My Tent on The Beach

I’ve always been a very private person. I know, it’s weird because it seems I’m so extraverted.  And I absolutely am.  I am as outgoing as you’d think.  But I also have sides no one sees…in the past couple months I’ve worked hard to make it sides that only a few people see.  Turns out transparency is important no matter where you are.

I’m particularly uncomfortable with the idea of “being known.”  I don’t love it when people think they know me…in fact, I thrive on the energy of knowing that I know for sure I am a mystery to people.  But I find myself at an interesting crossroads.  A couple months ago (just a couple months ago) I realized that, unless I really am committed to being alone forever, I’d better let some people in.  So, I’ve worked really hard not to stop that process…and now people know me.  Not everything.  But a lot.  A friend said just the other day, “I know you, Katie.  I know how you are.”  It still scared me.  But over the past couple days I’ve worked to be comfortable with it.  More than I’d like to admit.

And it’s kinda cool.

I often walk down the street wondering if people think the same thoughts I do.  Clearly, not the exact same thoughts so much as the types of ideas.  I’ve come to a point in my life that is not a crossroads so much as it is a need for clearing out.  I cleaned my room (I was trying to think the last time I had a clean room and, with the exception of a couple days, I think I’ve never had a clean room).  I’m filing and organizing all of the shit that’s accumulated on my desk for the past, oh, year.  I’ve been asking myself everyday as I walk to and fro, “What, exactly, do I want to do…today, this week and year, this…life.”  As far as I’m aware, I’m on my 4th mid-life crisis.  And I actually think that’s okay.  I don’t trust people who seem to know exactly what they’re doing; that to me is always a sign of a lack of introspection.  And it’s because I’m realizing for the first time, truly, that it’s hard work to just be who you are; it’s really so much easier to just be who everyone thinks you are.  And then you can go home and watch Burn Notice and no one will bother you.

It’s the same conundrum I find in yoga literally every day.  It’s so much easier to jam yourself into a complicated pose, hold your breath, and wait out the pain for a minute than to find ease in whatever it is you’re doing.  I’m fascinated by the fact that the simplest poses–mountain pose (standing with your feet together, hands at your heart), seated cross-legged pose, forward fold–are really very hard to master.  Because they are “easy” poses–ones that require ease…one’s we often don’t have enough time–or courage–to really do correctly.  And I think it’s because they require introspection, they require quiet and a commitment to looking for what’s really in there when all the flashiness of complicated, complex, and achievement-driven falls away.  These poses are who you are when you’re standing, sitting, and folding.  Seems like they would be the resting poses; I am wasted by them repeatedly.

This is what makes me wonder what other people think as they walk down the street.  They look so self-assured so many of them.  And they’re going so fast and with so much stuff. The clacking cadence of heels, the amble of a dog walker, the unsteady gait of the grocery-laden–they’re going somewhere, they’re doing something–what are they thinking? Because as I’m flip-flopping toward home at what, for some, seems an uncomfortably slow pace…I’m thinking about what it means to be me today.  Maybe my pace reveals my lack of answers or the burden of the question…but that’s okay.  Because I don’t trust the quick clackers or the scurrying laden ones.  Industriousness, to me, says distraction. I’ve known a lot of fast walkers in my life; to this day I’m not convinced that any of them really knew where they were going. I think I’m judging them; wait, yep, I am.  That’s okay, too. It’s not like I haven’t been judged for my snail’s pace…I’ve actually been yelled at.  Water under the bridge, I suppose.

But I always feel solidarity with slow walkers.  I believe in my soul that the weight of the thought determines the ease of the walk…and I’m working hard to walk with as much ease as I can muster. Wherever I’m going will just have to wait.

