Where’s the fire?

Tags

auto-immune condition, blinkers, Fire, Hashimoto’s, inflammation, life lessons, moving mindfully, pitta, Slow down, twaaang

Melbourne winter sun...

Fire, you say?

The short answer is that it’s everywhere (inflammation, causing this auto-immune condition of mine) and nowhere (there’s really no need to rush, not even a little bit). Inner fire – too much pitta throwing everything out of whack. Mind fire – going way too fast there, lassie! External fire – stimulus, trying to be where I’m not.

The other answer is that until I learn my lesson, it seems my body won’t quit with the un-subtle hints. I’m trying to develop a sense of humour around the perversity of it all, but it’s tricky sometimes.

*Twaaang*

Monday night, trying to get to the only health food store that stocks my sanity in the form of the anxiety-killing amino acid, L-Tyrosine… *twaaang*. Yep. That’d be the sound of my right calf muscle tearing once again.

Perhaps because I wasn’t moving mindfully. Desperate to get to the store before it shut in the next five minutes, not paying attention. I’d barely started moving faster, but it was enough. Same as before – that split second decision to change my pace and WHAMMY! Right in the calf muscle.

I spent yesterday working from home, barely able to walk or even hop.

Over the weekend just gone I’d been relishing the progress of my calf tear. Things were going well. I was doing gentle yoga, but no balancing on one leg. No running. Not even any extended walking anywhere. I’ve been good to my leg physically, but my mind hadn’t stopped racing ahead.

Wanting to get things done in a hurry. Be better. Be strong again.

Do ya feel lucky, punk?

This morning I read Sarah Wilson’s latest post on the difference between people who consider themselves “lucky” versus “unlucky”. Seems that the more focused and obsessive we get sometimes, the more likely we are to self-combust. In other words take your dang blinkers off, lady!

Be where I’m at. Look around. Don’t be so anxious to get my anxiety-assisting supplement that I’m not paying attention to how fast I’m travelling.

Slow down, and there won’t be a price to pay. Slow down, and smell the roses. Slow down, and be cool with not being the fastest filly in the pack (not that we ever were).

Sometimes I forget my body is sick

When I’m not crippled with an almost empty tank of energy, I can feel okay-ish. Other than an inability to lose weight and maybe the giant dark circles under my eyes, the casual observer wouldn’t necessarily pick it up either. Unless they’re sensitive to energy.

I also forget that I’m getting older and that I’ve been through a LOT spiritually, physically, mentally and emotionally (we write them separately, but they’re all really one and the same, no?).

I’m starting to put the pieces together. My body communicates back to me the things I’ve neglected or not noticed for some reason. It wants to play fetch and it never stops nudging me to throw the ball back. To keep the exchange going.

Listen to the bod!

Many years ago, my body took me on my first unbidden healing journey.

Then it painfully pointed out to me that I needed to get some help for PTSD. I was so dissociated that getting my attention required extra effort.

And now my body is showing me all the hidden inflammation I carry, caused by too much stress and adrenal exhaustion. The first hint was via my regular blood donation – seriously low iron levels? Could be so many things, but I was encouraged to see a doctor and from there, everything else unfolded.

So why does my body have to go to such lengths? Because I’m dropping the ball. Not listening closely enough and/or the connection between mind and body has been severed a little. Not completely, but enough.

Too sick to feel it

Someone once told me that for all the people out there thinking they’re in good health because there’s nothing perceptibly wrong with them, many are not. It’s just that their systems are too backed up for them to notice.

Being sensitive to your body is a good thing, you see.

I mean, imagine a blocked drainpipe in a sink. Add more crap to the stuff that’s already blocking the drain and do you think that makes a difference? Maybe the blockage isn’t noticed until there’s water over-flowing onto the floor. Oh, we say. The drain is blocked!

Yeah, it’s actually been like that for ages and we just never noticed. Until we do. If we’re lucky, that is.

Blessings and lessons

So I see now that I’m actually blessed, even when I feel like crap. Really. Because my illness was discovered early, before I could become irrevocably sick. I just need to stop thinking it should all be over NOW-NOW-NOW.

Instead, I have to pay attention to the lessons my body wants me to learn:

• Self-nurture, self-care and self-love are vital to health and happiness
• Anger, bitterness, regret etc… are all inflammatory for the body and mind
• I’m strongest when I listen to and trust my intuition
• Ploughing headlong into everything without looking around first is never wise, but it’s how I’ve lived most of my life
• I intuitively understand mind and body are not separate and I need to stop treating them that way!
• Moving too fast is what got us into this mess…

Doubtless, there are more. But I’m just gonna deal with what’s in front of me right now before I take my next (careful) step forward.

