Augustine: Reflecting on a moment of peace

 Dear Athena,

I have a childhood friend visiting with his wife and kids from out of town. They asked if I would meet them at the recreational center pool to meet his kids. It felt strange going back into this building I haven't been into for so many years. I'm living in my parent's house again now and it reminded me of how I would go there daily to work out after work. They don't have me in their system anymore but they gave me a day pass.

 

I had spent all morning in bed. Trying to get out of it, knowing I should send some cover letters and resumes, but feeling too anxious to do much of anything. I had a conversation with another friend on the phone and I tried to feel alright, and it was okay. I at least got out of bed and took another shower, worked out for 30 minutes before ending up back in bed as my mom listened to some talking heads say nothing on tv.

 

Seeing him again and spending time with his kids, I thought would make me feel anxious, but I just felt loved. I felt all the fear and terror of living fall away. I came home and my dad was making hamburgers and I didn't feel the impending sense of dread that has become a daily experience.  I had applied for a job near this friend and I thought about what it would have been like to move close to him. To be feel near close friends again. I feel like I felt over last summer during the pandemic, all the stress fell away and I felt "untraumatized." I was about to slip into another binge watching of youtube videos and I told myself that I wanted to write this out. That I needed you to know that I felt joy sometimes as well. I need me to look back and know that I felt joy and believe that I can feel it again. I feel like I've been waiting my whole life to be happy, I guess what I mean is I've waited my whole life to feel secure. I could own where I lived, I could make money enough to feel safe. That dream feels like it has been slipping away ever since this job became intolerable, but at least what I know to be true, what I remember to be true, is that I was never going to breathe again while I was there. I want to cultivate a life where I feel peace. I realize that it comes from inside mostly, but I also know that I have to find somewhere that doesn't feel like it is impossible.

 

We've gone through so much in the last few months that has felt like a referendum on who we are and our value. I feel like I've lost sight of the idea that I could be whole again. That it still existed as a possibility. I'm trying to practice more gratitude. I saw a video of a 50-something gay man who laughed at all the gay men afraid of turning 30.; all of his friends were dying before 30 during the AIDS epidemic. What is true as of now, won't always be true into the future. I have not lost my capacity to keep searching. The future will hold new trials, but in time I will look back on these ones and they won't hurt so deeply. But the love I felt during these times will still persevere.

 

With all the love and peace,

Augustine

 

Augustine: writing for a life I don't know yet

Dear Athena,

I'm out of bed before 9am, spending money I probably shouldn't on food that I probably ought not to eat. I've chatting with Liz, the server, about DnD and shared my mario kart d&d rules with her. I'm wanting to start doing resumes and cover letters, but it puts me in the wrong headspace. Taylor Tomlinson was talking on Pete Holmes podcast about morning pages and I want to write more. To put myself in a head space for the rest of the day. I looked up some prompts and maybe on other days they are the thing I should write to, but today, the only thing I can think to ask myself is what is it that I want to tell Athena? What is it that I want to tell myself? For myself I just want to "solve" the joblessness, but I thought this morning about how I'm always unable to lose weight so long as there is another problem to solve in my life. My body goes into "crisis management" and it's been living there even as I've been looking. I want to "solve" for this Thursday's interview at Boulder or make a plan for what comes after that falls apart. It's all part of the thinking and the chatter, it's not that I shouldn't do it, it's that I will get part of the way through it and find myself burned out and needing to recover. Letting go, it comes after 'avoidance', 'scapegoating', and 'fixing it.' It is 'acceptance' of how things will be.

 

“The fears that assault us are mostly simple anxieties about social skills, about intimacy, about likeableness, or about performance. We need not give emotional food or charge to these fears or become attached to them. We don’t even have to shame ourselves for having these fears. Simply ask your fears, “What are you trying to teach me?” (Richard Rohr)

 

I'm afraid of losing the ability to tell a story of my life that I am happy with. That everything will just become pain, exhaustion, and loss. I'm afraid that our society will construct a day to day life so miserable that I don't want to live it.  But…but…BUT I've already been there, I am there now some days. I was there while I was working. I'm so afraid of losing work and housing outside of my parents and that I'm somehow "falling behind" because if it gets bad enough then my life won't be worth living, but I already thought of my life as bad enough to not be worth living.

