For much of my life, I was worried about the future, among other things. I know many people who are lost in worries about the future and suffering regrets about the past. I was wallowing in fears and fantasies, anger and resentment; I began to understand that my mind was not connected to my body. They didn’t know one another; I was too busy worrying and planning.
I never really thought of the two as one thing; the mind always seems to work independently. It was in meditation that I began reconnecting my mind to my body. I had never spoken to my body or listened to it.
Two days ago, I was stung by a bee as I tried to fill the animal’s water tank. Meditation, breathing, thinking, and facing some truth.
It hurt and itched severely. I couldn’t sleep. This morning, I meditated, closed my eyes, and felt different body parts calm down. My breathing slowed.
The itching had stopped when the meditation was over and had not yet returned.
Was my body responsible for this change, and how? I don’t know. But the itching stopped.
I believe the human spirit—mine, anyway—was fractured as long as I was cut in half, separated into two parts, the mind running amok without the body. I kept reading that bringing the mind back into communication with the body was the only way I could be truly alive once again.
For me, it was true. I do feel alive again. People have noticed.
With little or no worry, I am free and happy; I feel whole and secure. I can’t say I can explain this yet; I can only say it was true. I am at home in the now. Some call it mindful walking and mindful breathing. I don’t know what to call it.
My counselor named this for me, it’s called dissociation. It’s a coping mechanism we develop when we are young, where we disconnect from our bodies and live in our minds because the present is too much for us to bear. It’s a very helpful skill as a child, because we don’t have many other tools with which to keep ourselves safe. It becomes maladaptive as adults because it keeps us from being able to be vulnerable (emotionally open) enough to form lasting and deep connections with others. For me, it’s been the most deeply imbedded and hardest to heal of any of the wounds that I suffered. It takes awareness and practice, like any new skill. I may be a quick learner, but I am a quick forgetter, too, and often I am right back where I started. When I feel threatened now, the best tool I have is to pause, breathe, ponder and proceed, when I remember to do it. Isolating myself from the threats doesn’t work, it only makes me feel even more disconnected from others; it’s a temporary solution that boomerangs. I am grateful to know these processes of my mind, and how I can help myself feel and do better.