I fully admit that I am the type of person who has trouble”letting it go”. I’m talking about most things…less is more rarely factors into my thought processes and I am a worrier by nature. There are a lot of factors that have led to my inner critic and self deprecating inner voice, none of which are really the point of my blog today…in fact, quite the opposite.
However, I have to begin with talking a bit about stumbling along the self help trail in order to try to “fix it”. This blog has its inception way back in 2017, on the road to Utah, in the middle of a full solar eclipse (weird or significant, depending on your beliefs here) that marked the beginning of the end of a beautiful friendship. At the time I already knew it was done. The road trip was great and we had a blast but we both knew we were at the beginning of the end when we set off that morning. Oh, nothing was said but you just feel those things, you know?
Cut to two years hence, another road trip, another friend and a lot of water under the bridge. I was healing from a significant loss or four and the relationship in question was still eating at me (“they” say that you require about three months for every year you have been in a relationship to get over said relationship) and I was on a roll to get back to where it began/ended to try to “take it back”, to make it mine somehow. I wanted to make new memories to toss out the old, see it with fresh eyes, this place that I always wanted to travel to that had somehow become completely coloured by that past relationship.
Oh, I was gonna fix it alright, right down to camping in the exact same spots, hiking the same trails and I think I intuitively even took similar pictures…without that person in them. Good lord. It’s almost laughable now, how hard I was trying to “let it go”, “process my feelings”. Oh, yeah, I was gonna do it “right”, whatever that means.
I came across a quote, as I scrolled away during my morning coffee today, that I’ve read a few times, and it strikes a chord in me every time I read it. I will credit @theredheadedwitch on instagram, as she is the one that posted this morning. The statement goes like this:
”You are not a constant self improvement project. You don’t always need to be fixing something, working on something else, healing, in order to be a valuable human…you are valuable just as you are, right now!”
Let that sink in a minute.
When was the last time you read a post, talked to an acquaintance, watched a podcast or show that didn’t somehow have something to do with bettering yourself? Get lean, get healthy, still your mind, meditate, be your own best friend, be a better you, improve yourself to improve your relationships…on and on. I don’t know about anybody else out there but sometimes the more I try to improve the more I feel like I’m not very good at much of anything. If I can’t successfully show up for myself (whatever that means) then am I doing my life completely wrong?! Insert face palm here.
I was reminded, reading this, that I had an odd but impactful meeting at sunrise on our last day in Bryce Canyon on that second trip. We had risen early to head down into the canyon to be able to hike in the shade before first light, photographers call it The Blue Hour, full of deep hues and hushed tones. Now, to hike in Utah means that what goes down must come up…it’s all fun and games until you try to hike out of a canyon between mid morning and late afternoon! So, on this last day, we went down before 5:30 am and we were climbing out by around 7:30. it’s a hard climb but nothing I’m not used to…however, the emotional weight of things piled on about halfway up…the tears came, overflowing, driven by the physical exertion and the feeling of leaving this place, again, in a few short hours. By the time I was three quarters of the way up I was sobbing, gasping for air and felt like I was going to die.
I paused, digging for a kleenex and ended up using my sleeve, still trying to get my breath and sobs under control before I hit the top and, in all likelihood, a lot of people watching sunrise (I am NOT a public crier, shudder). A voice, above me called down, “It’s okay, it’s not much farther now, you can do it!” I looked up, spying his white hair and wrinkled face peeping over the cliff edge. My first reaction was indignation that this idiot thought I was out of shape! “I’m fine,” I called back, as I continued to climb, “I’m just working out some stuff…” I completed, as I crested the corner of the switchback and met him face to face. He smiled and put out his hand, touched my shoulder and said, “Radical self acceptance, my dear, you’re fine, you just need to accept yourself completely as you are.” He handed me a kleenex and went on his way. I stood there, in the morning light and tried to compute what that meant…radical self acceptance.
Radical self acceptance. I am valuable just as I am, in this body, right here, right now. I don’t need to fix anything, build anything, make anything, save anyone, get my name in the paper, to be valuable. It doesn’t mean that we don’t have pursuits, goals, dreams and vision but maybe we just give ourselves a bit of a reprieve to just BE now and then, and to realize that we are still of valuable in that simple place of being.
Comments
Thanks Karyn for this… struck a cord for me.