There have been many eloquent articles written and films made about the impending 10th anniversary of Sept. 11 tomorrow. I do not by any means think anything I have to say will compare to what others are writing/saying, but the date has impacted me this week in a way that I never would have expected it to.
Ten years ago, on this day (the tenth), I put in my two weeks notice at a job I hated and then the following day, the world changed. I knew people living in the city at the time but thankfully no one I knew was harmed. The events there did not touch my life in the way that they did for so many others, but it occurred to me this week that the attacks that day are a touchstone in what would come to be one of the most difficult periods of my life.
My mom was diagnosed with Non-Hodgkins Lymphoma in the summer of 1998 just three weeks after I moved back from a two year stint in Florida. The serendipity of my return at that time is not lost on me. She received treatment, went in to remission, and then had a relapse in the fall of 1999. We spent January of 2000 in Wichita at a cancer treatment center where she had a stem cell transplant. At that time, I was attending Bethany College and trying to finish up my long overdue B.A. In the fall of 2000, my good friend Jason and I took a trip to NYC. Neither of us had ever been and it was a bit like walking into a fairy tale for me. I had always idolized New York, had thought for years that I would live there at some point, and so I was mesmerized while there. I even have a picture I took standing between the two towers, leaning as far back as I could to try to glimpse the tops.
My younger brother graduated on the same day as I, he went through in the traditional four years while I took a more, um, Bohemian approach. I realize now how ashamed I was to have taken so long to finish, how much I berated myself for not going through in four years, for being such a--in my terms--fuck up. No one else would have said this of me, but I said it to myself, and often. Then, just a month after graduation, mu baby brother got married and I again felt ashamed. No one was telling me I should have done those things before him, but I told myself I should have, and it led to feeling badly about myself.
What does this have to do with 9/11? Well, when Mom got sick, I never let myself get really upset because I thought if I fell apart, everyone else would, too. I held it together so others would have a strong model, or so I told myself. I think I really was just terrified of letting myself feel anything, and so I didn't. And then the shame spiral of the next year or so followed me around like a hungry dog, getting angrier and more violent until I was living in an apartment in Lawrence and working a job I hated in KC. So, I quit the job--thanks in part to a lawsuit that settled and gave me a little cash--and had pipe dreams of possibly moving to, you guessed it, NYC. But, then...9/11.
The legacy of 9/11 for me isn't monumental, it's not heartbreaking or even all that poignant, but that event signifies the end of a dream I'd had for a really long time. I sat in my apartment talking on the phone to Jason all day (after being sent home from work), and waited to hear other cities were being attacked. I kept expecting more damage to be done, and I held my breath in a perpetual state of anxiety.
And this whole week, I've been thinking that I'm still sort of in that place. All glimmers of the world as a safe place flew out the window for me when Mom got sick, when I shamed myself for my long road to education and for my even longer--and still winding--road to love, and then the final support beams were blown out when the towers came down.
A man I work with said we may not be daily effected by what happened, but we are all intimately effected, even if we don't realize exactly how, and I think he's right. It was a small piece in the puzzle of my fear-based life, and I let all of those events lead me to make decisions motivated by a need for safety, even in the most unsafe of situations.
In this next decade, I hope to move past this fear based thinking and live a life dictated by complete faith in love because where there is radical honesty and true love, there will always be safety.
Showing posts with label safety. Show all posts
Showing posts with label safety. Show all posts
10 September 2011
22 August 2010
Amen
From www.dailyom.com:
Without a Net
Living Life with TrustLiving life without a net can be just what we need to step outside of ourselves and make the choices we need most.
As we create the life of our dreams, we often reach a crossroads where the choices seem to involve the risk of facing the unknown versus the safety and comfort of all that we have come to trust. We may feel like a tightrope walker, carefully teetering along the narrow path to our goals, sometimes feeling that we are doing so without a net. Knowing we have some backup may help us work up the courage to take those first steps, until we are secure in knowing that we have the skills to work without one. But when we live our lives from a place of balance and trust in the universe, we may not see our source of support, but we can know that it is there.
If we refuse to act only if we can see the safety net, we may be allowing the net to become a trap as it creates a barrier between us and the freedom to pursue our goals. Change is inherent in life, so even what we have learned to trust can surprise us at any moment. Remove fear from the equation and then, without even wondering what is going on below, we can devote our full attention to the dream that awaits us.
