The Pendulum of Balance continues to swing...
Sitting in a Health Psychology class, I find the lectures particularly striking the information and discussion on the causes of stress and coping strategies have become such common “lingo” in every day language. I can’t help but wonder if the tremendous amount of attention on stress is not becoming a source of stress! We are constantly being told that it’s hectic, busy, stressful, busy, that there is not enough time for anything meaningful. After a while you begin to believe it and not “being stressed” becomes an abnormal state!
I often return to wondering: how much of our current stress is being cause by something we are creating rather than something “real”? I suppose in the end it becomes connected and cannot be separated.
Even though coping strategies can be aimed at changing the person or the environment, the focus is by and large on changing a persons behaviors. Our culture is creating and feeding into this cycle on the tremendous focus on the person and the phenomenon of individualism. Although I think it is important to be aware of one’s own self empowerment and potential to change, there needs to be a balance between the individual and the environment we live in for they do not live in isolation.
I think we need a little bit more focus or attention on how we change or improve the environments we are living and functioning in rather just on the “self help” approach we makes us highly adaptable but chronically stressed and looking for help! Perhaps if we all, as a group, community, city etc. realize and recognize that we contribute to the creation of the environments we function and live in (home, work, city, school) and that they have a direct impact on one’s well being – mental, emotional and psychological – then perhaps there could be a conscious and cultural shift to creating environments which are more conducive to the human condition, the “unbearable lightness of being”…and a combination of personal and community approaches to decreasing stress and improving overall quality of life could be more achievable.
Perhaps we need a little bit more attention to the ying and the yang of things…and recognize that the “homes” we live in are just as reflective of the person we are and our internal physiological and psychological environments.
And the pendulum of balance continues to swing…
New Skin
I must admit there was a nervousness I had about the idea of returning to Toronto, to Canada for that matter. The nervousness felt like light shackles around my neck and my ankles…only my arms felt free. I felt like I keep violently moving my body around to get rid of the heaviness that sets in, but the movements only make me more aware of it’s presence. So I stop and realize that my eyes are wet and thick from crying. I see all around me a suffocation of sorts…not because it is meant to be suffication, but because it all has dollar tags on it and it all looks the same and my identify finds to this to be suffocating... I realize I am not a clone and hence I have struggled to fit my oblong soul in a triangular culture. I laugh and realize that the only struggle I am experiencing is my own…self-imposed, self-created, self-played. My oblong soul is thirsty and patiently waiting until my consciousness catches up and stops fearing that I am not of this place. I feel like I am in a dream and all of this is symbolism…but then I realize I am writing this down and I have simply put words and images to a sensation that I have long held. It with each word I type, and each word you read, the suffocation is melting.
Asia has already left it’s marks on my life…it has changed me. In many subtle ways. In many ways, amongst it’s tightness and underlying tension, it also provide space that I have not experienced before. Perhapes it wasn’t space, but rather a connection, an understanding.
And so it has been solidified. This morning, at 6:52am, as I type and listen to the city wake up sipping a cool glass of water, the heat coming at me in waves from the balcony, the reality has been solidified: my past life is dead. I leave one place to return to another, aware that I am in new skin.
Grandma, say hi to Buddha
A couple of days ago I received one of those e-mails that leaves you slightly numb for a few moments and then you feel a rush going straight up your check-bones to your head. The e-mail was entitled "Death of Grandma Stenia". It was an e-mail from my mother informing me (and my brother) that my grandmother, the one living in Krakow, had passed away. I received this on sunday. Being in Cambodia, I felt rather ridiculously isolated from the entire thing, like there is some sort of an imaginary wall between life here and the "back home"...I wanted desperately to speak to my parents - to hear something more beyond a couple of paragraphs about her passing, funeral plans and so on...but to no avail. Perhaps I am that far away here.
I cried a little. I think that is normal - to be sad, to feel that familiar empty space...I went out into the city for some sort of comfort. Finding myself amongst unfamiliar faces which are carrying on like nothing has happened is somehow comforting. I ended up at an orphanage. Spent some time feeding little orphan babies with the nuns that run it. I dedicated my day to my grandma. In the late afternoon I felt I needed to be somewhere holy, somewhere spiritual so I could say good bye. I ended up at Wat Phnom - a Buddhist temple on a hill in Phnom Penh. I walked around the complex until I got up to the very top. I watch what people were doing in the temple. I asked a woman selling lotus flowers and incense if I could pray to Buddha as well. She smiled, said yes, and handed me lotus flowers and incense. "Two dollars" she said with a pretty smile. I guess we humored one another.
I lit the incense and as it smoked I placed it between my hands, knelt in front of Buddha (making sure my feet were not pointing in Buddha's direction). I thought about my grandmother...that she had beautiful wings to take her soul wherever it need to go to be at peace. I placed the incense into a large bowl, like everybody else. The bowl is full of ashes from burning incense...ashes to ashes, dust to dust. I walked a little more into the temple, a little hesitant and self conscious because I did not want to be disrespectful to Buddha or those praying. A nice man indicated that I should place the lotus flowers in a vase next to Buddha. My gift to Buddha. My gift to my grandmother on her grave. Buddhist believe that Buddha was born out of the lotus flower hence it has a very strong symbolic and religious meaning. I gave the lotus flower to my grandmother's soul. Rebirth, birth, death - a continuation of the cycle...beginning or end I don't know.
I left the temple and walked back down the hill, the heat and monkeys reminding me gently where I was. I felt lightness in my heart. I did not feel sad anymore. The emptiness is still there, but it doesn't make me want to cry.
