SARAH WOLF | WRITER, READER, GAMER
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My Inner Worlds
Two weeks ago I had a dream. Laid out on a tray in my kitchen were bananas, broccoli, potatoes, and something else wholesome that I don’t recall. Resting in front of me on the counter was one pomegranate cut open to expose the seeds. When I woke, I felt these foods would be helpful for me to eat at this time. “This time” being one of a major allergic reaction where my eyes have swollen half-way shut and look like I got punched in the face. Am I being dramatic? Only slightly. Prednisone helped, but I've stopped taking it after four weeks of being on that weight-gaining steroid (seriously, it makes me eat). I still have a bottle of the pills just waiting for me to get desperate enough to pop them. Nine days without them and my eyes look as bad as they ever have. I won’t post a picture because it’s not attractive. In my OCD ways, though, I snap a picture every morning to photo-journal the progression of this rogue allergy I can’t figure out. My eyes have swollen and burned for no apparent reason exactly three times in my life. The first time was in my mid-twenties when I worked in the tax department of a very large, well-known company that I won’t name. The office environment was toxic and filled with the presence of a sexual predator who eventually got a promotion because enough of us women complained to HR. And no, I don’t recommend this path for your own career progression. My eyes come into the story because I got this “rogue allergy” that wouldn’t go away and whose cause couldn’t be determined. I got relief by taking mega medicine that knocked me out cold so I had to stay home from work. Oddly enough, I’d get better after a day off. I finally learned the pattern that after two days in the office, my eyes swelled shut so I’d have to take the pills and stay home. Once that knowledge kicked in, I found a new job and the allergy went away. Fast forward seven years and the same allergy returned. Matt and I had separated, so my emotions were running high. I also gave up sugar for good at this time—it was a barrier between Matt and me, as any addiction is in a relationship. My eyes swelled, burned, itched, and basically drove me mad. My traditional doctor didn’t believe me about the reactions I experienced when I ate sugar, so I sought out a naturopath and went through a cleansing diet. If you’ve never done a cleansing, you are blessed. I hate them because all the toxins stored in the body come out and make life miserable. But I was already miserable and figured it couldn’t get any worse. Matt and I had seen the movie The Mothman Prophecies, where people had red burning eyes from exposure to this mythological (or not) creature. Pulled by this clue that maybe I had run into Mothman, I read the book and researched into this phenomenon. And here is where my memories end. Somehow my eyes healed without me doing anything specific. Was it the cleansing diet? Was it reconciling with my husband? Did Mothman stop surreptitiously visiting my house while I slept? I’ll never know. Because I don’t have any idea how this reaction cleared in the past, I’m following all the weird clues in my life. As I write this, I’m eating pomegranate seeds and beseeching the lord of the underworld for mercy. [Public service announcement: if you are experiencing an allergic reaction, please see a doctor. I don’t mention it above because it isn’t humorous, but I am seeking medical care and will continue to do so until my eyes are back to normal.]
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It’s been nine weeks since my last official check-in regarding my yoga practice. I’ve learned that the summer months allow for more time at the studio because my job gives me flexibility during that season. Now that year-end approaches, my work demands my attention. By the time January 1 rolls around, almost all my waking hours will be devoted to my vocation. It sucks, but I love my job and the slow summers make up for winter’s hard work. I’ve just pulled back from five classes per week at Raleigh Yoga Company to only three. I’ll practice Yin at home as my schedule allows, but I can’t do Bikram without the hot room and an instructor taking me through the twenty-six poses. The past several weeks have been difficult to make all five classes, so I’m practicing kindness to myself and setting more realistic expectations. Yesterday’s Advanced Hot Yin class with Laura Frey was incredible. There were two other yogis present besides me, and I enjoy practicing with them. Sometimes having space in the room allows for a more connected class. To be honest, being in a crowded hot room with people I’ve not practiced with can feel claustrophobic. Once I get to know a person’s energy, I’m fine the next time we’re together. With a full room it’s unavoidable to not touch your neighbor in certain postures, so it’s nice if you know the person whose arm you just smacked or whose mat you’re sweating on. And yes, I have sweated on a stranger’s mat before and felt mortified for having my face resting on his towel for a five minute posture. Frog pose forces intimacy with one’s neighbor, and I only hope my fellow yogis understand. My knees are healing and strengthening. While the right knee can usually tolerate what I ask it to do, the left still needs care and modified forms. I’ve found that I don’t like wearing high-heeled shoes to work anymore, which disappoints me. I like the look of heels, but my knees and back can’t stand the way they force my body into unnatural alignment. Bottom line: I’m learning that my yoga practice will go in cycles and that I can’t hit it as hard as I did in the beginning. I’ve also learned that my body is slowly strengthening and opening, allowing me to do more advanced work. The final thing I’ve learned is that I can successfully do Yin yoga at home, despite the dogs barking or Matt making noise. My years of building a focused mental