We attract support into our lives when we are willing to make those first tentative steps, trusting that the universe will provide exactly what we need. In that process we can decide that whatever comes from our actions is only for our highest and best experience of growth. It may come in the form of a soft landing, an unexpected rescue or an eye-opening experience gleaned only from the process of falling. So rather than allowing our lives to be dictated by fear of the unknown, or trying to avoid falling, we can appreciate that sometimes we experience life fully when we are willing to trust and fall. And in doing so, we may just find that we have the wings to fly.
When we believe that there is a reason for everything, we are stepping out with the safety net of the universe, and we know we will make the best from whatever comes our way.
Living Life with Trust
As we create the life of our dreams, we often reach a crossroads where the choices seem to involve the risk of facing the unknown versus the safety and comfort of all that we have come to trust. We may feel like a tightrope walker, carefully teetering along the narrow path to our goals, sometimes feeling that we are doing so without a net. Knowing we have some backup may help us work up the courage to take those first steps, until we are secure in knowing that we have the skills to work without one. But when we live our lives from a place of balance and trust in the universe, we may not see our source of support, but we can know that it is there.
If we refuse to act only if we can see the safety net, we may be allowing the net to become a trap as it creates a barrier between us and the freedom to pursue our goals. Change is inherent in life, so even what we have learned to trust can surprise us at any moment. Remove fear from the equation and then, without even wondering what is going on below, we can devote our full attention to the dream that awaits us.
We attract support into our lives when we are willing to make those first tentative steps, trusting that the universe will provide exactly what we need. In that process we can decide that whatever comes from our actions is only for our highest and best experience of growth. It may come in the form of a soft landing, an unexpected rescue or an eye-opening experience gleaned only from the process of falling. So rather than allowing our lives to be dictated by fear of the unknown, or trying to avoid falling, we can appreciate that sometimes we experience life fully when we are willing to trust and fall. And in doing so, we may just find that we have the wings to fly.
When we believe that there is a reason for everything, we are stepping out with the safety net of the universe, and we know we will make the best from whatever comes our way.
21 July 2010
Safety Net: Cinema is My Babysitter
For the last week or so, I've been watching movies like someone has declared film illegal. I'm consuming them. Katherine Hepburn black and whites, independent weirdies with casts I've never heard of, new releases about twisted young girls in rock bands, romantic comedies designed to make any viewer believe in the transformative power of love.
I have always loved movies. They provide an escape from whatever tragic thing is happening in my life, or a picture of a better world, or they help you believe that people can be better than you'd ever imagined. Sitting in a room seeing someone else's vision of love, tragedy, history, experiencing the world as it could be, as we hope it never will be again...there's a real reassurance in knowing that no matter where I am in my life, I can count on the movies.
Tonight, a movie I hesitated renting because I dislike the actress in it, had a moment in it that snapped me right out of my escape. In it, after a particularly ridiculous chain of events that makes the female lead want to flee a restaurant, the male lead asks her where she would feel most safe. Where they go and what happens in the rest of the movie--while heartwarming and lovely--don't really matter. What matters is that, when he asked that question, I realized I don't exactly have an answer to that question right now.
I used to think that wherever the people I loved and trusted could be found, I was safe, but circumstances change, people change. Love and trust can only take you so far and when the road runs out, so does any illusion of safety.
I'm not sure where my safe place is, and I'm not sure I'm ready to look for one right now. I think I'll just let cinema be my babysitter until I'm strong enough to not need one anymore. Film can be my safety net. I'll live in other peoples' dreams until I start believing in my own again.
I have always loved movies. They provide an escape from whatever tragic thing is happening in my life, or a picture of a better world, or they help you believe that people can be better than you'd ever imagined. Sitting in a room seeing someone else's vision of love, tragedy, history, experiencing the world as it could be, as we hope it never will be again...there's a real reassurance in knowing that no matter where I am in my life, I can count on the movies.
Tonight, a movie I hesitated renting because I dislike the actress in it, had a moment in it that snapped me right out of my escape. In it, after a particularly ridiculous chain of events that makes the female lead want to flee a restaurant, the male lead asks her where she would feel most safe. Where they go and what happens in the rest of the movie--while heartwarming and lovely--don't really matter. What matters is that, when he asked that question, I realized I don't exactly have an answer to that question right now.
I used to think that wherever the people I loved and trusted could be found, I was safe, but circumstances change, people change. Love and trust can only take you so far and when the road runs out, so does any illusion of safety.
I'm not sure where my safe place is, and I'm not sure I'm ready to look for one right now. I think I'll just let cinema be my babysitter until I'm strong enough to not need one anymore. Film can be my safety net. I'll live in other peoples' dreams until I start believing in my own again.
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