I think I’m going to spend this month of August speaking to emotions. In general, emotions are massively misunderstood. Usually, the feeler doesn’t really know how they are feeling, or they don’t make the intention to name them. And from my life experience, emotions in their raw and authentic forms are not received well, either. These two things are a recipe for emotional immaturity across the board. We fly off the handle when we probably need to have self-control. We suppress when we probably need to express. We shut down others when we are too uncomfortable with our own emotional immaturity. We move so fast we don’t typically slow down enough to feel let alone know what we’re feeling. It’s systemic. It’s problematic.
Emotions, or to be importantly specific – the allowing of all of the emotions AND the intention of naming them, is a keystone of my cancer story. I am passionate about emotional intelligence. I want people to experience what it means to give themselves the permission to feel fully. And then to know what they are feeling. And then to know why they are feeling it. And then to assess those feelings with a lens of ‘is this truth?’ And so, I model those things and I have since the beginning. If I’m afraid…I say I am afraid. If I’m pissed…I say I am pissed. If I am grateful…I say I am grateful. And I honor the experience in any of those and everything in between knowing that each one can offer me something, each one is purposeful.
I don’t buy into “stoicism is strength” and I certainly don’t believe that health is reflected in constant positivity, so this August, the anniversary month of the beginning of all of this, I will honor all of the emotions of each day. I will give myself the permission to feel them. I will name them (seek accuracy). I will claim them (get to the root emotion) and I will assess them with a lens of truth (does the emotion actually match the experience). Today – anxiety. Big time. My kid is visiting a college and meeting a college coach. It’s a big deal. An offer likely to follow. She is deeply invested. She really wants this. The root emotion here is totally fear and the anxiety is in the form of overwhelm and concern and worry, my mama bear heart not wanting my kid to feel hurt. But this anxiety also comes in the form of hope in the unknown, holding space for what could be and being mindful not to write the end of any story.
This Day in 2018:
Familiar. Foreign. Chosen.
The opportunities TO transform may not necessarily come by choice…………but being transformed by the opportunities that come, IS a choice.
(In my humble opinion, of course)
I say that in light of a conversation I had this morning with a very dear colleague, friend and trusted mentor.
She asked me a very interesting question: “Are you finding any familiarity in life now as it was before [your diagnosis and the past year]?”
My answer: “Well… sure. My surroundings are familiar – my home. My office. My car. My commute to and from work. My husband and children. My day-to-day responsibilities…. I certainly sit in the familiar. But who I am…foreign.”
Cancer hasn’t just been a bump in the road. Cancer hasn’t been a slight detour. Cancer hasn’t simply been a complication or a distraction or an annoyance. Cancer hasn’t been a ‘thing that has gotten in the way of the real life I’m living.’
Cancer is full on blowing up my familiar.
Cancer is changing me.
Cancer is transforming me. In every way. Literally.Every.Way. The way I think. The way I talk. The way I feel. The way I relate, empathize, interact, engage with others. The way I look. All radically transforming…
So, while I sit in familiar settings and do familiar things, I am experiencing it as a different person.
I sit at my same desk and across from me are familiar people, but I see them through different eyes.
Moving through my day feels methodically normal – get up, get ready, get in the car, get to the office, work, get in the car, get home, spend time with the family, go to bed…and yet, every move feels cancer. The sleeping. The fatigue. The body aches. The scars. The shampoo. The makeup routine. The going to the bathroom. The clothes. The putting on shoes. The food. The getting in and out of a car. The getting up from my desk. The interactions with clients. The taking a walk. The feeding the dogs. The getting hugs from the girls. The intimacy with the husband.
Expressing myself is now colored by new language…language that only this experience can provide. Understandings. Expressions. Values. Insights. Desires. Fears.
Connecting with others is a whole new learning. Learning how to hear them in the midst of what my head and heart are saying to me. Interpreting their interactions, their communication, their story through all new filters. Listening transformed is wrought with brand new vulnerabilities….
This has, no doubt, been the most destructive and productive and transformative experience of my life. And I am grateful that I have allowed it to be so.
And with the grace of God, the learning continues.
This Day in 2019:
Everything is Harder.
My body hurts. A lot. I wonder how long I’ll feel that way…
It makes doing anything harder. Cooking dinner. Washing dishes. Vacationing…..
Ugh.
No Post on 8/2/20