Someone I Miss: Eli at 16

I miss Eli. I miss hearing about his life. I miss being the go-to person when he is upset or musing about life or dreaming about his future. I miss having rummage rights to his psyche, to his thinking, to his growth. I miss his warm hugs and his presence. Now I have to knock on his door to get an audience with the king. And when I open the door, he looks up from his laptop and the cell phone in his lap (inevitably he's talking to his girlfriend and studying or talking to his girlfriend and reading D & D or talking to his girlfriend and doing calculus) and the look on his face is always, Oh all right, all right. How long is this going to take?

The Benefits of Obsession

I have come to the conclusion that no matter how much I meditate, how many silent retreats I go to, how much spiritual evolution I achieve (hmmm…the words “achieve” and “spiritual evolution” are oxymoronic, are they not?), I will always have a degree of obsession. I have always been an obsessive person, as long as I remember. When I get into something, I get totally into it—be it a new eating regimen, a work project, or the planning of an event—I fixate on the goal (or the process) and go for it. When I set a goal for myself, I can be incredibly disciplined.

The benefits of this obsessive streak have been manifold—the seven books I have written, the business I have established, the website I built, the persistence with which I approached learning everything I needed to know about my cancer, making sure my kids have whatever they need to be supported in their interests, etc. The downside is equally evident; when I am driving toward a goal, I put blinders on and stop seeing—or listening—to anything or anyone who gets in my way, anyone who thwarts my mono-focus—and this includes my spouse, my children, or other people close to me. I stop noticing changes in my life that any normal person would assess as requiring a shift in direction.

Samwayka

When I was on retreat last week, Bob Stahl introduced us to a Pali word, “samwayka.” It’s one of those words that exist in other languages to illustrate a concept that doesn’t exist in the English language. The Inuit, for instance, have 28 words for snow. There is the Yiddish phrase “shlemiel” which can be loosely translated as a clumsy, inept person, the kind of person who always spills his soup. There is the shlimazel, a person with constant bad luck, otherwise known as the one who always has soup spilled on him. Bob explained to us that the Pali word, “samwayka” means, “realizing that there is death,” a realization that leads to a sense of spiritual urgency.

A Few More Words on Silence

I have grown to love silence; I used to fear it.

I used to be afraid of myself. I was afraid to look in the mirror, to really look myself in the eye. I was afraid of what I would see there, some craziness, some demon, some terrible, awful, unbearable truth about the evil inside of me. As a young girl, I was obsessed with the movie The Bad Seed. And so when I walked past mirrors or ran a quick brush through my wavy, dirty blond hair, I would do it without really seeing. Without really looking. Because if I did, the bad seed in me would show itself and take possession of the good girl, carefully layered and lacquered against my outside.

Before my first silent retreat five years ago, I was grown, an adult, but still afraid. I was afraid that I could not face myself in silence for five days. What might arise if I was not busy, was not doing, was not filling my day with plans and lists? What if there were no loved ones, no children, no friends, no routines, no habitual ways to keep the underworld at bay? What I find in a world without telephones, emails, to-do lists, roles and responsibilities? Who would I be when all the trappings were taken away? When each identity—mother, daughter, partner, teacher, author, friend, doer--were taken away? Would there be a raving madwoman inside? A web of anxiety that I could not escape? Despair so deep and vast that I would never return?