I don’t like wrap-ups and resolutions because it implies that somehow who you are and how you do things is so flawed you need to “fix it,” which is a recipe for disaster. Making lists of all the bests and worsts of anything is pretty much saying the same thing. And I’m utterly useless at both. Follow-through has never been my strong suit (as evidenced by the fact that I am getting this up by January 2nd at the earliest) and self reflection is a glass so muddled I don’t even think a case of Windex could get that girl clean.
So I’m not going to do it now. All I am going to say is this; you are fine the way you are. You want to exercise more? Do it right now. Don’t do it for next year or for your reunion or wedding, just be in your day to day and stretch yourself out because right now is as good a time as any to do it.
I had a student this past training who said “I’m going to get a t-shirt made for myself that says ‘Discipline. Because really, what the hell else am I gonna do’?” And really that’s it. If I were to offer up any resolution suggestions for the year (which I am not, because this is going up after the fact anyway) it would be this: Dude, you are fine, just stick with it.
And the only 2010 wrap-up I'm gonna offer is an important lesson I've learned this year: Everything is a little bit of this and a little bit of that.
Stupidly simple I know, but not really. Admitting that everything is imperfect flies in the face of my most beloved belief that someday I will find one answer. That what I’m doing is right in some universal way. It’s been very hard to come to terms with the fact that there isn’t a lightening rod or that what I am doing isn’t an end unto itself but a process.
And it’s been even harder to accept that this process comes with both good and bad. That no matter what I choose it comes with what I didn’t choose. Within every choice there is sacrifice and loss. Sometimes the loss will be freely given, sometimes it’s mourned, but regardless, there is loss. If we don’t acknowledge that loss, we suffer. (Note I said “acknowledge” the loss. This is not the same thing as focusing on it. I simply mean acknowledging that it exists in the first place.)
Take the holidays. Until this year I have been an unapologetic Scrooge. I dread the holidays. If you’d asked me before this year I would have said “because it’s all about money! Consume, consume, consume! It’s just this American excuse to rob everyone blind.” But that’s not it. The fact is I’ve always dreaded Christmas because I love it. I’ve always loved it. I love sitting down with my family for a big meal, the smell of the tree, the lights, the music, the cookies, the sweet simplicity of the Nativity story, the goofiness of Santa living at the top of the world with his band a merry little elves. Seriously, what’s not to love?
Christmas in and of itself isn't flawed, but the fact that I wanted a Perfect Christmas is. I wanted the claymation TV specials, department store window displays, commercials, and movie Christmas. I wanted the horse-drawn sleigh to take me through the snow to the grandma's chalet in the woods where friends and family sit around the hearth singing. I wanted birds tying bows in my princess hair with sweetness, sprinkles, stars, sunshine, flowers and sparkles.
But real-time Christmas has always been fraught with real-time problems and base humanity. First there were the normal mishaps; the time my sisters and I almost set the house on fire playing with candles, the time we almost died in our sleep because my dad accidentally put smoldering embers in a plastic garbage bin, the time the dog ate an entire Pyrex dish of fudge – Pyrex and all. Then there was the fact that my family was poor, and of course there was the fact that Christmas brought out the spooky in my dad. As I got older the holidays were ear-marked by adult concerns; finding the funds for my own Christmas gifts, hurt feelings over gifts, over words, over a relative/boyfriend/spouse having to work, and of course the inevitable Huge Family Fight. All of which ruined my Perfect Christmas. And because it was “never” what it “should” be, I sequestered Christmas to the part of my heart reserved for cleaning toilets.
And yet, my love never really died. As I continued to insist that the holidays were ass, I was squirreling away a little bit of hope each year that this year I would get it right. And the vicious cycle continued.
Of course Christmas is just one example of reaching for simple, neat solutions to shield myself from the pain of loss. Moving away from home is another example. Before this year, every time we’d go to Spokane I would be dismissive of it. Not because I genuinely hated it, but because I loved it and didn’t know how to mourn the loss. I have learned that there is no one right choice. Moving back to New York has taught me this. When we left California I was sad to leave my family. Living so far away from them is hard. But, I love living in New York. My life here is good. But, it comes with loss. Likewise, if we’d stayed there would have been loss. And that’s the point. Stay = loss. Go = loss. Before I would have tried to vilify the other to buoy the current, but when I do that I don’t offer space for sadness and that shuts me off from love which moves me even further away from friends, family and authentic experiences.
As per usual, the holidays this year were fraught with depressing moments of frustration. I was very happy to see the backside of them. Likewise, I still feel a constant homesick and pine for some perfect balance between "here" and "there" where I can have it all. But, after a year of sitting with my discomfort, of allowing it to be a little bit of this and a little bit of that, when that wave of "this is the worst thing ever" comes over me I have found a kind of peace. By just allowing it to be crappy, by trusting that crappy is as transitory as happy, I have found more peace in this one year than I have in twenty years of vilifying denial.
Plus, I breathe so much easier. And I like breathing. It's the one thing I intend to do more of this year.
