Because it mattered

I have many strengths and qualities that I'm proud of and have contributed to my success as a writer, as a parent, as an educator. However, getting over difficulty and strong emotions is not one of them. I regularly mourn lost relationships - romantic as well as fizzled friendships. I miss my freedom in college. I miss school. I miss being a kid and being with my family. I even miss struggling when money was tight.

My experiences practicing Zen Buddhism inform my awareness that this is due to attachment - the source of all suffering. I attach easily to feelings of love and being valued with an intense desire for feelings and people to stay exactly as they are. Despite that desire, the reality is everything and everyone is changing all the time.

Part of my Zen Buddhist practice, is regularly reading, reciting, and embracing the Five Remembrances (Thich Naht Hanh):

"I am of the nature to grow old; there is no way to escape growing old.
I am of the nature to have ill health; there is no way to escape ill health.
I am of the nature to die; there is no way to escape death.
All that is dear to me and everyone I love are of the nature to change; there is no way to escape being separated from them.
My actions are my only true belongings; I cannot escape the consequence of my actions; my actions are the ground on which I stand."

Sometimes this helps and sometimes it doesn't but I've come to accept that my longing for previous relationships and experiences is indicative of the influence they've had on my life. The moments that linger in my mind were powerful, emotional, and impacted the trajectory of my life.
And sometimes when those really special, powerful moments of my life are over, it hurts a little. Sometimes it hurts a lot. The magnitude of loss is comparable to the depth of the value of that moment. It hurts because it mattered.

Outlet or Outlet Cover?

Eight months ago, my partner and I were enthusiastic to learn that we were expecting a second child! After losing a child through miscarriage the previous year, we were overjoyed. And anxious. We wanted this baby so much but it was hard to let ourselves feel excited. And for me personally, I was ill-equipped to handle the complicated emotions that come with early pregnancy that following a loss. Anxiety and depression are regular players in this act of my life and they took front and center roles over the last year; specifically anxiety, stole the spotlight as we awaited the passing of the “danger zone” first trimester. And while I wanted this baby more than anything I’ve ever wanted, I entered a place of  necessary abandon of my usual coping strategies – specifically drinking alcohol and running – leaving me alone with my thoughts, feelings, insecurities, and anxieties.

In addition to dealing with worry over the health and well-being of our unborn child, I also had to come face-to-face with the everyday stress of life - paying bills, dealing with challenges at work, driving in bad weather and so on. The kinds of things that would usually accumulate and I would turn to running or drinking to relax and regain control of my emotions. Prior to this pregnancy, I accepted those as outlets for processing stress and difficult emotions. But now without either of my two go-to strategies, it became quite clear that I didn't actually know how to deal with discomfort and overwhelming feelings. These go-to's weren't outlets, they were outlet covers. The merely allowed me to avoid dealing with what needed to be dealt with. This initially resulted in being short-fused, losing sleep, and a general impatience for typical inconveniences. And I felt disappointed in my lack of ability to handle these things without a crutch. I didn't have a plan for working through this but I talked to people I trusted, I named my emotions, I focused on what I could control, and I wrote about my feelings. This didn't ease my desire to go for a run or to have a drink but it did help to process the uncomfortable feelings and reduce their impact until they subsided. 

But I know this time without running or drinking is temporary. We have four weeks until we meet our new little one and assuming goes well for me and the baby, questions remain: after the baby is born, where does that leave me with my cast of difficult emotions? How quickly will I retreat into the compulsion to chase away difficulty? Have I learned to separate outlets from outlet covers?