I can hold onto all these tangible achievements and I can still lose the story of the life that I want to live. It already feels like a ship on the horizon, routinely moving on without care or notice of me, in need, on my life raft. The only thing I have is to let it go. Maybe I'll still be "rescued" by a ship, and yes I can still shout and wave my hands when one passes by. But largely, it will be the currents and shipping lanes that determines if and when I am spotted. What is left to me while adrift?

 

“All great spirituality teaches about letting go of what you don’t need and who you are not. Then, when you can get little enough and naked enough and poor enough, you’ll find that the little place where you really are is ironically more than enough and is all that you need. At that place, you will have nothing to prove to anybody and nothing to protect.

That place is called freedom. Such people can connect with everybody. They don’t feel the need to eliminate anybody . . .” (Richard Rohr)

 

You do not need to be good. I do not need to be good. We do not need to walk on our knees for a hundred miles through the desert repenting.

Love,

Augustine

 

Athena: Verbal Processing

Augustine,

I know you know this because we spoke on the phone today, but for posterity's sake...I found out today that I didn't get a job that I applied for. A job that I was more than qualified for (my previous position, just on a different team), where I knew the hiring manager very well--she's a long-time friend as well as a colleague.

What hurt the most is how personal the feedback felt--though I know it was given with the very best of intentions. I spoke too fast. I needed to pause longer for questions [though...I did]. Though this wasn't mentioned, I think that I really would've been better to have more explicit visual aids--they weren't required but I think it would have have helped. I found this out an hour and a half before another interview for a distinct position on the same broader team. The position that felt like more of a stretch for me, that I figured I would be less qualified for. Now all I can think about is how badly I feel like I flubbed that interview too.

I'm too much. My thinking is...jumpy. It's connected, but I don't always spell out all the pieces every time my brain makes connections because it moves too fast for me sometimes. I love context so sometimes I want to give that background for an example and I feel like that makes me long-winded. Or rambly. And this time I felt like I was so vague in some of my responses so as to not be helpful. I feel. sunk.

I know that I need to move past this. That whatever happens, today's interview is in the past. Me not getting the first job I applied to is also in the past. It can't be undone or redone or fixed. But I'm prone to ruminating.

Why wasn't I enough? Why does my mind work like this? Why is it that I know the importance of thinking before speaking and collecting my thoughts so that I can seem poised but as soon as I'm asked a question I panic or get so excited that I can't stop? My mind can't stop, it never seems to stop. Isn't this a strength as well as a weakness? My mind can dart quickly and make connections where they might not occur to other people. I can flit through a problem and visualize all of the different pieces, playing it through. Why couldn't they see that? Why can't I explain that better? Why can't I rein myself in? What if I fail here too? What if I don't feel and I occasionally have to work with team members who...it feels like judged me. Didn't want me for something that just...I don't know. It could be a big deal, maybe they just didn't understand me at all, couldn't see the ideas through my words. But I didn't think I was so bad as to be incomprehensible. Maybe I'm losing self-awareness. I need to do better. I need to consider this feedback and grow from it. I don't feel ready to do that yet. But maybe tomorrow I will.

I could write for longer. Sometime I should, maybe it would help. I should write until my fingertips have poured out all of the thoughts in my head (Would there be an end? Or would I just end up going in circles?). And then I should pare it back. But honestly...in writing I'm given the gift of time. I've wrangled all my thought sheep before leading them out of the pen--it takes me awhile to do it, but I do that before I ever start typing. Spoken words are different. Even if I take a pause as soon as my mouth opens I end up at the mercy of the connections that my brain makes, thoughts that trace and trip through my lips.