~ Svasti

How to not confuse a tablespoon with the whole enchilada

Tags

acidophilus, antibiotics, bonfire convention, cranky, ear infection, enchilada, loopy, pitta, queue jumpers, searing hot poker, Snow White, tablespoon, whole enchilada

Okay so every time I think I’m ready to write specific posts, others just come right along and elbow their way in. Freakin’ queue jumpers! Then, occasionally others morph into somewhat different posts, while keeping their original intent. Sort of.

You’ll have to excuse me right now as my pitta zings off the charts and once again I find myself lumped with an ear infection. Not a terrifically soggy and gooey one like the famed Double Whammy Right And Left Side Ear Infections of 2008 but nonetheless. Painful in it’s own glorious way – like a searing hot poker shoved deep inside my ear cavity, as if there’s a wee bonfire convention going on in there. Not to mention the ridiculous lack of energy (sleep? Right now I could sleep for Snow White!) accompanying this bout of joy.

So yeah, Imma little cranky and somewhat loopy. But nevermind, I wanna write something I’ve been meaning to for a while now. This post is both a queue jumper and a long-sufferingly patient work in progress that’s morphed into something else. Sort of.

And it’s about tablespoons and enchiladas.

I mean, we both know they’re quite different, right? A tablespoon holds… a tablespoon’s worth of stuff. An enchilada, as we know, especially if it’s the whole enchilada… holds a great deal more. Right?

What I’m suggesting is that it’s incredibly easy to confuse a tablespoon with an entire enchilada and not even realise that you’re doing it. Because we all do it, even if we don’t mean to. It’s just kinda how things go, until we learn to recognise the qualities of tablespoons and enchiladas.

Generally, it doesn’t matter. Unless it does. Until someone thinks they’re really talking about the whole enchilada when really, they’ve only ever seen the tablespoon. Know what I mean?

No? Okay… well an oft-quoted yoga blogger I know wrote something about it:

Assuming that you know me from reading my blog is a bit like assuming you know Jaimal Yogis or Elizabeth Gilbert because you have read their books, in which they reveal aspects of their internal lives.

Also, another yogi blogger’s recent post is a perfect illustration of how actually, you’re looking at the tablespoon. And even if you get to look at the tablespoon from another angle, it’s still a tablespoon.

So, what’s the tablespoon if it’s not the whole enchilada? Why, it’s an implement to access the goodies contained in said enchilada. Thing is, you can only ever fit so much enchilada onto your spoon at the one time, eh?

Even if the stuff that’s ladled on to the tablespoon is like, super juicy and intense, it’s still only a tablespoonful.

Have I used up all the mileage on this analogy yet?

Whatever. Not so recently but then again not too long ago, someone really thought they were getting the whole enchilada but they were sadly mistaken. What’s worse is that they never, ever took pause to realise they were reacting to the tablespoon and not the enchilada. They didn’t once question themselves, what they thought they were getting or seeing. Which is kinda sad, and a sure-fire way to make sure you’ll never ever get a proper glimpse of said enchilada…

And what I really want to confess to y’all is this:

Right here on my blog you get regular tablespoonfuls of enchilada. But at no time, not ever, do you get the whole thing. Not here. I’d suggest that even IRL (in real life), those enchiladas we think we’re getting 100% of might still be just tablespoon-sized helpings, if perhaps more of them and more often. But still, not 100%.

Really, who ever truly gets to understand their own enchilada entirely, let alone another person’s?

Even though I love to share and perhaps have a bit of a deep-seated need to describe the enchilada in painful details… it’s still never the whole thing. You know?

So, people. Be cool. Recognise that at any time, you’re never being served up the whole enchilada. It should make life easier for you and everyone else you deal with, yeah?

And now it’s time to rest, write up a class plan for tomorrow night (oh yeah, I’ve got a mini teaching gig until the end of November. Also, possibly more teaching lined up for next year!), and uhhh, take both my antibiotics and acidophilus tablets.

Hope everyone is having a better Monday than me!

~Svasti

P.S. It should be noted that I’m a huge fan of enchiladas, and in fact really, really enjoy them with chicken and mole sauce from certain fabulous Mexican restaurants in Melbourne. And, even when I eat whole enchiladas, I get that in fact, it’s never really the whole enchilada. Or something like that! 😉