yet another personal-ish essay on the joy of ceasing my fixing
in this second essay, i want to talk about the beautiful truths about freedom from fixing. the first essay felt like a lot of harsh truths and painful realizations, but the more i think about this topic, the more sweetness i find in the process of releasing the reactive process of fixing.
freedom from anticipating the future opens up a lot of energy to be applied elsewhere. i have been delighted to notice that this energy can flow more freely into the present and capacity to be in the moment. the powerful thing about being a person who is present within the nowness of their life is that this enables them to be integrate all the different parts of their personhood. fixing predisposes a person to addressing things regressively or into the future, as if your influence can extend into that time without interacting with your current self for what it is. but presence engages the dynamic energy of a person that allows them to respond to challenges and obstacles as they arise. how lovely it is to be able to engage even with difficult experiences for what they are.
embracing meaning informed by my unique perspective is an experience of joy. the focus shifts from being objectively right in a situation, as a position of power i can lord over others. it becomes far more involved with how i am struggling towards liberation on a day-to-day basis and how linked that struggle is to fully embodying my humanity, embracing the needs of the collective. if my personhood isn’t a fixed state i am required to maintain, the door to a new world is accessible. emergent strategy becomes a way of life. support is allowed to take on different shapes and forms.
responsibility for my self, my life, and liberation for all has taken on an element of invitation. here, i am freed from moving through the restrictive paths that oppressive structures have designed to end me. tending to my being is only a burden if i remain disconnected from the beauty of my nature. it is only a devastation to go through hurt and harm when a person has no tools to express these states, grieve the loss, and repair what requires it. it is a good thing to be alive; it is truly awesome experience to have within oneself the spark of life. i see it as existential affirmation that Life itself required my presence on this earth. without spiritually bypassing the genocidal forces that work against the lives and rightful living of marginalized peoples, without forgetting to acknowledge their active death-bringing that conjures horrific paradigms like “the cost of living,” without glossing over the fact that i will always need to do my part whatever that means during different seasons, the fact that i/we am/are here at all is all the payment i/we need to give to whatever force brought me/us into being. every life-giving, life-nurturing way i bring my essence to connect to the collective, this is only a further gift to the life that has bestowed itself upon me. and i am devoted, by conviction, by choice, and by nature.
so i may not have access to perfection, but i definitely have access to the push and pull, the joy of being whole now. and what a pleasant surprise it is that being whole really means being with the sum of all my parts, even the broken ones or the ones that are missing. wholeness is embracing the tears because that’s how our bodies have learned to respond to pain and despair. wholeness is grieving, “love in a heavy coat,” as the poet Shannon Barry named it. and truly, the fantasy of fixing and finally being fixed excludes many from the frustrating, but ultimately nourishing progress of determining and discerning what equity and liberation actually means in our reality. if this was a once-for-all type of wave, affecting everything, my wisdom is not adequate to say for everyone else what justice actually looks like.
in the first part of this pair of essays, i welcomed myself to my life. and now i want to affirm that there is joy to be found here, even if i was ushered into this space with tears. a major reason why much of existence and society is suffering is because unsustainable ideals have been centered for far too long. (maybe one day, i will write an entire other essay about this, but let’s keep it in passive voice for now.) i am curious about what lies beyond “life is suffering and this earth is a dumpster fire.” i am excited, even if only for this moment, that perhaps life is about a great joyful push towards more abundant life, towards freedom. and i am committed to it, if only to the work of remembering joy in my body and affirming that new worlds are possible always.
Thank you for bearing witness to the joy of this release. Your support is essential; you can share this with a friend. And if you’re feeling generous, and resourced, please feel free to buy me a coffee.
English