So I think it would be fair to say that this spring was a tough one.  Use whatever metaphoric imagery you like, it was long and full of bumps in the road.  Doors were slamming and no windows were opening.  Mountains kept popping up left and right.  I ended up on a very stuffy mountain range of problems.  And of course in the cosmic scheme of things, my problems were relatively small.  Was I starving? No. Was I homeless? No. Did I have no shoes?  No.  Was I even walking to school uphill both ways?  No.  But while I appreciate the fact that my life could “function,” I was “less” in a lot of ways.  Vision-less, hopeless, sleepless, restless.  And some of these still persist today, but certainly not to the acute degree or the breadth that they did just several months ago.

I attribute the change to a couple things but most centrally…yoga.  It wasn’t so long ago (2 months, actually) that I regularly started taking yoga classes (not half-heartedly doing DVDs in my dining room…which I refer to as my ‘yoga studio’).  Somehow, the interaction with a teacher and other students began to work away at some of the anxieties that had built to the point of all of my ‘lesses.’  And in a way that doing yoga “at the gym” as a “workout” could never touch.  A return to the breath–the present moment–was and is the most holistically therapeutic thing I’ve ever done.  So much so, that I feel it has spurred “returns” in other places that, frankly, I thought were long gone.

“What the hell are you talking about Katie?” you must be thinking.  I understand that…the notion that enduring the burning, searing pain in my hamstrings created by a forward bend or working through the panic that arises right in my throat when I maneuver my way into a handstand or headstand could actually manifest itself in very real ways outside of the yoga studio (in this case, not my dining room) seems bizarre and crunchy-granola new agey (this is my own system of classification, just for the record).  But here’s how I’m seeing this work out:  old friends I haven’t spoken to in years have popped back up in moments that I really needed them.  (What freaks me out is that if I think real hard about it, it almost seems like I’ve “summoned” them to me…I know, I know…I’m in a panic about it myself.)  School which was an absolute albatross in February has returned as a true interest.  My financial situation–always tenuous at best–that was positively dire three months ago has positively worked itself out…and not just as a “hey I got a job at Best Buy” type of scenario but as a “hey I’m a fucking sociologist…now pay me to teach it” kind of way.  (Again, if I look hard, the Universe has clearly…CLEARLY…steered me back into the classroom in a very definitive way…and has arrange a payment system that is better than I’ve ever encountered before.)  I’ve been granted closure in the situations that were tearing me apart emotionally.  I’ve been granted insight into the most difficult challenges.  I’ve actually found in a new way what compassion means…especially in approaching myself and others with compassion.  And it’s because of those fiery forward bends and the heinous twists that make me feel like a real failure on the yoga mat.

It so interesting to really begin to understand what yoga teaches.  Everyone thinks about the “flexy-bendies”–you know, those people (usually women) who can lick their shins and turn themselves practically inside out and afterwards talk about how being a human pretzel gets them to a new level of enlightenment.  I have a new respect for them…yoga’s made them that.  But focusing on the physical stretching is just too one-dimensional; yoga has to also stretch your mind and your heart too.  Otherwise, we should call it calisthenics and be done with it.  No, yoga builds spiritual muscle-memory; it teaches you to endure, to dare, and to deal with emotions as they come and in a way that allows you to learn control and mastery of them.  Yogis talk about it in terms of detachment.  I just call it sanity.

But I’m glad I’m plugged into it.  It seems whenever I really focus on it, the Universe responds to me and returns me to exactly where I need to be.  And gives me things like this as a sign that I’m doing okay.

I’ve never been a fan of the Manichaeins.  They were an ancient competitor of Christianity, professing the belief in a dualistic approach to everything.  We all hang in the balance between two opposing forces vying for our souls.  ”What forces?”  you may ask.  Everyone together now: “Good and Evil.”  It sure makes things simple doesn’t it?

And as much as I don’t like this particular kind of simplicity, I can’t help but embrace a much more holistic idea of balance and complementarity.  I think the principles could be the same: I think there are opposing forces at work very often in my life but they don’t work to rend me apart as much as the work to balance the social order of things.  When I’m having a particularly horrendous day, very often my close friends are experiencing the opposite.  When I’m frustrated, if I’m open to it, I notice people stepping in, usually subconsciously, to alleviate that.   A day after I seem to make amazing progress on whatever challenge I’ve been laboring, there always seems to be an inevitable fall from grace (usually and ungraceful one).  I’ve never considered these opposing forces pulling me outward, farther and farther apart.  I’ve only come to understand them more definitely as a process of falling in and out of balance.  There’s always a yin to a yang.  There’s always a sweet to a savory.  There’s always compassion to follow judgement.  There’s always light after darkness.

