Yoga Tattuesday & Ordinary Joy #reverb10

Tags

#reverb10, Anxiety, back seat driver, big gaping hole, Depression, disassociation, Enlightenment, fairy floss, fork in the road, Meditation, morbid alternative, ordinary joy, Self-destruction, sense of enjoyment, spaciousness, vacuum, Yoga, Yoga Tattuesday

Before I get into the next #reverb10 post, I just wanted to mention that Birdie over at Yogi, Interrupted has written a feature post on my tattoo as part of her Yoga Tattuesday series.

Go check it out and say hello to Birdie! 😀

Ordinary Joy. Our most profound joy is often experienced during ordinary moments. What was one of your most joyful ordinary moments this year?
~ December 27 prompt

Actually, this year has had a bunch of them. Mostly as I previously described: those moments when I’ve realised that depression is no longer running the show.

Where I’ve been surprised by my own darkness-free sense of enjoyment. Free of anxiety, even. Those moments are almost unbelievable and they appear a little bit mysteriously. Think of fairy floss magically wrapping itself around a stick: there’s other forces at work, but to the naked eye things suddenly appear to change.

Like… hey, I think I’m feeling pretty happy right now. For no particular reason… Fuck, but that can be mind-blowing when you’re used to a more morbid alternative!

Don’t get me wrong, depression still sticks its nose out every so often looking for a soft place to land and dig in. That’s its nature. Once it’s had a taste of you, it always wants more. Although it should be noted that the “it” I’m referring to is none other than our own minds. Depression is not an imposition from the outside, but one way that our brain functions or rather, dysfunctions.

Over time the onset of depression’s symptoms get easier to recognise and as long as I’m still doing yoga, riding my bike and connecting with nature then it can’t easily get a foothold.

Not that it doesn’t try.

Most interestingly, while examining my mind recently I noticed that depression shares the same root experience as meditation. A sense of spaciousness. A big gaping hole. A vacuum.

However if you’re not prepared for that kind of spaciousness, it can be very scary. It can even look a little bit like death. No matter who you are or how much work you’ve done on yourself it can be quite shocking.

I know this from my own experience – I’ve been shocked several times now, via both depression and meditation.

And perhaps depression is just one fork in the road, a really well-trodden path because the alternative is… what? Self-destruction?

Unless you’ve had any meditation experience, then there aren’t really too many other roads to take. You can’t see them and even if you could, they wouldn’t make much sense. Because there’s just too much noise going on there in the ol’ mind.

Problem is, once you’ve become acquainted with that sense of empty space, it never really goes away. In fact, it can be a little bit like the worst back seat driver imaginable. Always commenting and shadowing your actions, seemingly not being helpful at all. Butting in when you wish they’d just SHUT THE HELL UP! Ever present and waiting, causing unnecessary stress.

Until we learn to relax and humour it: the back seat driver; depression. Take your pick. Life isn’t going to end because of them, not unless we allow it to.

This is why I say that yoga and meditation had as much to do with my recovery as all the therapy I’ve ever had.

The physical practice of yoga – all that movement and controlled breathing – was just what I needed to get out of my head, because depression lives in the mind and then invades the body.

To build up my sensitivity in order to dispel disassociation. To sense and feel in ways that weren’t too scary.

The practice of meditation helps us understand the mind’s vagaries and also provides discipline. And it is this discipline that we need in order to free ourselves of the endless terrors the mind will cook up if we let it.

Endless hours of this kind of work: vigilant observation of the mind; moving my sorry ass around instead of sinking further into the couch; feeling, even when it was painful to do so; facing the truth about my experiences, as much as they hurt.

And my reward is this: these little moments of ordinary joy.

Of rejoicing in a glorious sunny day while waiting for the train.

Of skipping gleefully down some street and noticing the beauty of a tangled mess of tree roots.

Of talking to animals I come across, just to say hello.

A cute random dog I befriended on the street

Of that incredible high I get post-yoga class, body and mind engaged and experiencing life fully as an integrated mind-body awareness. Less a singular person and more a living organism, just a part of the whole.

Of all of those things and more. Ordinary moments of joy, indeed.

~Svasti

Healing in 2010 #reverb10

Tags

#reverb10, Broken, Depression, disassociation, dualistic experience of the world, Healing, injured, Kinesiology, Nieces, patience, pranayama, PTSD, Repression, ringlets, Shirley Temple, Yoga

Healing. What healed you this year? Was it sudden, or a drip-by-drip evolution? How would you like to be healed in 2011?
~ December 19 prompt

I read another #reverb10-er’s post (I lost the link) suggesting that in order to be healed, something must be broken or injured. While this is true, I think many people don’t realise the hurts they are carrying. They’ve pushed their pain so far down inside, they can no longer feel it. I know that was true for me. But we can only lie to ourselves like this for so long.

