Navigating My Journey

I have been “at sea” for the last six months or so--at sea without an oar or any navigation equipment. And on New Year’s Eve, my ship was dashed against the rocks, when my beloved brother died. I have wandered around for the last month, wondering how to get back on the track of my life. Since my chosen field is coaching, and since my focus is living appreciatively, I have felt for the last month as if I were floundering around without a life jacket.  How could I appreciate life again when I was grieving for someone so very dear to me? Where would I again find someone who shared my memories, and understood so well what and who I was all about? Who would I save up funny stories to tell that had a point or a lesson that we both recognized?

This morning, I woke up with my answer to those questions. Only I can navigate my journey ahead. So often we look to others to create our happiness. If only my partner were more understanding, more fun, more adventurous; or if only I had the perfect job, or if only I had enough money, or a clearer direction in life. Then happiness could be mine, and I could live appreciatively every day. But life will always throw stuff at us that is hard to deal with, because this is the nature of living: the good with the bad. And finding something to appreciate in bad times is my way of navigating the journey. That doesn’t mean that we live turning away or denying that bad stuff happens. It means finding the kernel of good that we can take away.  So yes, my brother is dead. Someday, I fervently hope that I will see him again, whole and healthy, but for now, I am back to navigating with instruments. My instruments tell me how grateful I am to have been blessed with a brother I could love and respect through thick and thin. They also direct me to appreciating that my brother is no longer suffering, and that he was happy and satisfied with his life, so much so that he told me if given the choice, he’d “take the same deal again”.

I am not quite sure where this maritime metaphor came from as I am not a sailor, and actually get quite seasick, but even though my navigation instruments have become a little rusty, I am in the process of cleaning and repairing them, and getting on with my journey, because after all, I am responsible for my own journey, and whatever shores I land on will have their own difficulties and triumphs.  It is up to me to find them with a  grateful outlook and an appreciative heart.

Being heard

G-d bless best friends and pencils.  Sound weird? But between the loving ear of my oldest friend, and the lead of a not-so-sharp pencil that I used this morning to answer some questions in a book that I was using to focus my attention on a diet program, I think that I have found my voice again, and my heart has started beating again. Saturday night, my friend listened to all of the self-pitying, all of the grief, all of the complaint that I could think of to heap at her feet, and she told me that I had some importance on this planet.  I, the appreciative living coach, could not think of anything to appreciate, could not pull out one element of my life, or one thing on the whole earth, to be grateful for.  My pain was so acute, that just making it through the night would have been the most obvious thing to be grateful for. But I just couldn’t. My friend, my alter ego, my Jiminy Cricket, my Wendy, listened, scolded, listened, cuddled me though the phone lines, listened, channeled my mother, listened, and put me to bed so that I could sleep through the night.  She embodied the meaning of friendship, and does every day, and has for the last fifty years. I am grateful for Wendy.

My brother died last week and I have to admit that it immobilized me to the point that not only was I not functioning on all cylinders, I also couldn’t think.  Oh sure, I bathed and dressed and did some routine chores, but my executive functions, thinking, planning, decision making, were all on hold. I couldn’t even write about it, about my feelings about my brother, my feelings of loss and grief, my anger at being the only one of my original family left behind with no guidance, no shared memories.

Today is the first day that I kind of feel like myself again, and the first day that I feel as if I am not walking through a fog, or through the mud, with the ground sucking at my feet as I move.  Today is the first day that I have been able to see the sun, feel the air moving in and out of my lungs, feel the warmth of a hot shower on my skin, and appreciate that the loss and bereavement that I feel is the result of the great love I had for my brother, for the good times that we shared, and for the closeness to another person that we shared all our lives. That is what there is to appreciate.  The gratitude that I feel today is the result of having a brother who always thought that I was better than I thought I was, smarter than I ever felt, kinder than I deserved him to think, and more competent as well.  He often reminded me of accomplishments that I tend to think of as average, and that he saw as something special.  I am grateful for Victor.

Today is the first day in two weeks, that I can appreciate the people around me who have stood by and lent me their shoulder, or their strength, or offered me a helping hand during this time. Today is the first time that I can find solace in the things that have only felt painful for the past two weeks. I am grateful to G-d for the capacity to heal.