Today, I feel sad. I still did the interview anyways and I tried my best even if I feel badly about it now. Tomorrow, I will focus on my thesis. I will pour myself into something else, something that feels positive instead of soul-crushing, even if it also feels a little bit daunting. Maybe the day after I will begin to figure out a way to make myself fit. To figure out how I'm going to pare and prune the thought trees that spring up at the easiest spark. To focus. To make myself fit in the ways that I need to in order to feel better about myself in front of others. I will practice and practice and practice until I can fake it. And I will keep the soft, rambly, connected core of myself and protect it. I will cherish it and hide it, keeping it only for the people whom I can entrust it to. Maybe it doesn't fit, maybe this is one way that I am not enough in this moment at this time. But I can save that part of my heart for a team that I've built trust with, who will see beyond the weaknesses and to the strengths embedded within.

+Athena

Athena: 70 Pound Packs

My dearest Augustine,

For some reason, a memory came to mind tonight that I haven't thought about in years--and I don't know that I've ever really paused to reflect on it. I was reading some articles on LinkedIn about setting boundaries, delegating, etc, when all of a sudden I flashed back to La Vida.

My group was pretty small--six of us plus our two sherpas. There were a total of three guys in our group, the rest of us were women. And before we made our packs the very first time, our head sherpa made a point of emphasizing that we should "make sure to take our fair share" when packing.

Of course, me being me, was so worried about making sure that I was taking my fair share that I did. And more. I don't remember why the number stuck in my head, it may be totally inaccurate, but later that same sherpa was like, "Goodness, why do you have a 70 pound pack?"

Within maybe an hour of hiking on the first day, I had an asthma attack and needed to take my inhaler because I had taken way too much weight in my pack. The sherpa realized this after having said asthma attack and then we re-distributed again. I can't remember if he asked why I had taken so much, but of course it was because I was worried.

Worried about being a failure. Worried about not pulling my own weight. Worried about inconveniencing the people I cared about, though I only barely knew them at that moment in time. Worried that I wasn't doing enough.

I feel like somewhere there are "normal" people who hear the sherpa's words and go, "Okay, will do!" and somehow can figure out what is appropriate. And maybe they take a little more than their fair share, but they don't try and take 20 pounds more. They understand their limitations and they take that into account.

I have never been that person. I don't know how to be that person.

Instead, I am the person who will way overload myself because I so deeply fear not being enough. Or causing work for somebody else. At times it can be paralyzing or I can get myself into really unhealthy situations. Honestly, that was a large part of what happened at work--with the added complication that the workload was unrealistic in general. But I took on the stress of it more than I probably needed to, because...maybe if I could do that and stress and figure it all out, I could help. I could figure out some miracle ot make sense of it later on down the road.

I didn't. I couldn't. Instead, I left. And some days it feels like the most utterly selfish thing I've ever done, but I also know that it was absolutely necessary.

I don't know that I can not be a person with a 70 pound pack. I don't know that I'll ever be able to hear some scolding or guidance and not think it's somehow directed at me and panic that I'm not doing enough and double-down.

But there won't always be another person to recognize my overloadedness who can help me stop, take a breath, and then re-distribute the load for me though I insist I'll make it. I need to start learning to advocate for myself. And I need to know that I'll have a listening ear on the other end.

+Athena

Athena: Holding Hands on the Way Down

Dear Augustine,

In your last letter, you wrote:

 

A time passes though and I find the time spent falling to be boring but also luxurious. A solitude to the air rushing past me and now just a curiosity as to what will happen when I land. "What is at the bottom of all this? Who is to say?" Left to my thoughts for long enough and I can begin to recognize and categorize them. The fear of the landing, the wondering of what it will be like at the bottom, the desperation of wishing I was still grasping to the top, the anger at everyone who didn't prevent this from happening, the dual self-loathing and pity for now being here, the enjoyment of being in a freefall and all the fun I can have while it lasts. Pema Chodron would call this all "thinking;" to "touch the chatter and let it go."  Anne Lammott would help me to visualize it as the mice that won't top chattering in their glass jars; "Turn up their volume for a moment, hear it all, then turn it all down." I don't remember what Madeleine would say, but I'd imagine she would have me sit by a babbling brook in her circle of quiet and give me a happy buddha to look at. I find myself at this moment of falling feeling grateful to all the women who have found themselves falling before. No particular thoughts, but a warm sense of compassion for myself knowing they would have the same.