Almost three years ago my body kicked off a rebellion against the intense repression and disassociation I’d been forcing it to swallow, just so that I didn’t have to. Which led to a bunch of scans, which led to a life-changing discussion with my chiropractor. Before long I had a referral to a therapist, a diagnosis of PTSD and depression and a long, LONG road to recovery ahead of me.

All this healing business has been much harder than I ever thought it’d be. But it’s been absolutely worth it. And this year I’ve begun feeling soooo much better than any time in recent memory. All of my hard work is starting to pay off!

I can’t tell you the number of times this year I’ve found myself just groovin’ along, finding pleasure in all kinds of things and noticing how it resonates through my body and mind.

Now maybe that sounds like a normal day/week/month/year to you. But it’s still something of a novelty for me! There’s still more work to do however. I think there possibly always is, even if the wounds aren’t quite as serious as others.

Because to me, the definition of healing is having an open heart that’s available for anything or anyone. And life in this dualistic experience of the world creates an ongoing pattern of opening and closing. Healing is about making more openings than closings, yeah?

And so without further ado, a short list of the things that have healed me this year. They’ve healed me in different ways – physically, mentally, emotionally, spiritually. Some of it happened like a lightning rod and other kinds of healing were more gradual. Some of that healing is still ongoing, as I think it is for most people.

Hugs and kisses from these sweet little darlings – spending time with them makes life worth living. They light me up with killer smiles, their very well developed sense of humour and hilarious antics.

My older niece is a sensitive, observant, thoughtful and sweet little thing, with chocolate-brown puddles for eyes and ringlets worthy of Shirley Temple. She’s also a clown of the highest order.

The younger one has moods that range from the blackest of scowls through to the silliest baby giggle you’ve ever heard. Actually, her giggle sounds like it belongs to a black man! She’s wildly determined, stubborn and knows EXACTLY what she wants…

Yoga – for anything and everything that ails me. Shadow Yoga for teaching me to see my body in new ways and understand that my perceived limitations are just that: perception and not reality. Teaching yoga for understanding more about how to share the gems of yoga wisdom and do so with grace. Yoga is also a measure for how the healing of my shoulder is going…

Physiotherapy – extremely painful but absolutely necessary for helping to sort out my crazy left shoulder. It’s much better than it was, but still not perfect. The physio was important for a while, and gave me a chance to work on my pranayama (as opposed to swearing at or punching the poor guy).

Kinesiology – when this happened, I was suddenly very aware of how much gunk must still be clogging up my body and mind. Luckily, I already knew a rockin’ kinesiologist and we’ve had two appointments so far (the next one is in late January). Each session has been very to the point and as such, quite intense. Also, highly amusing. Especially when unprompted by me, Kerry says things like: Okay, what happened in your life when you were eighteen? Or twenty-seven?

Ha-frickin-ha, body. Clearly it’s time to get a whole bunch of internal house-cleaning done. This work has been right there, in my face and with nowhere to run. Not that I want to run, but y’know…

Acupuncture – the ongoing journey of healing my shoulder has led me to an acupuncturist who works with energy as much as he works with needles. It’s a good match for me, and things seem to be kicking along.

Letting go of expectation and having a plan – oh yes. It was a BIG idea and a fabulous one, to start questioning why the heck I thought I wanted what everyone else seems to want. Simply because it’s what we do?? So now I have a plan, and that plan puts a sparkle in my eyes and grin on my face.

Patience – I can’t begin to explain the importance of learning patience in my healing processes. All of them. Healing is generally not instantaneous. Even those moments that feel super-quick and as though you’ve been hit by a lightning rod are always preceded by much hard work.

Patience, and not expecting change overnight or despairing when it doesn’t happen the way you want it to – these things are so very important to staying on the path. Keeping that healing momentum moving. Then one unspecified day in the future, you’ll be surprised to wake up and find that you’re feeling… not as bad.

And it gets better than that, too. It really does.

~Svasti

After-burn

Tags

Accident, disassociation, Emergency Essence, fury that looks like fear, passenger dominos, physiological traces, Post-traumatic stress, PTSD, Satay Chicken Dinner Box, Trams, trauma response

So I’m riding the number 64 tram home from work, just like I do any other day when I’m not cycle-commuting. It’s the end of the week and okay, it hasn’t been the best day ever, but it’s cool… and now it’s time to go home.

