Fearlessness. Or: How my entire life is explained in pop music

I remember being fearless.

I don't remember precisely what it felt like.

But I know that I feel differently now than I did then.

"Wow Sandy, what a sense of rhythm you have!" my friend said, while we were participating in a group circle dance at my Energy Medicine graduation.
"Are you making fun of me?" (I was pretty sure I had finally just figured out which leg was supposed to go up when. Maybe someone had instantly noticed my amazing dance abilities?)
"It's like you're dancing to completely different music than everyone else." Not a naturally gifted circle dancer then.
"Story of my life..."

I came home from the trip, and looked around at my apartment. Everything about it is the life I have created. Me, as an adult. The result of a series of compounding decisions. What plates to buy. What apartment to choose. Which job to take. Which degree to pursue. What school to attend.


And I sat down heavily and wondered if this is where I wanted to be taken by my choices.

A lot of people have posted online about "Say Something" making them cry or feel sad. I realize for most people that's because this song is about a person. "Say something, I'm giving up on you." It's about losing a relationship or love. For me, I kept listening to this song and feeling like I was singing it to the life I was living. 

I've spent a lot of time talking to people about what I would like to do next. And what that would look like.

I don't want to leave academia, at least not entirely. But I am not the same person I was when I arrived at my job.

I am constantly reminded of this.

As I write this, my dog is at my feet quietly whimpering as he readjusts his position. I should be writing a power point for a presentation later today, and instead I am at home with a timer on, so that I remember to wash and change him every two hours.

I just feel like he deserves a break already.

We both do.

It's not so much that Bandit gets sick when I leave. He always did.

It's that now, Bandit is a symbol of the many things in my life that are never going to be how they were before. And that has changed me. Continues to change me.

And for a long time, I thought that meant I was behind or needed to catch up or that I'd lost time. "I Didn't Get Anything Published All Year! I Must Write Faster!!!!"

More than ever, I've been thinking that the last year and a half was instead like being shot out of a cannon. All the time I felt like I wasn't moving, I was actually being launched somewhere it would have otherwise taken me years to arrive at. Nice, comfortable years, where I'd get to switch to comfy shoes and slowly adjust to the new altitude and do things at an even pace. Instead, my ears are bleeding and I think I've punctured a lung. The view is beautiful, but disorienting. I don't know where I am. Or why I'm here.

Maybe I am asking myself hard questions right now because I no longer live in a world where "how much did you publish this year?" feels like the right question to be asking myself. You can wake up on a beautiful island, but then, if you don't know where it is or precisely how you arrived, it is bound to be disorienting. And the relevance of your CV is certainly in question.

When I sit down heavily at my kitchen table and survey the meditation cushions that have morphed into extra dog beds, and the coordinated pillows that came with the couch, and listen to the silence around me... it is as if I'm waiting for the right question to appear.

Whatever it is though, seems to elude me.

"I feel like I'm at a cross-roads," I told my energy medicine mentor. "I feel so stuck."
"I don't think you're stuck at all."
"I feel stuck. That's why I want you to do this healing work on me."
"Why do you think you need me to do that for you?"
"Because I don't know how! My meditation brain is broken. And you can fix it. So I can hear myself again."
"Perhaps you have mastered your meditation tool, and this is an invitation to develop a new one."
"But I'm not trained in that yet. I'd need two more years."
"Do you really believe you have to take four years of Eden Energy Medicine to be whole?"
"No. That's ridiculous."
"So maybe this is your invitation."
Have you ever wanted to hug someone and defiantly throw your sippy cup on the floor all at once? "So... you're telling me... I have to heal myself."
"I'm telling you I'm happy to be a resource. And you can heal yourself. Maybe there isn't even anything broken."
"But then why do I feel so stuck?"
"Is there another way you can language that?"


No. Obviously not.  (Also, By The Way, I just brutally paraphrased that otherwise entirely beautiful conversation).

And that's why I have Rihanna.

You tell me WHAT NOW.

I've been writing about this for a while now.

Normally, I like to write about things after the fact. After they're a little more worked out. I like to highlight the epiphanies and moments of internal brilliance. I like to discuss clear growth and share things I've figured out a little bit.

In other words, I like to sit here at this lovely blog and kind of talk about how awesome I am. 

But. That's not where I'm at right now. Lately, each of my ah-ha moments seems to be book-ended by feeling pretty confused and unsure of myself. I feel more like a middle school girl now than I ever did at thirteen.

Which makes putting my life to a pop-music soundtrack seem like the most appropriate of all available options.

And I sit over a mug of coffee, and I try to imagine what kind of home I could step inside lightly.


Because...The Truth Is, I've been terrified of doing the things that give me energy and inspire me. And even more scared of letting go of the things that drain me.

I have shifted into a world of scarcity thinking. It seems like there is so little I've managed to hold on to that I ought to clench them more tightly. I do know better than this. I know, really, I have so much. Still, I guard my diapered dog and my first grown-up couch, however urine stained, with bared teeth.


...probably inviting jaw surgery into the picture before too long.

Nonetheless, I can imagine a home filled with the faces and voices and memories of all the people who believe in me, sometimes more than I believe in myself. I just can't entirely picture myself having a key to it yet.

Perhaps, if I am patient with myself, it won't be so terribly long until I'm there.

And if not. What's a little jaw surgery anyway? I think I could be fearless about that.


Namaste.