There Has Been a Blob Trying to Eat Me.

And for the first time, I think I am going to be okay.

“The work of the eyes is done.  Go now and do the heart-work on the images imprisoned within you.”  Rilke’s Letters to a Young Poet.

Where there once was a label of anxiety, now lies a blob.  A bland, dark, oval-shaped blob that has been with me for most of my life.  This blob, I identified as anxiety because when I look at it or sense into what it feels like in my body,  it makes alive in me all of the sensations of what one might think of as anxiety.   My breath either becomes non-existent or shallow, my body aches with constriction, my limbs feel restless while longing for a place of ease, and my thoughts become flooded with all of the different energies swimming around, which causes a bit of confusion and what I like to refer to as, mush-like thinking. 

There is something so familiar and known to me about the blob.  One is because I haven’t really been able to imagine what my life would be like without it.   Although not a friend, it has always been a loyal companion. 

It wasn’t until recently that I was given just enough space between me and the blob that I could see for the first time in my life that it was not actually in me.  That instead, it was outside of me.  It wasn’t me.  And it wasn’t anxiety either.  Anxiety was just my response to it.  

Now, you could imagine that this kind of blew my mind.  This thing that has been following me around for what feels like my lifetime is now finally being witnessed with eyes and distance instead of just living, feeling merged and enmeshed with it.  

This blob, I have now come to realize, is my trauma.  It is where the pain lives, where the grief becomes suffocated, where the younger parts gather to hide away.  It is where words don’t go, where only monstrous sensations and unrecognizable tones live.  It is where I have hidden all of my hurt, all of my rage, all of the parts of me that feel too hard to hold.  It is where the generational pain gets absorbed without being able to ever be digested.  It all goes in the blob. 

Whenever something gets rattled in me in a way that comes close to the truth of the blob, and what is inside it, a part of me quickly moves into action — to protect myself from what I think I fear.   Then comes (what I have named as) anxiety.  These whirlwinds of overwhelming sensations flood my thoughts enough to move me farther and farther away from the blob. 

The blob is where the darkness lives.  It is what I have taught myself to fear.  It was what my family had taught me to fear.  It is what the world and our society have taught me to fear.  

Many of us are not ever shown how to sit in the darkness.  How do you tap on the edge and wait to be welcomed in and greeted? How do you know you will be okay?

I entered the darkness of the blob.

I finally went there. 

I finally met what it was filled with.

And I can honestly say that it wasn’t scary.  There was actually nothing scary about it.  

It was just filled with all of the emotions that I had tried my hardest to keep at bay without even noticing what was happening.  This automatic care has the power to keep you away from certain parts of yourself.  What I found in the blob was a deep well of grief, the kind of grief that hollows out the belly when in its expression.  I also found the sadness of what was missed and time lost, along with the rage for what was hidden and kept locked away within.  I also found deep tenderness for myself and so much compassion that it could cover the entire sea.  

And most importantly, what I found was that not only was it not scary, but I desperately, without knowing it, needed to be able to know that I could be with what was there.  

The blob, if you will, set me free.

Accepting the parts of you that once vanished is never easy.  Yet, not accepting them isn’t either. 

Recently, I have become more aware of the themes of darkness and light and how I am adapting to both.  Maybe it is because of winter — and this winter has actually taken me deep — maybe because the pink budding flower yesterday told me spring is coming — maybe it is because I have been in the trenches of a healing journey that I feel as though I stumbled upon.

Moving in and out of these places.  In my attempt to understand their purpose, I am also trying to just surrender and trust the process.  While also knowing that our awareness for even just a moment matters.  For they carve out a reference point, a path that you can return to. 

The protective wisdom, this blob separating me from my pain, has kept me in the dark yet also tried to keep me away from it. 

I can’t help but wonder if it is because I needed time to find my light. 

I needed space away – to cultivate a softer, stronger, more spacious self.  

A self — that has had its seeds sowed. 
A self — that has developed patience without having to be the patient. 
A self — that has built its pillars of love, of connection, of family. 
A self — that has cultivated a deep desire for inner safety and ease. 
A self— that never wants to give up on finding peace within.
A self — that knows she wants to break these cycles of hiding it all away. 
A self — that believes she is.  One awareness at a time. 

And now a self — that has learned how to recognize the blob without fear, instead just an attempt at softness, deep admiration, and unconditional love. 

May we all learn to love our blobs. 

Because I am learning that is exactly what they need. 

PS. Spring is coming. And I can hardly wait.