Identity Breaking

My Osteopath is back! I am a happy happy girl. First thing after catching up, was treatment to help my body integrate the immune-boosting-bug-killing pills I'm taking.

I am glad to report that I am no longer feeling ill effects from the Transfer Factor, and that one pill every three days seems to be working very nicely for me. Apparently, not having immediate ill effects, however, does not mean my body is actually responding as well as it could... thus the jagged ups and downs, and the extreme reaction to air pressure drops, and other such variable reactions to various stimuli. I can honestly say that I am feeling remarkably better this weekend.

What I am now processing is the idea that I would be very well served, especially in my healing, by not attaching myself - boxing myself in, if you will - by creating and re-creating identities and identifiers for myself.

Before I went into a state of extreme healing, I could define myself thus: Single Mom, Hispanic-Canadian, Heterosexual, Montessori Teacher, Outspoken Advocate on Behalf of Children, Jewish by Ethnicity, Spiritually Undefined, Fully Employed, Home-Owner, Mortgage-Payer, Volunteer, Driver, Camping Enthusiast, Scholar, Roller-Blader-in-Training, etc. etc. etc. What I'm trying to get at is there were so many things by which I could identify and define myself. Then, suddenly, I am home. Most of that goes out the window, and the rest... I have to change how I do and how I relate to that definition.

Let's take Single Mom as an example. Before all of this, I was active with my son. I was able to take care of all our basic needs all the time. Yes, I had support from family and whatnot, but it was mostly me. I did the shopping, the cleaning, the driving, the carpooling, the laundry, the dishes, and everything else a Mom does. And being a good little Montessori mom, I made him help me. Then we had fun together - we read, played, played some more, went to the park, went rollerblading, went swimming, ran races, kicked balls around, and then some more playing and talking. We had no need to stay over at my parents' place. We did sometimes, just for fun, but that was all. I did not need help the way I do now, so technically, I can still call myself Single Mom, but it means something very different. Now it means my son and I live in our home by ourselves, and that's about it.

In breaking down these definitions of self, I have found, as you know, if you read most of what I write, that I am so much more than any of those things, and even than all of those things put together. Those of us who have to leave the workplace often struggle with this idea of becoming a human being rather than a human doing. It can lead to great anxiety, depression, and all sort of lovely stuff. In my case, though, I feel like I have been given a gift. The gift is this time during which I can see beyond these quotidian definitions, during which I can explore different ways of being, of relating, of acting, of thinking. This has been so crazy liberating. It frees me. The essence of me. Most people don't get this opportunity, because they rarely get to step outside of their lives.

I've stepped outside my life, and I quite like it.

I had been thinking about it in terms of breaking out of the box. Until I got so caught up in the metaphor, that I put myself right back into a box, all about boxes. So thanks to an e-mail from a friend, I am revising this whole stance. In order to truly live outside the box, one must let go of the idea of the box. I think I'm getting there.

The trick now, is going to be how to maintain this openness. I know the answer is awareness. There is a part of me that still wants to be defined - yes, my ego, for all you spiritually inclined types out there - and I am inclined to let it. I mean, now I'm a Blogger, and a Facebooker, and a Knitter, right? Well, yeah, and I'm also not quite so attached to these terms. If I were a true Blogger, I'd be writing more consistently, I'm sure of it, because I've felt that pull - that desire to write now, so something gets published, and someone reads it, just because it's Tuesday. The thing is, that then it feels like work, like something I have to do, and I think that's where the difference comes in. I think of it like this: I'm a blogger, not a Blogger. I write when I feel compelled to write. I do not write so I can gain followers and influence; I write because it's the best way I've found to process these types of ideas and propel my own development. I actually left no comments, shared nothing and liked nothing on Facebook all weekend (and holy cow, the sky did not fall). I didn't feel like it. I caught up today. I felt like it. And my knitting comes and goes, as does my jewellery, and everything else I do. I'm living more and more in the flow, and less and less by convention, compulsion and habit (personally imposed or otherwise).

I know for me, personally (probably not for everyone with any situation like mine) this is a crucial aspect to my healing. This is a Big Thing I am learning. And I feel it is challenged, this learning, this way of being, every time I make my little forays into the social world. This creates a cognitive and spiritual dissonance, and if I tune into it, I can bring myself back to it. And if I don't tune in, it interferes with the healing processes. So I wonder if more hermitting is needed, or if perhaps the dissonance is a good cue that it is indeed ok for me to be stepping out in small, manageable ways.

Either way, I feel I'm on a good path.