It would be easy to imagine that after a decade of dancing around the May Pole of inner work that I would somehow have this thing figured out, dialed in. And yet, as the streamers untangle, they reveal even more knotted, rotting coils beneath, ones that may have held their breath for years so as not to be detected, shaking with silent laughter, like a child at Hide and Seek.
And wouldn’t you know, all these years on, that I am still surprised at what bastardized hilarities still exist. Hilarities that hinder, hamper, and hamstring. (How’s that for alliteration!) For example, this doozy: I must choose between my own happiness and others’ — there is no room for both. Which leads to this juicy bit: Family Life is a death sentence for the Soul. Geez, dude.
I’ve been unraveling these desiccated bandages of my psyche lately for a purpose I never had before: To attempt to become willing to create a family. Some people call this, Falling in Love, Growing Up, or simply checking off the boxes of Life.
I call it Hanoi.
And so it is my job now to engage with those doubts and fears that tell me a life with others is a life of burden and sublimation. I am to call to the dining table the ashy projection I’ve been worried is my future … and ask her to be willing to see things differently. To introduce her to the parts of me and of the Universe (yes, that one) that are here expressly to help her hold her autonomy and verve and dreams alive, to blow breath into them, to guide her to a new vision of what Fulfillment can look like.
I do not want to be alone as I do my dream work, nor do I want to exchange it for listlessness.
There is another model, another way. And I am sure, without doubt, this new way lies beneath the next layer of ancient, colored crepe.
Owning Voice 