letter

Dear -----

This is gonna be a rant. So feel free to read at your own convenience. 

 

The other day you reached out, out of the blue to send me love. 

It was really helpful. But I didn’t respond. That morning, I was preparing for what felt like would be a difficult day. Around that same time, I spent 30 minutes meditating in my office and began to cry as I thought of the suffering of all my clients. I saw images over and over in my mind, of the universe, splitting apart and coming together, collision and division, creation and destruction, but which was which, was totally beyond me. It was beautiful. Breathtaking. And hard to bear so much sadness. 

 

I have been trying to meditate more often. Getting into a good heart space. It’s odd how when I am not in that space, I am very resistant to it. But when I get back to it, I am open to the world, and yet… find it difficult to relate with other people. More on that later. 

 

On Friday my coworker who I was basically work-partners with for the last year, had her last day. She had been burned out for months, so it wasn’t that big of a surprise. But she told me the previous week, and this week we are on spring break, so it was an abrupt change. It will be even harder when we go back, we were already short staffed and so now we will have to take on additional jobs to cover for her position. On top of that, many of the students depended on her for better or worse. She isn’t a very open communicative person, so it was difficult to be partners. At the same time, we transitioned to telehealth shortly after I took the job, so without direct supervision, in many ways I relied on her to teach me the job. 

 

Her position was the Mental Health Worker -which basically means someone with a BA who doesn’t really know what they are doing. Not enough training, and they are thrown into the mix to take all the little jobs that the higher ups don’t have time for. My coworker often spent her time fixing the computer links and making sure the desks were 6 ft apart to be in compliance. 

In the last few months, I had a lot of internal frustration with her, because as she burned out, it was apparent that it was impacting the kids (and making my job harder). In the best case, she was neutral. She would watch tv and movies (day after day) with them and ask them to find examples of the skills she was supposed to be teaching. In the worst case, she was simply delaying their timeline at day treatment, not really doing harm. But how to remedy that? No idea. I tried to talk with her, but even when we created plans she wouldn’t follow through for very long. EG, students should create goals on Monday and check back throughout the week. They would half-ass the goals on Monday, making them meaningless, and she would collect them and put them in a folder on her desk never to look at them again (makes no sense, right?). The thing I found more frustrating was that she would often insist the kids had the skills to self-regulate, but without teaching them any skills to self-regulate, or coaching them into it. She would give them worksheets, but never go over it with them to ensure they understood. It was kind of like in Guatemala when they asked us to show that we could create an excellent test, regardless of whether the kids could pass it. Felt very meaningless. Anyway, her job devolved into a sort of babysitter role during quarantine, and she was never able to get it back on track even when we were back to full time in-person. 

So it was her last day, and I felt all this pressure to support the students in honoring her, while simultaneously feeling somewhat glad she was leaving. Additionally, I felt like I had to hold some of the space for her… having known burnout from a job you feel attached to, it’s an odd mix of feelings and afterwards you feel like you’ve lost some part of yourself. The push-pull of wanting to hold space, and also acknowledge my own shit, is frustrating to me. I can handle that for the kids, but I find it irksome as shit to do it for my coworkers, and lately, I am realizing that all my coworkers are all too human. We are the same as the kids. Where are the adults? No idea. T

he more difficult thing for me is managing my own anxiety, thinking about next week when I have to plan two graduations from Day Treatment (which I have not done before), and prepare speeches and get the kids ready and all that, without a partner. I want to celebrate their achievements, but I can’t encompass a year worth of growth into a 30-minute event. I don’t want it to feel like a kick out the door, but it is. I am sure it is just my little worries, and that it will all turn out fine once I drop my perfectionism. They won’t even remember the speeches, just the feel after all. But it saddens me to realize I don’t have control over that. 

 

So, then I spent the whole weekend by myself. 

Not really talking or reaching out to anyone, it was sort of selfishness, a desire to give back to myself, and also a fear of not being enough for others. I’ve found myself in that space a lot these last few decades. I don’t like the scarcity mindset but I am there a lot. What is difficult is that when I am not in it, I almost jump to the other extreme (which happened this weekend). 

