keeping steady

things have been swirling quite a bit in my life lately; large changes are suddenly visible on the horizon. it is both breathtaking and slightly unsettling. i am reminded of a quote from pema chodron’s book when things fall apart: heart advice for difficult times. i once owned the book, but then i gave it away, and unfortunately i can’t find the quote i am thinking of online. but it went something like this: when everything feels like it is falling apart, remember that there is always firm ground beneath your feet, and a constant sky up above.

to be clear, my life isn’t falling apart in any “negative” sense - in fact, the upcoming changes are mostly exciting and invigorating - but nonetheless, circumstances that i’d recently acclimated to are now starting to get uprooted, and so the lesson still feels relevant. whether life is self-destructing or coming together at a dizzying pace, it seems important for me to find something solid to stand on, or a steady reference point to gaze at.

the last time this reminder came to mind was rather spontaneously, during the first of my two hospitalizations for psychosis back in 2013. a therapist or nurse was leading a particularly chaotic arts and crafts session, during which one male patient exposed his penis to everyone sitting in the cafeteria, and another patient, in her third trimester of pregnancy, circled the room while mumbling paranoiacally about president obama. i had been drawing tentatively in the corner with crayons: a stick-figure person next to a house, green grass, and a partly-sunny sky up above. the therapist went around the group asking if we knew any sayings or mantras we could use to soothe ourselves when we felt agitated. that’s when i suddenly remembered the pema chodron quote, although it felt like ages since i had read it. the therapist seemed surprised upon hearing what i could remember of it; i don’t think she had expected such an even-keeled response from someone who had just received an involuntary shot of Zyprexa earlier in the day. eventually she smiled and tacked my drawing up on the bulletin board in the cafeteria.

i am not sure if i have internalized the pema chodron quote any more today than i had in 2013; it still requires noticeable effort to sense the ground beneath my feet. but i am gently hoping that, over time, i will come to feel intuitively anchored in the solid parts of life, without having to remind myself to look for them.

Photo by Annie Spratt on Unsplash