One of my more recent insights of which I’m particularly proud (but really not attached) is to realize that these rhythms, this balance, is not linear.  These balancing forces appear to us as a cycle; ultimately, I think we can trust in the rhythm.  When we approach it as linear, everything appears out of place and is scary and creates anxiety.  If we’re always moving forward without paying attention to the backward, then we’re certainly going to be lost.  While the present always brings us something new, it also always (ALWAYS) reminds us of something old, something familiar, comfortable, to be honored.  But how much is that balance.  We have to want the balance…otherwise, the rhythm disappears.

This is a really abstract reflection on really concrete events I’m watching happen today.  From one source I see hurt–disappointment, discouragement, and wounding.  In the meantime, another source experiences great joy, abundance, and love.  I’m sitting in between contemplating watching “Glee” again and finding some contentment for both right where I’m standing right now.

It’s a weird day.  In that rhythmic, balanced sort of way.

I’m going to warn you now this post may not be funny.  I won’t run away from it should it happen organically, but this is a “thinkin’ reflectin” kinda post.  And why?  Because I’ve been thinking big picture lately and it’s easier to see some revealed truths when one considers the breadth of one’s life.

“It’s been a rough couple months.” I realized I’ve been saying that, now, for years.  ”I just gotta get through this next interminably long period of waiting and things will be okay.” Then, like clockwork, another interminably long period of waiting starts on another new worry.  It’s seemed neverending…and is when approached in that fashion.

What I realized the other day, though, as I was sitting and lamenting to myself is that I’ve been coming at all of this from only one direction.  If I run around the other side of my worry, what appears is a huge opportunity: I have the time everyone wants to figure my shit out.  Yes, I have work to do.  Everyone has work to do.  But I do have the chance to really reach in and find myself in there– a lot of people don’t.  And I should really stop waiting and start reaching.

I think everybody has one major personal mountain to climb in their lives.  This isn’t hardships–I think we all have a lot of those.  But hardships are circumstantial; we struggle, usually, because we have to meet reality everyday and sometimes, when our expectations and our world doesn’t match up evenly, we run into trouble.  The personal mountain, though, is that one foundational “issue” that sets the tenor for all struggles.  It’s those little dark parts of ourselves we don’t want to think about that drive the way we respond to tough circumstances.  Mine personal mountain is definitely born directly from fear of reaching.  I’m growing convinced that this is why I’m so worried about getting swallowed up, lonely and alone, by the sands of time.  I’m not a reacher.  I’m a nester.

So, in all of my “time” that I have to think about things, I’ve realized that I’m not going to un-stick myself from this place unless I actually start reaching…somewhere.  Instead of being solely reactionary, I’ve got to reach beyond that and be a little proactive.  Instead of clinging to the idea of routine, I have to reach beyond that.  Being the Disney princess that I am, I think I’ve grown accustomed to the idea of fate–things happening.  And I’m actually coming around to see that fate is what happens when you realize that just letting things happen will lead you in random directions.

Life is reaching.  I’m not sure I’ve really found that yet but I’m willing to give it a try.

Yesterday, I was headed over to the eye doctor for some new,  exorbitantly expensive contact lenses when I saw possibly the greatest vehicle I’ve ever come across.  A silver Dodge Utilivan pulled up next to me and I never would have noticed it had it not roared past me, displaying it’s company to be “Universal Power and Control.”  There was a ladder on top…it was an electrician…or was it.

That made my whole day…as did my ridiculous knee-jerk reaction that was, “How do I work there?”  I don’t know how to do anything electrical…but I’m willing to be an apprentice just so I can drive that truck around Chicago.  Brilliant.

