Being in a total state of flux, transition, uncertainty, and generalized insanity, is a great time to check in with the essence of yourself, I find. It may seem like these are the times that you are the least “yourself” because you’re all out of sorts, but I’m finding that if I can get past the blind terror for a second, I am more authentically myself then ever in these moments (anyone else feel like these moments might be increasing in frequency?...and that maybe these “moments” are just , oh say, life? lets not spin out on that, but i’m just sayin'....).
I don't have a job (well, not one that is even remotely in my field). I don't know where I am going to end up living geographically. I don't know if I am going to have a baby right now. I don't know if I can have a baby ever. I don't know how to balance my creative passions/desires to effect change in the world with my need for increased financial stability and debt management. I don't know what to make for dinner. I'm not 100% sure how my stove works (kidding). At a crossroads here, people.
In phases like right now, I am not on autopilot. My old patterns don't apply and my well-worn road maps seem to have up and vanished. I’m being forced to trail-blaze, and I’m being forced to dig deep into my inner reserves of strength, power, and creativity. I have always prided myself on having it fairly together so to be in this moment where I don't know what I will be doing next week (let's not even talk about next year) is a big challenge to my self-concept. This is a dynamic that my miscarriage certainly put into motion. When I'm in a "glass half full" mood, I can see it as one of the strangely positive offshoots of the whole wretched experience--the fact that it landed me in the scary and fertile ground of being utterly lost and separated from my old tightly held self-beliefs. This being lost unlocked (read: enforced!) my new self-discovery process. The original plan was that my new job would be to be a (cute, magical, easy breezy) mommy. Then I got pregnant and I said to myself, "Good planning, Becca, right on task". And then the other shoe dropped and I was forced to let go of who I thought I was going to be, and take a good long look at who I actually am.
It's scary to let go of the constructs I've built about who I am and how I function in the world. It's a little like skydiving without a parachute. Trusting myself in the midst of the chaotic free-fall is tricky, but that's the place that I'm trying to live right now. I am trying to trust that if I fall back on who I am at my core, what I believe in, what lights me up, and what I am capable of, then I will find myself on the right path. Yesterday I was sitting on a sunny bench and a man in a bright orange leather jacket walked by playing 90s R&B on a little portable boombox. He said (to me? or just near me?) "Just do you, child". I guess I'm trying to make my new job to "just do me" even when that "me" is not who I always thought it was. That "me" doesn't have to look how I always thought she would in order to be right. That same orange-jacketed prophet then picked something out of a trash can, but I'm not here to judge. The advice still stands.
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