I'm carrying over quite a bit of PTO from this year to next and was called out on this by a co-worker. "Your bosses take vacation! You have the time! Do it!" Though vacations are wonderful they make me anxious. Doing nothing brings up huge fears in me. These fears aren't fully formed and I can't say exactly what's bothering me. Not having my hyper-scheduled days planned? Wondering what's happening at home? Typically when I take a vacation someone else suggests dates and it's much longer than I want. I shave a day or two off with an excuse but still get concerned at the length of time. When I arrive it takes me a solid 2-3 days to truly unwind. I may be poolside with a drink in hand but my mind is swirling everywhere trying to regain a sense of control. When I'm busy I feel in control.
I don't think you need to look all too far into my past to see that control and survival are at the core of my busyness. I can only relax at home when truly everything around me is perfection. And it's never perfection. I have no concept of a day watching Netflix or laying in pajamas. Even when I procrastinate, which is much more than you'd expect from me, my mind is going. I'm making mental lists, looking at the time, planning the most efficient way to get things done. I worry constantly that I'm missing something, that I'll drop the ball somewhere, and it will all crash down on me with no one to pick me up.
Even being a yoga and meditation teacher, it takes tremendous effort and will for me to practice what I preach. I go to yoga almost daily and know well how a class ends; you get comfortable on your back or whatever position feels good, get still, breathe. And it's hard. The joke in yoga is that this pose, savasana, is the hardest because you do nothing. I can't just lie down either; I need to set my blocks so they are ready to be put away, wind up my strap, and make sure I can have everything done so I'm first out of the room. Why do I do this? Am I late for something? No, I just need to get the busyness out of my system to allow myself those few moments of stillness.
Staying busy allows me not to think too deeply about what is bothering me. When I'm busy I can avoid the hard questions that lurk in my head. Too much inner thought can take me down scary roads that bring up pain or force me to face the things and take action. Action could mean discomfort, I may need to say yes, say no, accept a hard truth and no longer pretend I don't know.
I'm extremely tired...
I was having a conversation with a friend recently who is working through some hard shit she learned about her past (with her permission: she's adopted and learned she's the product of a rape). A lot to take in for anyone. She said, "I feel like I'll never be done processing." I felt those words. I can't recall a time in my life I wasn't processing something that happened to me, or if I wasn't then I was stuffing down the pain in some unhealthy way.
I do feel processing is a necessary part of being a healthy human. All the people I've met who haven't processed their trauma, "I just don't think about it. I'm fine." are most certainly not fine and they throw up their inner demons on the rest of us. But how long does this go on? For some of us will it never be over?
A friend recently posted this pic that says, "When you can tell your story, and it doesn't make you cry, that's when you know you've healed." I agree as there are terrible stories of my past I can finally tell without crying. I still have feelings towards what happened, I'm not numb, but my emotions are in check in a calm manner. I had a therapist say it a different way, "When you can tell your story the same way you'd talk about the weather then you know you're healed."
There has been another saying going around that didn't quite sit well with me. "Trauma is not your fault but healing is your responsibility." I would carefully say this...Trauma is not your fault. Period. Yes, healing is available and offers hope and freedom. But too often the "your responsibility" part carries unsaid timelines and expectations. Healing comes in waves; you can forgive, go to therapy, do the work and find yourself 5, 10, 15 years later being hit with the trauma from another angle. Though it may appear someone is going on and on about the same tired subject....it's not the same and a new level of processing begins. Ram Dass said, "We are all just walking each other home." And many times that is what is needed more than anything...someone to walk by your side saying, "take all the time you need".
So for those of us doing the work perhaps it's a lifetime of processing. While understanding the pain and sadness of the past will likely lurk back, I'm learning to have happiness in today.
