Perfection in the Personal Paradox

        Hello, again.  I promise I'm still around, and working toward progress.  You'd be surprised at how many drafts from over the years I have sitting there, started but not feeling "right".  But that actually plays well with the idea that I've thought to share for this week.  Let's see if it gets out for you to read!

        It's a little raw, just so you know.  But that's how it's been, lately, and what falls out of my mind is usually filtered through whatever is on it at the time.  Pretty sure that's the way it works for a lot of things, for a lot of people.  Anyway, here we go.

        Recently I was talking to a friend about the way my life has played out, especially recently, and I said something that struck a chord in myself.  Here is the gist:

        I've been working on moving forward with a new, more personal project.  I keep working on it, even though a lot of the time I feel that all I'm doing is lying to myself in order to keep going, and giving myself the illusion of moving forward.  I keep this phony play going even when I know that's all it is, because in reality, it is not in my nature to just give up, lie down, and waste away.  Sometimes I wish I could be more like that, but in reality, it literally hurts me to even try it - physically, mentally, emotionally, and in my general psyche.  So, with energy I do not feel I have and a nearly vacant hope, I keep taking a step at a time toward something I don't believe is even possible, just so that I'll keep believing in the movement.  It is the movement that helps me feel like I've not been lost and thrown away.

It is the movement that helps me feel

like I've not been lost and thrown away.

        Well, there was a bit of a revelation for me.  First of all, yeah, it's been a bit of a dragon to slay, getting through the process of getting all the genetic and other testing done, as the first round of requests have been rejected by the insurance, and the geneticist must resubmit with an appeal in order to hope to be approved to actually do the testing for the genetic diseases he fears I have (which could be life-threatening).  Their office has to do this so often, they have a department specifically for submissions and appeals to insurance companies... but this is NOT a debate about The Great American Insurance Game.  This is just a point along the way, inasmuch as I've been sharing my journey.

        More specifically, it is one of the reasons why I have been feeling drained by both the logistical and pragmatic issues of my life, including the actual symptoms and complications by treatments, prognoses, and whatever else; the effects on my social interactions; my looking toward the future; and then of course the process of grief* itself.  Every, single day I find some new complication, which has become such a norm I feel like I'm on a sinking ship, and all I have is a flare gun to help show people what I've learned, hoping it helps them in some way.  (I suppose I should say *you*.)

        One night I started looking through the many catacombs of quotes I keep handy, and I can't remember which search term I was using - probably "misery", because that was where my head likely was - and when I read this one, it caught me by surprise, for some reason:

[F]or just one second, look at your life and see how perfect it is.
Stop looking for the next secret door that is going to lead you to your real life.
Stop waiting.
This is it: there's nothing else.
It's here, and you'd better decide to enjoy it
or you're going to be miserable wherever you go,
for the rest of your life,
forever.

~ Lev Grossman, The Magicians

        I can't remember how many times I've read it.  I can't remember how many times I've thought it, over the years, but I also can't remember if I've actually put solid words to it.  And here are solid words, black and white (more or less) and read all over, top to bottom and inside and out.

        My friend kindly listened as an unusual, emotional outpouring happened, and the words I tend to not like to say snuck out of me before I could catch them:

"This was not the way it was supposed to happen."

        I tend to avoid saying them because I believe there is no "supposed to" in life.  Things happen, and we can't always prepare for them.  Sometimes a meteor hits the earth and burns a hole in your town.  Sometimes an earthquake sets off a worldwide, catastrophic event.  Sometimes lightning starts a fire that burns thousands of acres of land which you call home.  Sometimes a freak accident rips your loved ones out of your life, and you're the one left to tell the tale.  Sometimes you find out you were born with a genetic time bomb with a very slow, meandering, self-destruct feature and nobody saw it coming.  Stuff happens.  Whatever you wish to call the "source" or "reason" or whatever, I tend to stay neutral about that, here, but... stuff just happens sometimes.

        Maybe I say that because over the past, several years, I've been seeking something.  Balance, perhaps.  The more things have gone haywire, the more I've needed to become calm.

The more pain, the more peace.

The more anxiety, the more serenity.  

The more heartache, the more release.  

        It has become more a search for finding how to hold on by letting go,

                                                      and finding energy through emission. 

        And then I try to explain it to someone and they gently tease me by saying how "Zen" I've become.  For the record, I don't see that as a bad thing, if it means that I am becoming more healthy as my body fails me!

After all, I like to say that Wit and Irony met up and gave life to Paradox,

and that was how and where I started!

        I guess this post is one of those where I start out whining and end up reminding myself that there is a way I keep moving, and I do know there is something in me that will keep moving even when I rail against it!  Which is really why I tell you these stories.  Because I know that someone out there needs to know that they aren't alone in this kind of thing.  I know I've benefited when I've witnessed others come out in their various forms of voices, to stand up and be counted among those of us who are quirky; messy; chipped in places; broken in others; bent like bamboo; pulled like taffy; living unbelievable stories of courage and cowardice, strength and disadvantage; all in one, or all in pieces.  

        And really, we all are.  You wouldn't be reading this if it didn't resonate in some way, hmm? And that is the magnetism of the human heart, which pulls us together and helps us all, if we choose to let it.  We have the power to help us all keep moving.  One step at a time, and if we keep moving together, our steps can become great ones.  

        Sometimes, we can even find a reason for light, love, beauty, and even laughter along the way.  Funny how that happens when we join together in peace.

        Better days ahead, my friends!

(*"The Giraffe's 5 Stages of Grief" video contains comedic bleeped material which may not be suitable for everyone, but still cracks me up for some terrible reason.  Ahem.)