Hey there,
I’ll start off by acknowledging, here at the top, that I did miss the first newsletter this month—which is more or less what I want to talk about today.
I have two versions of an explanation for you:
The short version is that things have been bad lately, and something had to give.
The long version is that things have been really bad lately, for a lot of reasons, and my capacity to write, and to write about my writing, or really to do much of anything, has dwindled to little more than a trickle.
I won’t (and in some cases, can’t) get into the details here; suffice to say that chaos in my professional life, challenges in my personal life, and a minor flood in our apartment swirled into a perfect storm that left me pretty wrung out, these past weeks.
So I’ve not written, much. I’ve not done much at all, aside from dealing with the fallout. It’s been fun.
Things have been getting better—skies have cleared on all fronts, for now. Far enough for us to plan and adapt for the near term. And I’ve been doing my best to take care of myself, which I’ll expand upon down below. For now, I’d like to share two related images that have helped me recently:
The first comes from Oliver Burkeman (of course). In Meditations for Mortals he compares our journey in life to traveling down a river.
Sit with that for a moment; call to mind that image, of water swiftly shushing along, muddy banks and greenery bowing over on either side, or maybe steep red canyon walls, or another scene that speaks to you. Hold onto that, for the moment.
Burkeman contends that we all are traveling down this river, in one direction, and, for all intents and purposes, are at the mercy of the current—whether we like it or not. He points out, correctly, that most of us like to think of ourselves as navigating a wide, calm river in a super-yacht, standing at the helm, above it all, in control, following the course we’ve set for ourselves, totally unfazed by bumps and snags and rapids and meanders. Coasting along. Comfortable.
In reality, he says, the river of life is wild, winding, and swift, and we are given only a single-seater kayak to get through the obstacles. Wishing we were in a super-yacht doesn’t help, in this scenario; only learning to better navigate the waters, to make ourselves as comfortable as possible in our kayak, and to make small adjustments to our course will see us safely down.
It’s hard to let go the illusion of control, but, once you do, you can focus on getting better at kayaking.
To extend the metaphor (and get to that second image): even expert kayakers, people aware and adaptable enough to navigate the river with ease (which is not me), get tired, sometimes, or are challenged by a particular stretch of river, or come across a beautiful bend and just wish to sit on the bank and rest. And so they might; and so might we.
Paddle over and climb out of your kayak, for just a moment, onto the bank of the river you imagined earlier. Take a deep breath. And another. Watch the water go by.
This invokes a mindfulness and meditation technique shared by the Buddhist monk and teacher Mingyur Rinpoche*, which imagines the mind as a river and mindfulness as observing that river, watching thoughts flow by, and becoming aware of that process, that experience. This is summed up in the following quote:
"If you're lost in the river [of thought], the river is controlling you. But if you see the river, that means you're out of the river. The river cannot control you because you're not in the river."
I think these two images—of the river as life, and as mind, naturally flow together. One helps to come to terms with life as it is; the other teaches awareness and understanding of life’s flow. Both have been of immense help to me, these past weeks and months, as I learn to better navigate the currents of life, and to know when I need to take a break and watch the water flow by. That, at least, has been good, or, at least, made the bad easier. There’s something to that. I hope it might be helpful to you too!
PS I want to stress that I’m doing okay! Don’t worry! I hope to return to the normal newsletter schedule next month (finally!).
PPS Wishing the happiest of birthdays to my wife, who is thirty, flirty, and thriving! Love you, Sarah ❤️
*I came along the lesson from Rinpoche via Healthy Minds, which is a free app and program developed by neuroscientists and psychologists at the University of Wisconsin. I’ve talked about it here before, and I highly recommend checking it out!