Of course, the irony was not lost on me…in fact, the whole episode was nothing but ironic since for the past 7-8 weeks my whole life has been one big shitstorm of unknowing; Universal Power and Control has been my sad, pathetic mantra.  I’d do just about anything to get it at this point.  And whenever I’m clinging on so tightly to that need to control, I just know that whether I like it or not something profoundly chaos-enducing will surely happen.  I just need to let it go a bit.  There is a balance to all of these things.

So this morning as I was standing (okay more like trembling) in “vertical splits pose”–the one I’ve also heard called “needle”–I realized two things.  First, I came to accept the fact that I cannot have universal power and control.  Actually, I’m not even sure I’d want universal power and control–I mean, really, wasn’t that what the entire movie Aladdin was all about? [Sidebar: is anyone else as shocked as I am that the entirety of the western world has been saying this name wrong...and that it's -ah-la-DEEN....not ah-LAD-din?  Thanks again Disney for creating another lie my whole life is tremulously built upon. End Sidebar].  My greater insight, though, is that I already have universal power and control–but it’s really only over my universe which is mildly annoying but a step in the right direction.

I’ve been sweating blood over the past couple weeks, especially when it comes to people moving and moving on.  It seems there’s a lot of this going on.  I feel adrift in their seas…at their whim…I’m floundering.  Except, while suffering through breathing in “needle pose,” I began to think that the power I have in these situations refers specifically to my ability to trust them.  I have the power to trust the people who are moving and moving on.  If I can stop fixating on the circumstances [moving and moving on] and focus on the people [trusting they will show me the loyalty I show them], then the situation becomes more manageable.  The people define the circumstances.  If I empower them to do that, I can breathe a little easier, at least for now…by that I mean this second.  I’m trying to work up to a minute.

One of the greatest comforts I find in yoga is that these systems of thought are ancient…and they seem almost tailored to me in this day and age.  If Buddhist monks on the mountain a thousand years ago were fixated on how, exactly, to live in the here and now and not slip carelessly into the future or past, then…well…good for me.  I really am human.

And I still want that Universal Power and Control truck.  It’s just to tempting NOT to think about…

Oh graduate school–it’s a mystery.  It’s a menace. It’s my life.  What am I doing? This past month has been absolutely nutty.  First, the backstory.  It was the sweet autumnal air of October that jolted me into a realization that, in order to continue to eat and sleep in this lovely apartment I now rent, I would have to apply for this dissertation fellowship due in January.  Now, in real life, that seems almost absurdly far-forward thinking.  In academia, I was already severely behind. Thus I commenced getting on my horse and writing these papers that have been torturing me for over a year.

My progress was good, by the holidays I was still on target–life was looking up.  And then came January.  Oh wicked winter month of January.  I cut my holidays short, I got my self back to Chicago and I hunkered down.  In two weeks I procured two final drafts and one “really good” first draft of a dissertation proposal which was scheduled for January 21st.  After a good but reality-inducing meeting with my dissertation director (who is new and who replaced my old one that announced he was leaving the university in July), we decided–upon the advice of other faculty–that moving the defense back wouldn’t have that much effect on the fellowship application…thus, the defense was pushed back, the application turned in.  And I could finally breathe again.

That was for 3 blissful days.

This afternoon I returned to an e-mail from the evil trolls at the graduate school.  They flatly rejected my fellowship application–that’s right, the one I broke my back working to get in on time.  [THUD]. “What?!? Why?” you might wonder.  Well, because I didn’t have my dissertation proposal done–you remember, the one we postponed on the advice that it wouldn’t be that big a deal.

Awesome.

And so, here’s my reflection today.  It’s surprisingly not gripey–frankly, I knew this would happen and I am not at all surprised by the bad advice, the incredibly rude e-mail I got informing me of this decision (which also told me I could come and pick up my application at the graduate school to get it off their hands…well, thanks Graduate School…you guys are great), or the fact that I’m now on my own again to figure out how to keep living.  No, my reflection is on my complete lack of panic.

