me” and “you,”
but this was when I thought
we were separate—
in accuracy, these are not
my words,
nor my thoughts
and feelings:
they are ours.
We are creating
this language now, by trading
"words" and sensing meanings.
We are looking at objects and
experiencing "life" and
negotiating our very
similar hungers
and contentments
in this place.
This place has no permanent
wall or boundary:
we absorb and spill—
my in-breathe, your out-breathe;
your sweat, my rain;
your effort, my
"archeological finding";
my folly, your pain.
Likewise it goes between
you and me, between us and
them,
among every living class and
kingdom, through every
existing space
and moment.
"We" are— from birth
until death— trading and
sharing so intimately
and continuously
that there is no
real line.
Look in my eyes:
even my existence
is yours
.)
. * .
/ | | \
/ \
Feel this time as the first time.
(We grow. But the past
is a story
we
tell; the future
is a story
we
dream.
Only now
ever is.
No matter how
our
mind
blends
these
.
.
.
.)
Cherish this time as the last time.
(... And what is
now,
had never
been,
and never
will be
that/same
again.)
Experience the overwhelming present.
( ... Now is full and all-containing.
A moment.
child of an infinite wave of moments,
becoming footholds for ongoing presence,
that sharp moment itself containing everything:
all echoing past
and nascent future
at a pinpoint of time
cradling the immensity of all objects and energies
mixing together. Nothing and no one separate;
similarly born and mutually consequential.)
. * .
/ | | \
/ \
Accept the ever-changing mystery of being a presence.
(You are this, now:
you are in this, of this, by this, and with this—meaning
you are
chemically and motionally
created in all,
inherently part of all,
persistently shaped by all, and
continuously negotiating with all
in ways that move and shape what becomes of all.
Where now goes,
depends on how all moves—
every part, in relations close or far /
soon or eventual / bold or subtle ,
with every other part that it-they-you-I-we extends into —
and the only sure outcome of this is that all will be different.
And new in its details. While staying connected.
And continuous in its sum. So again, of course,
“you” is a pointed way of saying “us”; in the same way that
“now” is a pointed way of saying “all.”)
Dissolve the wall between “this | eternity”
(We are all together.
In this existing state,
with no real end,
no meaningful beginning.
Some things simply seem to be and do—
like rocks and water,
light and wind.
Some things also seem to witness and breathe—
like plants and animals,
cells and galaxies.
What an amazing state to have grown eyes within...
Eyes that move
and one day grow still;
eyes that dissolve into what they once witnessed;
eyes that grow and drink light to witness.
All together.)
. * .
/ | | \
/ \
* * * * * * * *
Extra credit, from here:
(if you would like to do more than just be, peacefully)
Ask "What kind of ripple do I want to send through the universe?"
(Everything ||
I ||
face || provides a bumpy
in || , uneven
this || mirror of what I do
world || to things
|| in
|| this
|| world.
So, what effect
would I like to have
on things I pass?
people and places,
beings and atmospheres,
objects and environments...)
Trial-by-experience how to make these waves.
(I observe,
wondering
"What do I not perceive?"
I stay present,
"Close to
my senses,"
in this
concrete moment.
I interact,
"Moving around
what does not mooove..."
I reflect,
noting:
"What actually moved,
in what direction,
by what energy?"
Moment
by moment,
notice where
these
moments
have patterns,
that become
familiar, the
longer and more
attentively I
experience them.)
Refine these motions.
(So I find that I am refining myself,
as a part of this world.
And that—
if nothing else—
is a fulfilling, complete experience.
As
opposed to
a
zombied-yammering
xenophobic-whining,
viciously uptight twisted straining,
rashly quelled, preemptively offended,
nagging malicious,
lethargic kennelled jealous,
indignantly hampered,
gorging fearful, egomaniacal
desperate
confused
banal
angsty
stressful one.)
I was getting major deja vu from the bolded letters as they were all things that people had told me before. Just breathe, take a break, don’t overthink so much. As if I hadn’t tried. The unsolicited advice from people that clearly have not experienced the darkness of mental illness just made me want to hole in deeper and never interact. But at the same time, it was sometimes easier to slap on a mask and “stop moving—all that flutter behind my vision.” This entire poem made me feel seen but at the same time, just reminded me of my darkest thoughts when I sincerely believed that no one was truly on my side because they just didn’t understand. It’s very odd. How life works, I mean. Life can give you so much but then take people away just as fast. And the only thing that we are fairly given is how unfair life can be. It’s so easy to want to do nothing, to just stop, but life doesn’t just stop. When you say, “thinking is overrated; wanting is overrated,” I couldn’t help but finish the line inside my head with “living is overrated.” No matter how much you lose, the sun always rises and sometimes that alone is enough to send someone over the edge. As I read on, it’s hard for me to tell if the advice is deeply ironic and cynical or if it is genuine. They’re all things that help, I’m sure but I just find it hard to believe that someone debilitated by mental weight would have the energy to go through these exercises.