I’ve been on the tram for no more than five minutes when it starts breaking quite jerkily. There’s not much to grab hold of coz the tram is packed – every seat taken and those of us standing are just a few degrees off feeling like sardines. Skin touching if you move a smidge to the left or right.

Within microseconds I’m flying, almost horizontally really. So is every other standing passenger. The tram driver it seems, failed to notice a red light and at the last possible moment slammed on the brakes. The resulting game of passenger dominos roughly throws us all a couple of meters forwards.

Nothing I attempt to hold onto works out. A multitude of thoughts race by… oh no… what’s happening… I can’t stop myself from falling… is this going to hurt… there are people falling on top of me… there’s nothing to grab hold of… oh no…

It is only when the tram stops lurching that we mid-flight passengers land ungracefully and mostly on top of each other. My phone, which had been in my hand, is now on the floor and in pieces. Luckily not too many pieces and it can be put back together. When I manage to stand upright, I’m in a completely different section of the tram.

The haze of shock sets in.

The driver does not apologise. Does not check to see if anyone is okay. The tram keeps moving but much more carefully now.

I am not okay. I’m not sure if anyone else is hurt, but I’m too dazed and angry to find out. My already manky shoulder (luckily I have a physio appointment next Tuesday) is throbbing. My neck and lower back are sore.

I’m asked if I’m okay by a woman and her family. Passengers with seats, lucky things. The woman standing next to me and I are both having separate conversations about what just happened – she, on her phone (she’d helped collect the pieces of mine), and I with the family. The woman says that from her window seat she saw the red light, and how he didn’t even try to break until the last moment. It’s not as though a red light happens without warning.

Indeed.

They get off the tram a couple more stops down and I gratefully take one of their seats. I know I’m going to report this and ah… I can see the tram number, an individual identifier. I check the time… yeah, it happened just after 6pm. Along with the route number that should be enough information for the complaint I’m going to make.

Everything feels a little surreal. I make it to my stop and walk home unevenly. I feel the strain in my body – that always happens in a fall because our muscles futilely brace for impact.

It’s done. I’ve called Yarra Trams and explained very calmly. Yes please, I’d like someone to call me back and tell me what happened as a result of my complaint. No, I’m not sure if I’ll need medical treatment for the pain in my body, I’ll let you know. Okay, thanks for the reference number, I’ll write it down.

Done. And yet not.

Seems that trauma leaves physiological traces not just in the brain but also in the body. Oh…

I remember a little now. Yeah, this is what it was like. I can never remember properly afterwards, the same way you can’t quite recall how painful it was when you broke your arm. You know it wasn’t good, but the details escape you.

Until something happens to open the floodgates. I’m teary. But I don’t realise this, until I’ve been sitting in the dark for about three hours. Tears yes… and fury that looks like fear. I haven’t eaten. I haven’t done anything. Oh right, that disassociation thing… I stop feeling normal at all.

But I am okay. I know that. I know I didn’t die, I didn’t hit my head. I am not seriously injured, but it was close. Another half a meter and I might’ve hit my head on something upright and made of metal. But I am safe now.

And yet I start to hate everything. My body leads the revolt with memories of how it used to respond. Ah… the after-burn of PTSD thanks very much.

Mostly, my mind is not engaged at all in what’s going on. There’s so many reactions and responses going on. Things that make me wary of loud noises. Things that make me move very slowly. Things that keep the tears coming even though there’s nothing to cry about, really.

But it doesn’t stop. I take some homeopathic Emergency Essence (designed for treating shock). Actually I take several times the dose. And I head out on my bike to double check that the world isn’t still trying to kill me.

It’s late, but I find food and I wander around in an attempt to recalibrate my mind. But even once I’m back home eating my Satay Chicken Dinner Box, I’m not okay. See, these things always take time. More Emergency Essence before bed.

Sleep was fragmented and awful at best. And today I am all aches and pains with a side dish of trembling like a leaf.

It shouldn’t be that hard. Yes, the tram driver was a dickhead and I’ve done all I can in that regard. And I am okay, really.

And it’s been almost a year since the worst of my PTSD symptoms vamoosed. Yet a small and relatively harmless incident like this breathes life into the trace elements of my trauma response.

Luckily, I live with a yoga teacher and I hear she’s kinda okay at sorting out physical aches and pains. I’ll find some time for all of that later. Right now I have to go and do family stuff for my sister’s birthday. I’m bringing the cake. And there will be niece cuddles.

And I will be okay eventually…

~Svasti