environment are paying off and helping me embrace Yin. The more the mind shuts off during the postures, the greater the benefit. I look forward to seeing how I feel next June at my one-year anniversary. Today presented a challenge for balancing my energetic selves. I pluralize self because I have many aspects that don’t yet fit into one. The morning started with a good journaling session and sipping coffee while the Wolf pack meditated and slept around me. (Matt was the meditator; the dogs napped.) Matt had a client session and left for a few hours. During that time I decided the sun felt right for cleansing the household crystals, so I made many trips from room to room and out the back door to carefully place the gems and stones we have collected over the years on the deck to bathe in the sun. Each solstice or equinox, I perform this ritual to help the energy stay clear and balanced in our home. The sun shone beautifully on the yard and begged me to take some pictures of the stones returning to their own natural harmony. So I did, feeling mesmerized by the window crystals featured below. Something switched me from the calm yin of the morning to an energetic yang that went unnoticed until Matt came home and actually left the room we were in because he was trying to find a meditative space to do his creative work. I harshed his vibe, but didn’t feel insulted. It was time for my advanced yin yoga class, and I left the house knowing I’d return in a smoother frame of mind. And I did. Class was great, allowing me to sweat out the yang and absorb the yin in the hot room. I arrived home relaxed and found Matt not in the meditative space I had prepared for--he’d taken on the yang. I can now feel some sort of energy zinging inside my core, out of harmony with the chill mood I’m experiencing externally. The equinox encourages the world to balance, to find that state of equilibrium between light and dark, or any other pair of opposites that apply to our present circumstance. While the true equinox occurred one week ago, I chose to do my seasonal sun clearing today and am feeling the inner imbalance of yin and yang energies. I love that I can sense this and can work towards integrating it into a whole, where the flow gently draws one way or the other, but it still works in harmony. This is the way I become one self instead of the many selves that pull me in disparate directions. My yogic journey continues, and it is delightful.
The time passed where I could hide myself, yet still I hid. Others saw within what I wouldn’t—a strength, a keen edge used in kindness, a woman containing her power inside a shadow of her true self. Not for one second more. I choose to live fully and to consciously build the creative reality I have craved my entire life.
No more silence. No more shame. No more swallowing my secret.
At age 29, the year I found my talented therapist (see post here), I recalled a sliver of memory that shattered my foundation. I was sexually assaulted as a young child. My reason for going to therapy was to stop having panic attacks when I drove in the rain. After six months of building trust with my mental health partner, we dove to a deep place that stored my frantic need to control my life. I cannot express the devastation I felt as I came out of that remembered incident. I wouldn’t believe it at first, my mind telling me it happened to my sister, not to me. But the compassion and love in Jan’s eyes and voice as she coached me through that initial horror told me the truth. She knew. I think she knew all along.
Looking back over my life and my marriage up to that point, all the signs were there. Neither Matt nor I suspected my young past, but together we pieced the puzzle into place and both had to deal with an altered reality. He gave me the space I needed to heal, which took a lot of time. Actually, the healing has been ongoing because an additional layer will reveal itself, and I have to dig deeper to work through those “new” issues.
Each layer takes me further into my desire to give up the need for control that plagues me, to care for my self and for my body, to treat both well. It’s not my or my body’s fault that someone harmed the burgeoning four-year-old light that was supposed to shine in this world. I will shutter my lantern no more.
That’s what I’m grieving this summer. The loss of a childhood I never realized I missed. The loss of a potential we each are given. The loss of the choice to strengthen it or to let it dry in the streambed of my life. My flow was altered, but it wasn’t stopped. It has struggled to find the channel where it can roar with the power of not a stream, but of a churning rapid. Was my creative spirit fated to be broken so I would flounder through my years, longing to write the words I see in my head, yet too frightened of opening that portal and seeing more than I wanted to? There’s no controlling the artistic expression that feeds my heart’s longing and opens the gateway to my innermost pulse.
I guess that’s the fear I’m working through now. If I had my world shattered at age 29 by peering through the door to a healthier emotional state, how will my current life change as I open the creativity flowing through my veins? For the past three years I’ve intentionally worked on nudging myself through this chokehold. Seriously, it chokes me, a grip around my throat. Maybe that’s why I have neck pain, and maybe my spinal issues will fade as I free the voice waiting to be heard.
This blog is part of my journey to freedom. Yoga has been crucial for accessing these stale, stagnant remains of a life that no longer defines who or what I am. A secret spoken is a secret no more. It has no power left to generate the silence and aloneness with which I’ve felt I had to live.
I am rising from the ashes of an unconscious life, and I feel the power of a massive force hidden within. This picture of a planet rising from stormy cloud cover resonates.
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