 

We pray to Alice, the patron saint of those who are find themselves endlessly falling, that we may find ourselves bored of the terror and chatter of our own fears. That we may consider and then let go of all the things that led us to be here and become curious and unafraid of what lies for us at the end of it. We pray to find compassion for ourselves in the falling enough that the air that rushes past will become as a soft support as we drift to sleep.

 

Reading these words were certainly a suckerpunch in the feels, in the sense that this is another moment where I can only say, "Yes. Me. Too." All I could think of when I read this was that scene between Danny and CJ on The West Wing where he suggests that if he's going to jump off a cliff and she's going to be pushed off, maybe they could hold hands on the way down. That sense of solidarity and companionship is perhaps why I cried in both happiness and sorrow when I found out that you too had left. Sorrow for all the stress that you and I are both enduring, but joy that we're not along in it.

It feels exactly like falling, and that was the metaphor that had come to my mind so often in my last days. Especially because I didn't want to leave, and it seemed like there might be opportunities for me to stay were it not for bureaucratic hurdles. Part of me wanted to say, "Yes, I recognize that I am the one who chose to leave. But I chose to leave because I had no other choice. And aren't I worth fighting for? Can't you prevent this from being a necessity? Would you not move this boulder to keep me?"

I let go of my grasp on the cliff face hoping that I'd find a handhold a few places down. That I might be falling but it would be temporary, and that I might figure out a way to climb back up the cliff face sooner rather than later.

I'm still falling. 

And it's the uncertainty of feeling like I don't even know if there are handholds, and wondering whether or not I should just grab for the first one that I see [What if it crumbles in my hands? What if I fail again?] or keep falling for a little while longer.

These past two weeks I've just not wanted to get out of bed. I have work that I can do, but I feel so lazy. I feel so lost and can't' seem to navigate through what I'm feeling or find the words to put to it. Nothing more than just..."sad". I'm grateful that I have school work that I can [and should] be focusing on. I haven't been as diligent as I need to be about getting ahead on things, but I hope that I can change that pattern over the next two weeks. I have work for my class and work for my thesis that I can get started on. And I think I'll be excited about it if I can really just get into it. I'm worried about the loneliness of it though--reading by myself. Getting excited about scholarship and struggling to find ways to share it with other people.

And there's a part of me that is kicking myself so much through the laziness of things. I am so lucky to be able to have time right now. Yes, I am worried about money, but I also know that I will be okay for months. I know I have a safety net in my parents if push comes to shove, I know that I won't be homeless or wanting for food. That makes me so lucky, and it's something that gave me the space to let go of the cliff face instead of hanging there forever and risking a nervous breakdown.

I feel like I'm squandering my luck which makes me feel more guilty. Isn't this what I always wanted? Time to pursue learning that interests me? Space to breathe and reflect? And I'm...I'm not using it well enough and I know that I'll regret it later. But I don't know how to navigate the unstructured...falling of it all. I'm tilting and twisting upside down and round in circles and I feel like I just need a bearing. I just need hands to grab to say, "You're not alone in this. You're falling but I'm here with you." I know that I'll be okay, I know that I won't be crushed on the bottom. And I am so so so lucky to know that. I just need to work on getting my bearings. On remembering that I already have hands to hold. I just need to reach out and grab on.

+Athena

Athena: #same

Dear Augustine,

Oh, for me it's most certainly been the several years of silence. Not just on this blog, but everywhere. I have not been writing. I have not been reflecting in a sustained and meaningful way--though I have sometimes yearned to do so--I have been. Close to drowning. Treading water in an ocean where wave after wave keeps hitting me and all I can do is think about how to survive the next one. I do and then I know another wave will be coming soon. It has been a month since I resigned and I still have not really and intentionally made the space that I've needed to, in any sustained way, to breathe.

That will need to be my goal for this upcoming Thursday, I think. Now that I have finally gotten to a better place with school work. Or at least am in the lull between finishing everything I was behind on and needing to aim towards the bigger projects that will be coming at the end of the term.

Yes to being on the same team. Yes to feeling that same pain alongside you and with you, because some days it is such an utter ache. My former boss responded to an email I had written, the evening after I spoke to you, and said something like, "We didn't take a chance on you. We recognized that you belonged. You still do, even if you're not here," and I let out a breath that I didn't know I was holding. I have read and re-read those words at least a dozen times in the past three days.