The Pope's Death - Reflections
As with most great or famous people, their legacy comes into full light upon their death.
I have been in the presence of many in the “blonia” (a large field) in Krakow for papal mass in 1979 and then in 1999. I have a vague memory of the 1979 mass (I was but 4 years old), but I do recall the crowds and the spirit that took over the crowd in the pope’s presence. The 1999 mass did not take place as it was cancelled because the Pope was too ill. I still have shivers today as I recall what it felt like when a crowd of almost one million fell silent at the news of the pope’s illness and then begin to pray and sing. I can’t explain it. At that point I was a participant. There were tears in my eyes – and now I know that when something resonates completely and truly with me, I have tears in my eyes.
I have heard my grandmother talk about the Pope – probably the only man in her life who she truly loved and felt that in some ways that he loved her as well. I have listened to my mother speak of the Pope as a man she admired, who touched her heart, and who taught a generation of Poles not to be afraid. I recall a brief conversation with a priest a couple of years ago about a documentary about the Pope – he expressed a profound dislike of the “american version” of the Pope: He explained that first and foremost the Pope was a religious man, a spiritual man, not a politician.
Perhaps those who mourn do so because the Pope struck at something profoundly personal. He was a symbol of something that was and is a part of them. And so, even though it feels far away or untouchable, it is still very real. In this way he united millions. He encapsulated a faith that penetrated millions. Often in the dark moments, in the misery, and in the despair, belief is the only food that the soul exists on. Somehow I find that beautiful and intensely human.
I find myself surprised at the reactions expressed by Canadians who express a great sense of loss by the Pope's passing – I truly don’t understand where this sense of loss steams from. Perhaps I don’t understand how the Pope has touched Canadian lives. Or, I am more accustomed to Canadian friends and acquaintances who either express a dislike towards him in general due to his religious and political positions or who simply do not have any direct impact from his passing – they are neither practicing or explain that they do not believe. So be it.
Reading a few articles, which did not gush over the Pope, but rather speak strongly in opposition to the Pope’s position on various issues, there is one point which I found particularly striking – why is one man’s death more important than the death of the thousands that die silently everyday? In some ways, it is a rhetorical question. In some ways, this is not unique to the Pope’s death. I feel that the Pope’s death does not diminish the daily death of countless others. However, our astounding recognition of his death and ignorance of these silent deaths does. Our response to his death demonstrates how we place human life on a very harsh hierarchical scale. And we create these hierarchies – at least we empower them with our activity, belief systems and behaviors.
I have been writing this piece for a while now. It’s been challenging because I find myself at the funny cross-roads (again) where the polish and canadian cultures that have had their influences in forming my thoughts, opinions and who I am, are having their influences in how I feel and respond to this man and to his passing. Here’s what I have settled upon that strikes true with my internal checking system: The Pope was a mortal man. He was old, he was sick, he lived an incredible life. Death seems the most natural thing in the world. His position made it impossible to satisfy everybody, so he stuck to what he knew. I am ever grateful what he has given to people like my grandmother and my mother – love and hope and the courage not to be afraid. I celebrate his life by lighting a candle and praying for all the silent deaths that take place every day with out expensive clothing, grand celebrations, and the witness of millions.
Luxury, bugs, chicken feet and choice...
As part of my preparations for traveling to Cambodia, I paid a visit to the travel doctor.
His office is not the standard, sterile, cramped space one is accustomed to in walk-in clinics. His office has "travel artifacts", photos and collected pieces from exotic places. This makes me feel like I'm in good hands...
Looking over my travel itinerary, the doctor asked: "So what makes you so lucky that you can leave everything behind for 3 months and travel to exotic places?". The question struck me as odd, because of all the things that I have felt about this trip so far, "lucky" is not one of them. Without giving it much thought, I responded "I choose to go".
I choose to go because I am curious. Because I am not content with only living a surreal existence through tv, movies and books. Because I have the ability to help and contribute and I want to participate in this way. Because I want to see the world through a filter other than then the one I know. Because as culture shocked as I may be due to the differences, I am more shocked and inspired by the similarities shared by humans. Because what I know is neither the end nor the beginning...
The visit with the travel doctor became a reality check - one of many I'm sure - as I looked over the list of some 15 injections and pills I will need to take for immunization against various bugs, parasites and the whole bit - some of which would leave one permanently "damaged". Towards the end of the visit, reviewing this ridiculous list, he looked up again, smiled and asked: "Do you still want to go?". Now nervous, my romanticism blunted by the real risks of 3rd world travel, "yes" was the only answer that sat well with my internal checking system.
Leaving the doctor's office, I was struck by the freedom I live in. The luxury of being able to leave "my life", being able to afford to leave my job for an extended period to work for free...suddenly Dr. B's comment that "volunteering is a luxury" made absolute sense to me.
I don't know what to expect. I don't know how to fully prepare. I know that the spiders and scorpions won't bug me much, but the chicken feet will. All I know is what I'm leaving and who I am leaving...the rest...well, if anything, expect change.
exhale slowly, inhale deeply
I want to seduce you because you can write.
Not only can you write, but you seem to understand my words.
Not only do you seem to understand my words, we share the same language.
You are sexy like an angel.
You are not of this world.
Moment
Like an angel
I felt you from a distance
A shadow...
Who caressed me with soft whispers
With wings of feathery tenderness
So strong
So sweeping
So dangerously all encompassing
...like sand running through fingers
I feel like sand running through your fingers
slithering, falling
from the heavens