 

I thought of you a lot over the weekend, but still didn’t reach out. I pictured you and your decisions, those enormous universe changing decisions, and I didn’t know what to say. Sometimes it was the scarcity, but then there were other times when I just felt like moss growing on a rock. Like, a witness to the changing landscape. I have nothing to add, life is what it is. I don’t have any responsibility to it, other than to be the moss that I am… does that make sense? 

 

Sometimes when I am out walking, or when I am meditating, I get into this weird state where everything is in its right place. I will look at a collection of different trees. Some with branches shooting straight up, others out sideways, others twisting like veins, and others hanging. And there is this weird feeling like they all matter equally. They are all miraculous, and their varying forms are what make the universe whole. The dead tree and the new sapling are all sacred. The tree with leaves, each leaf fluttering differently in the wind, each reflecting the sun light in a unique way, each bug bite on the leaf, each chlorophyll cell, each atom, everything is perfect. There is nothing to change, nothing to be pained by, except the awe. The awe is painful sometimes. I walk around and look at each winter coat, each strand of grass, each face, each dog, and everything is a reflection of G-d. It will change, it will grow and die, and each is in its right place. Each its journey, flowing perfectly. 

 

Sometimes I get scared by this feeling. Rather, I often get scared of this feeling, because I want it to last forever. 

It doesn’t. I get called back by a sudden ache in my feet, or a thirst, or a sugar level drop. I get called into familiar drama in my mind. In planning. In grocery lists. In thoughts of myself, my disconnection from others…

Sometimes I struggle to get back to it. I think, what if I just left all this life behind? Took up my monk robes. Went out. And it’s funny because I day dreamed of doing this as a child all the time, and I still do anytime I get a break. I joke with friends that if I didn’t have a sex drive, it’d be easy to be a wandering monk, following the miraculous. Staring at everything and everyone with a slight grin on my face. 

 

But I’d be lonely too. That’s the thing that often strikes me. When I am in that space, I feel completely part of the universe. I walk with my head high, I feel purposeful without specifics. I feel like I can trust in everything, that my follies, mistakes, sins are all part of the journey. Meant to be, karmically entangled to teach me of the unity of being, and so nothing is bad or wrong, just a breath in, a breath out. 

But despite being so fluidly part of the universe, a drop in the river, surrounded by every other drop in the river, I am also… sad. Mostly just lonely. I want to hold hands with another drop of water. I want to feel connected in a visceral way, even while connected in this universal… and I can’t do both. In a poem I wrote a few years ago I called it being tantalused (tantalized) but reaching in both directions and unable to obtain either. A sort of crucifix metaphor I suppose.  

When I am in my state of awe, I look around at these faces, and I assume they think I am high, that nothing I say matters, that I am a crazy person with my fuzzy face, my long hair, my piercings, my offcast gaze… they must assume I am high.  I feel high. I find everything amusing. I am high on something. But why can’t I share this high?  Why do I feel outcast in the midst of feeling everything is perfect? 

And then suddenly my mind shifts to every little criticism I have of myself, its why can’t I trust and celebrate with others when they experience it? Why am I curmudgeon who doesn’t actually like anyone? Why am I so judgmental? If everything has its right place, why do I hold grudges, why am I jealous, why am I so anxious to control… why can’t I just connect. Why do I have dozens of people whose calls I mean to respond to… but I don’t. Something isn’t right. I am not right. I must be… not ok. 

And I travel back and forth between these polar opposite feelings, but in both cases, I don’t feel the firm grip of connection. Don’t feel truly rooted nor dispersed in the universe. Caught between them always trying to reach in both directions.    

 

I had this thought that I might only have 20 or so years left. Sometimes that kind of idea freaks me out, but it was really helpful actually. It put a cap on things.  What will I do with the next 20 years? What are my actual priorities…?