Yes to needing an organizing mythology (and Joseph Campbell has been on my list forever and ever and I need to actually read the book I own of his. I can't remember if it's Hero of a Thousand Faces or another text of his, though.

---

[Picking this back up a week later]

Yes to all of it. We just spoke on the phone about the dream of "educational consultants", but I thought I'd capture some things here too. Yes, yes, yes, to that. Though I don't want to own my own company ;). But I just like the idea of working with students one-on-one and helping guide students so that they can be the best possible versions of themselves.

What would it look like to build something like that in an equitable and accessible way--so that students of all backgrounds could benefit from it? Would would it take to make that a reality?

I'm so grateful that you are with me on this journey,

+Athena

Augustine: Falling

Dear Athena,

I found this quote in a book think you would enjoy reading, Aristotle and Dante Discover the Secrets of the Universe.

"Do you remember the summer of the rain… You must let everything fall that wants to fall." - Karen Fisher.

 

I'm staying at my parent's this week while they are out of town. It's strange to have so much time and space to myself. I usually have plenty of time to myself at the house with the guys, but that is crafted and means staying in certain areas or negotiating space even if we do it with our awareness instead of words. Here, I walk move from room to room with no hesitation I'm about to come upon someone. There is no need to be anywhere or feeling that I shouldn't take up a space. It's so freeing to feel entirely able to follow a whim or desire and there be no one else to offend. My heart clinched up when I first came down to the house and moved some of my boxes in, when I realized I would start living here again and won't know when I move out. It felt like a sign of failure, an embarrassment. I spent all day exercising thinking I'd be able to burn it off, but my dreams last night were about my old job.

 

I woke up this morning and got out of bed. That may not seem like an amazing feat, but usually I spend time inoculating myself to being awake with some type of social media. It's like escapism for having woken up in my own body with my own problems. But today I went down and made coffee and let the dog out. I didn't have to question how many people I would make coffee for, or whether I could sit and read on the deck, or if I needed to pick up everything when I was done. I thought about what "I needed to do today" and looked at my list, but realized that it could be whatever I felt until later this evening when I have dinner and art projects with a friend. I didn't even mean to start writing this till another reflective thought struck me. I've already had a month off, but there is something about finally being alone that has allowed to appreciate the lack of productivity. There is no one to witness it and therefore it can just 'be' without judgement. I imagine that I was grasping the edge for so long, knowing that once I let go I would begin to fall so I held tighter and harder. But no one can go on holding forever. So I let go and I've been terrified of the fall and what happens when I land. "How could you let go?" Trying to find ways to still hold on "What if you can tried holding differently, or yelled once more for help?" when the edge is gone, out of sight, but still cutting up my mind.

 

A time passes though and I find the time spent falling to be boring but also luxurious. A solitude to the air rushing past me and now just a curiosity as to what will happen when I land. "What is at the bottom of all this? Who is to say?" Left to my thoughts for long enough and I can begin to recognize and categorize them. The fear of the landing, the wondering of what it will be like at the bottom, the desperation of wishing I was still grasping to the top, the anger at everyone who didn't prevent this from happening, the dual self-loathing and pity for now being here, the enjoyment of being in a freefall and all the fun I can have while it lasts. Pema Chodron would call this all "thinking;" to "touch the chatter and let it go."  Anne Lammott would help me to visualize it as the mice that won't top chattering in their glass jars; "Turn up their volume for a moment, hear it all, then turn it all down." I don't remember what Madeleine would say, but I'd imagine she would have me sit by a babbling brook in her circle of quiet and give me a happy buddha to look at. I find myself at this moment of falling feeling grateful to all the women who have found themselves falling before. No particular thoughts, but a warm sense of compassion for myself knowing they would have the same.

 

We pray to Alice, the patron saint of those who are find themselves endlessly falling, that we may find ourselves bored of the terror and chatter of our own fears. That we may consider and then let go of all the things that led us to be here and become curious and unafraid of what lies for us at the end of it. We pray to find compassion for ourselves in the falling enough that the air that rushes past will become as a soft support as we drift to sleep.