If this graduate experience has taught me one life skill worth talking about (and on days like today I feel this might be the only one), it’s the complete control of my knee jerk panic.  I have no doubt this will work out.  I have no idea how.  I don’t even know where to begin.  But this is the 6th year in a row I face this situation in February.  And miraculously, something works out.  And so, I just think it will.  That could mean it won’t…but I don’t think that.  I don’t know if the options I think I have will end up being the saving grace.  I suspect something else will pop up.  It just will.

And after this degree is firmly in my little paws, I’ll reflect on the degree to which the universe is telling me to get the hell out of sociology.  It’s becoming hard to deny.  Fool me once, shame on you.  Fool me six times–something is just not right here.

But that reflection will have to wait for awhile.  For now, Mrs. Katie’s gotta go get a job.

I was talking with Monica a couple weeks ago…complaining, actually…complaining is what I was doing.  Once again, I found myself in the same exact rut that I always find myself in when I’m at personal perigee (I know, I’m trying out a new word), wondering why I’m there again.  Monica has been invaluable in diagnosing these low moments not as random, linear occurrences but as cyclical points…thus, once I get over one, it’s likely to come back around–and it sure always does.

So this time, I went ahead and gave myself a new little challenge (mind you, now, this was weeks ago).  Instead of just grabbing hold and weathering the storm as usual, my challenge to myself was to not get complacent, a stage that always results in such low tides.  In order to do this, I promised myself that every time I caught myself at a proverbial “fork in the road,” I would –as the cliche dictates–take “the road less taken.”  That is, I wouldn’t do what I was most comfortable doing; I would accept the challenge in hopes that it would not result in the usual “comfort-driven disasters” that have been piling up.

I’ll be honest…this logic is not bad.  It’s not easy, but it’s also not wrong.  I’ve found myself in several situations recently when I was at such a fork and chose the challenging route…it returned the gain I was hoping for…it was uncharted territory, that’s for sure.

But here’s the little catch I find interesting: it’s not always the hardest choice I’m making.  It’s the one that’s most uncomfortable.  So, for instance,  I found myself sitting in front of the computer, ready to write an e-mail that I was sure would “fix” the problem.  Well, this is a typical scenario in which I end up tortured.  So, I sat and deliberated for a good 10 minutes.  I even went so far as to write a draft…twice. Each time I went to send I said to myself, “Send it if you think this’ll really change anything.”  Each time, I knew it wouldn’t and I junked the draft.  It wasn’t easy…but it wasn’t the hardest choice either…that actually might have been turning off the computer and blocking the whole thing out.   It was the one that really left me squirmy…because it made me think about what I was really doing.  And I saw it.  And I didn’t do it.  And it didn’t kill me. And in fact, I think it paid off.  I think.

Another example: I was beside myself with anxiety on Tuesday–school-related.  My usual choices are 1) block out the anxiety and pretend it’s not there or 2) wallow in the anxiety.  The last thing I wanted to do was think about the anxiety…so I thought about it…I searched for the cause and realized it wasn’t stress but not knowing…anything.  So much was up in the air.  So Wednesday I woke up with one goal: “Get things settled.”  And I did.  I made phone calls (which I hate), I made office visits (also uncomfortable), I asked for firm, specific feedback on questions I needed answers to…and by god if I didn’t brace myself for the apocalypse every time a question came out of my mouth.  But I got answers.  And now I know.

The key to this game is vigilance, I think.  And to tread boldly directly into my fears, which are the essence of all of my discomfort.  If I sense I’m holding back because of a trust issue, I challenge myself to trust.  If I’m running away from a confrontation, I confront.  If I duck a hug, I hug back (that one’s for Meghan).  I think the only way to get out of a cycle is to turn around on it and look it face-to-face.

What I’m finding is that a little discomfort goes a long way.