 

Recently my boss asked me if I would like to apply for a different position, what could be similar to a promotion, but a slightly different track. I said I’d been considering it, but it didn’t feel right. The job would combine some of the things I like to do, create curriculum, support new staff, still do some of the therapist stuff.  But it feels like I can do all of those things without the job title and responsibilities I dislike. Even if they offered me a raise of 10k (which they wouldn’t), would it be worth it?  I don’t know. That’s not the reason I do things. 

I have a hard time imagining myself doing this job in a few years. Probably by the time I am 40, I will want to move on. For my own growth, I’ll need something different. I don’t know what that will be. Maybe monkeying around. Maybe being a monk. 

 

Is it reasonable to want kids if I only have 20 years left? Does it matter if it is reasonable? Should I do a job where I caretake others for the next 20 years Or should I go adventure some more. Should I learn to play music, write a book, keep a blog, run a community center… I dunno. In my awe state, I don’t have answers but anything that comes up is accepted. If I end up doing nothing, that’s acceptable too. If I run the course and stay the way I am, that’s fine. If I become someone new, that’s cool too. 

 

**** I had to go to work, and didn’t return to this for a few days. 

In the meantime, you told me things had changed for you?  I am curious. I want to know all the things!

 

 

Today was a weird day. I had supervision and had run out of things to say. So I told my supervisor I want to talk about the anxiety I feel around the graduations. I told her how its triggering anxiety in me, and how I have responded. And she said basically, of course, your adult-self responds effectively to that, you’re fine. But that fear that comes up, what’s that about? And I said, some desire to honor the kids, honor the relationship, some perfectionism, some desire to make everything perfect and control for everything, to do it well, to not cross lines accidentally, hold everything for everyone… and she kind of called me out on using these terms like “control” and “perfectionism” to mask the fear underneath, and mentioned that I should probably be in therapy for whatever that is.  

It was kind of brutal. Helpful, but hard. My inner little kid got sensitive. Her phrasing made me question a lot of things, and I went to one of those core belief charts and basically did a little analysis on myself. I really struggle with many of the core negative beliefs. Most of the shame/guilt, some of the survival stuff. It’s not just one. It’s fear of abandonment, of being alone, of not being good enough, incapable, unlovable, outcast, bad/evil, etc etc. I think in part, that is why it is so easy to relate to others, but also why I have a difficult time believing people relate to me. 

Anyway, it left me a little shook up this afternoon. Because I think in 99.9 % of ways, I have learned to be effective and productive and “good” at what I do. But what she was pointing out, is that’s my survival strategy, not simply because I care or am invested (most likely both). And I know this is true. I think about it a lot. It comes up every time I have to make a decision that involves another person. 

And of course, because she was concerned, it made me question everything.  Why do I do any of the things I do? Is it just because I am afraid I will be punished, outed as bad, unlovable, the worst?  If I am doing things because of these fears, does that make it bad? Am I less reliable than I believe myself to be? Am I just projecting on everyone all the time? Am I the one sabotaging all of my relationships?!? Will this fuck up all my clients?

And unfortunately… its true on some level. 

The shame is so pronounced, that I alternate between total heavenly zen (and somehow totally self-aggrandizing in it- and avoidant of relationships) to total shame-blame (and again totally self-oriented and avoidant). Neither of which can really be my true self -which I assume is somewhere in the middle and without so many hindrances getting in the way of relating to others... less certainty, more existing in relationship without so many thoughts. Just acknowledging everything is fine… not amazing, not horrible. It’s fine. It’s just as it always has been. 

 

But I think I have recreated the world that I felt as a child again and again. One in which I get positive attention for being responsible, and avoid disappointing others directly through withdrawing, not asking for my needs to be met, not taking risks to be my true self. And I think the world has responded to me in kind. Saying, yeah you seem alright, we won’t worry too much about you. 

I think I want to change this, and I don’t really know how. I think I was hoping that by putting myself in a better heart space more often, I would naturally shift out of it. But I don’t know. 

I don’t really know if it matters either.

 

What have you learned about yourself or the universe lately?