ReplyDeleteThis is the perfect comment to this poem :)
DeleteYou're right:
these self-obvious truths are easy to say. So even people who don't practice them well will tell others to do them...in place of trying to empathize and just be with them at the struggle they're in. "As if I hadn’t tried. The unsolicited advice from people that clearly have not experienced ... I just find it hard to believe that someone debilitated by mental weight would have the energy to go through these exercises." Saying what to do -- without saying how, for you specifically, is useless. And most people won't take the time to learn exactly where you're at; this poem definitely can't.
And you're right:
In trying---like, really trying---to distill the how in stages for you {Mizuki, or someone else who's not me}, I saw at every step that "This only works if you FEEL it; if you beat yourself up, break yourself down, wrestle yourself, hate yourself, hate everyone, hit bottom, recognize that it's either die or let go, and finally manage somehow by stubborn life-will to let go that ingredient of your suffering without slitting your own throat. And those two points are reeeeally really close together, in my experience."
So yeah, when you say " it’s hard for me to tell if the advice is deeply ironic and cynical or if it is genuine." It's both. The first two [Dissolving] steps both say to undo a previous step because nonattachment really is that convoluted and unintuitive and contradicting: seeing mortality without sadness, and loving life without hating the people/forces/etc. that end lives, is right on the razor's edge of not caring at all. The difference is whether you're engaging with the world enough to remember you're an animal ~ and all it takes is a few-too-many nights of poor sleep or days away from nature or one-too-many superficial blowhards to pull you into uncaring (I still wrestle with that, and have to remind myself).
And finally, Mmm...Half-agree; it's your choice of words:
"Life can you so much but then just as fast. And the only thing that we are given is how life can be."
"Fair" isn't a natural thing; it's a human-designed thing. We all eat other lives to live, shit out what we don't use, and compete for scarce resources.
"Life" isn't a man at City Hall who gives you things and then insists you return them ahead-of-schedule. There is no schedule. Living is a state of being. We have what is with us, until we don't. And in between, we make the most of the *experience* of living. So again, Fair isn't a real thing. We are privileged to be a species with no natural predators. Except ourselves.
Then, right on the nose, you say: "It’s so easy to want to do nothing, to just stop, but life doesn’t just stop. When you say, “thinking is overrated; wanting is overrated,” I couldn’t help but finish the line inside my head with “living is overrated.""
YES! It's your willful choice to be here. That's put right in our DNA ~ the will to keep existing. We'd be a pretty shitty species if we all just wanted to sit and decay. Because "life doesn't stop."
So, *if* you can find it in your drive to think less and do more... to want less and savor more..., *then* maybe life won't seem like an unfair jerk who's doing things to you, but a state of being that you're trying to ride ~ to get the most out of it before it leaves you ~ and then to just let it go. And rest in peace.
I like those words :)
(feel free to shoot me an email if you ever want to talk this out voice-to-voice. Sending you a hug.)
Just glancing at this poem I was overwhelmed with a bit of stress, something I rarely struggle with. Not to be beaten, I read the poem, and as I made my way down the page the poem scared me less and less. This is how I approach most of my problems in life, chipping away at them bit by bit until it is no longer a problem. Just as I might divide up work to make it more manageable, every word I read made the poem easier to understand and overcome. Reading through the poem I began to understand why stress has never been a huge issue for me, I do most of these things whenever I’m overwhelmed. At the root of all my solutions is pushing out whatever is stressing me out and centering on myself. I especially loved letting go of the idea of owning, you can say something belongs to you but the moment you can’t enforce that, the concept goes out the door. I also liked the idea of letting go of the idea of normal, as someone else’s idea of success may be vastly different from my own. Letting go of the good and bad also helped rekindle some of the old discussions I used to have in philosophy club, which completely changed my perspective on morals, even if I don’t completely agree with them. When you consider the butterfly effect your actions have, or simply follow them to their conclusion, it is extremely hard to say you are a morally good person. One example I love to bring up is: by accepting a job you deny somebody else that same job offer, someone who could have needed it much more. All these different methods to get rid of stress can, and should, be applied to daily life to change a person’s perspective.
ReplyDeleteReading through this poem, I felt very closely connected to the descriptions of what overwhelming stress feels like. The bolded statements describing physical actions to take while having intense stress, which then move into how to handle one's mindset, remind me of how it feels trying to calm down in moments of panic. The typed characters depicting a person interrupting the poem reminded me of having an out of body experience while stressed, when it becomes difficult to breathe. The combination of trying to calm down yet being unable to can cause a feeling of disconnect from the world, which is represented perfectly by the imagery of the poem. This idea is also represented by the actual image chosen to be paired with the poem. It reminds me of the line between feeling grounded and feeling out of touch with yourself, a line that becomes extremely blurry when stress takes over the mind and body. The twisting shape near the end of the poem, to me, illustrates that twisted feeling inside when anxiety and panic starts to overwhelm the senses. Yet as the poem goes on, I feel a sense of comfort and relief in the advice it gives about living in the moment, grounding oneself, and refining the experience one has in this world. I also found comfort in the idea of recognizing patterns within stress, because the ability to recognize patterns also allows me to realize that the stress will pass, no matter how overwhelming it feels in the moment.
ReplyDelete