Wow.  Two weeks since the last post.  A lot’s been going on recently.  Andras left Chicago, I kicked out my dissertation proposal (yes, out of order…I’m not done with special fields yet), choir’s up and running, and today in Chicago, fall arrived.  Actually, with howling winds and a dramatic drop in temperature, it rampaged in.  And away we go.  Tomorrow will be Thanksgiving and I’ll wonder where the fall went.

But in all of this flurry of things, I’ve been looking for solace in the steadiness, or maybe steadfastness, of some things that never seem to change.  Nothing is ever static, obviously, unless it’s not animate.  But, since I’ve been fairly drama-free lately (and I have no problem with that), I’ve been able to stand as the outsider and look in to other’s life issues…and begin to see that they’re cyclical.  We’re happy then we’re sad.  We love and then we don’t…and then we do again.  We’re excited and then depressed. And when we think we’ve had enough of something, either good or bad, that something changes…but in predictable ways.  I’ve been re-fascinated by the cyclical ways in which we work even when we know it and we know what’s coming.  We are so predictable and yet never really seem to learn or to let go.

Yesterday I was at the Alpha Sigma Nu induction…finally, the Jesuits thought I was honorable enough to pay them $75 to wear a medallion at graduation…what can I say…it was a vendetta from my Marquette days.  Anyway, the speaker reminded me of a quote from one of the Jesuit martyrs that I think is interesting.  He said:

We are not human beings looking for a spiritual experience.  We are spiritual beings embedded in a human experience.

For some reason, it really spoke to me yesterday, especially in the light of all of these cycles I’ve been watching: some of self-destruction, some of loss, some of finding joy, some searching for love.  I think de Chardin is right.  The spiritual side of us, that which cannot be seen by observing us in our physical presence, is why we do what we do.  If it were all rational and logical, we’d never choose to repeat some of the things we do.

So I guess it’s funny that in all of these changes I see happening so rapidly, that it’s really just a coming around the mountain again.  In fact, I’ve probably written about this very thing already…several times.

We never really change.  We are the steady in a context that moves around us and carries us with it.  We respond. But do we change?

I really hate to be that chipper, cheerful, “Look at the sunny side of life,” kinda girl.  In fact, it makes me want to flog myself for it. I’m much funnier when I’m wry and cynical.  But amazing things have been happening to me recently and I’m not sure why.  I suppose the smarter side of myself says, “Katie…what the hell? Why are you questioning it?”  But, you know, I like to live on the wild and stupid side.  So let’s dig in…

The goodness, I’m finding, is in the universal return.  Like Mars in retrograde, stuff keeps coming back to me at the right time, in the right place.  I’m making myself sick with my own giddyness about it.  “Like what?” you say, “Katie. What is mystically on the return?”

Like:

1. Chez and Patrick with whom I now share an office.  Previously I thought that would be a productive space.  Today, Patrick and I proved that it probably won’t be…academically speaking…but it was great.  My return to the sociology department is the return I was looking for.  Weird.  Couldn’t have seen that coming.

2. Katie and Andy visited on Tuesday.  For Katie, it was a return to Chicago. It was glorious.  For Andy, it was not a return, but he didn’t seem to have a horrible time, so maybe someday he will return.  Either way, though, it was wonderful.  I haven’t had that much fun in a long time…with adults who appreciate Harry Potter like I do.

3. Friday we returned to Book Club.  Another fantastic time.

4. A little bit of my zest for sociology has returned.  It feels right again when for a long time it did not.

5. I returned about 79423874 library books last week.  Literally a weight off my shoulders.  Also means…I read them.  Another weight off my shoulders.

6. Fall is returning.  This past week I literally curled up under my down blanket, had a beer (the RETURN of Goose Island Harvest Ale), and watched football.

I could go on but I’m getting nauseous.  Bottom line, the returns are so celebratory because it means I’ve been given a reprieve from waiting, waiting, waiting, waiting.  I guess I want to ask why…what changed?  Was it me? Or the Universe?  And how do I keep this table turned in my direction?

But, you know…questions are stupid right now.  I’m just going to go sleep while I can because with returns, here’s the thing: everything returns.  Even waiting.