I’ve lived almost six decades now, and I’ve grown, evolved and learned a lot over the years, but the old adage, “the older I get the less I know” applies now more than ever. And it’s not just that the world seems to be moving at light speed (it does) or I’m losing my short-term memory (wait- what was I just talking about?) it’s because, as one gets older, you learn that you don’t know everything there is to know, and that the things you do know are continuously changing.
For example, I used to “know” the “right” way to think about many things, including big issues like The Economy, National Politics, Immigration Policies and Healthcare Reform.
Heaven help me, I had an opinion on everything.
But as I got older I realized that there is far too much nuance, multiple legitimate perspectives- and an untold amount of behind-the-scenes shenanigans that are perpetrated every day- to be able to accurately assess most situations in their entirety. I learned that I could only go on the facts as I knew them, and even that was getting more difficult to determine as information flowed in fast and furious and data was deliberately hidden or skewed. Turns out, if you live long enough, you learn that most situations and perspectives aren’t quite black and white but rather untold quantities of shades of grey.
Obviously, a few things are black and white-we can all agree that heinous crimes are unacceptable in human civilization, that love is good and preserving life is important, but we can only go on the information at hand, accept what is in front of us and move forward with an open heart and open mind, because we don’t know what we don’t know.
There is so much more to the world than we can comprehend, so much more data that we can’t access, it’s an unimaginable act of hubris to think we’ve got it all figured out.
For instance, I’ve spent most of my life pining- pining for a job I wanted but didn’t have, pining to return home to Chicago after living away from the city for so long, pining to have my husband show up for me in the specific ways that I wanted him to, pining to have a smaller nose and a bigger chest, pining for all the things that I didn’t have but desperately wanted.
But I wouldn’t have described it that way. I saw myself as an Action person. I did not simply pine, I Achieved! I Went For It! I Took The Bull By The Horns in order To Accomplish My Goals because I was A Go-Getter!
So instead of patiently and passively waiting for the Universe to show me the many important and wonderful things it had in store for me, I strived and pushed and pulled and manipulated and forced my way through the world, going after what I wanted with the single-minded determination that I am known for, and shifting gears like a leaf blowing in the wind when I changed my mind (something else I am known for). Because I was certain I KNEW what was best for me, and I thought I KNEW how to go after it, and I was positive I KNEW I wouldn’t be happy until I got it, because sitting around hoping to get what I was POSITIVE I wanted was for losers and I was a Do-er!
But all I was really doing was pining. Longing. Yearning- albeit in an active way- so much that it left me less and less fulfilled and more and more frustrated every day. Sure, there were legitimate circumstances that justified some of the pining, but it got to the point- and I got so driven- that I stopped paying enough attention to all the good in my life and only focused on what was missing.
And then I started on what I affectionally refer to as my “Woo Woo” journey. Ironically enough, it began with a scientific book: Stephen Hawking’s A Brief History of Time: From the Big Bang to Black Holes. This book explained in simple terms the nature of the time and space and explored some of the more fascinating aspects of physics: black holes, general relativity, and quantum mechanics. That’s where I first learned about the double-slit experiment and the Observer Effect, and the subsequent Copenhagen Interpretation of that experiment, which states that the physical properties of the universe change simply by the act of being observed. Strangely enough, it was this ground-breaking and decidedly un-Woo Woo scientific study that led me down a rabbithole of mysticism, spirituality, and supernatural states of being.
What better gift to give a Certified Control Freak than a highly supported and vetted professional theory that posited, if she worked hard enough and thought the “right” way, she could master her own reality. She could have anything she wanted! Of course, I wasn’t too terribly unhappy in my life but no matter- I always wanted more, and now I’d found a way to get it. I immediately went about doing anything I could to manipulate the very atoms of the universe to help give me my heart’s desire. I made vision boards, acted “as if” the things I wanted were already in my reality, and spent all my mental energy on manifesting my dream life.
What better gift to give a Certified Control Freak than a highly supported and vetted professional theory that posited, if she worked hard enough and thought the “right” way, she could master her own reality.
Until the Universe knocked me back on my ass so fast and so far that I tumbled and rolled for years before finally struggling to my knees- my mouth full of dirt and grit, my body cramped and aching and my soul bruised and battered- holding up my hands and crying Uncle.
Ove the course of three months, my youngest child was killed, my oldest niece died suddenly, and I was diagnosed with cancer. And while I was reeling from all that, the pandemic hit.
And all of a sudden, all the things I KNEW I wanted to be happy were reduced down to a very short list indeed. I wanted my daughter and niece to be alive again. I wanted the world to heal. And I wanted to live. That was it. Nothing else mattered.
My memoir recounts this harrowing journey in detail, as well as the years I spent afterward, drifting around, searching for some kind of happiness -or at the very least peace- in a world that had instantly turned as dark and foreboding as an episode of Stranger Things.
I tried to at least find a direction in which to roam and even attempted to set a few goals for several years, but I didn’t understand that that was one of the major lessons the Universe was trying to teach me.
You are not in control.
What you seek is already here.
You don’t know what you don’t know.
I eventually got the memo, so I tried to do the one thing I’d never before attempted: I tried to relax. I tried to meditate and do yoga and started more gratitude journals than I could count, but even through those seemingly passive practices, I was still trying to control the outcomes. I was still trying to steer the ship. Because I was addicted to trying. I could not simply just be.
And then I found another book: The Power of Now by Eckhart Tolle, the renowned author and spiritual guide, who offers very compelling arguments that the “Now” moment is all that really exists. According to the book, worrying about the future is an attempt to control it, and dwelling on the past is an attempt to rewrite the narrative, and both attempts result in untold frustration and displeasure. Now is all we ever truly have, but most of us waste it while attempting to control the outcome, because we think we know better.
Tolle presents his case much more eloquently than I ever could, and I highly encourage anyone who is struggling with their life’s narrative to check it out. Because even though learning to go with the flow and live in the moment sounds easy, it’s incredibly difficult. Especially in the current zeitgeist when people seem to be deliberately agitated and provoked- if not downright manipulated- more than ever.
But whenever I am simply just being, I have a whole new perspective. Like a kaleidoscope, the Universe shifts in ways that I would never have seen because I’d been too busy searching for what wasn’t there. When I am being fully present, and not worrying about the past or future, when I stop grasping and let go of expectations, I see whole new arrangements: the way my husband stopped in the middle of our year-long home renovation just to build my Halloween yard display because he knew I was excited to decorate again after not doing it for several years. No, he doesn’t randomly bring me flowers, write me sonnets or even remember to hold the door open for me all the time, but he built me a “haunted DJ stand” with turntables and speakers so my Disco Skeletons could have a place to dance. Because he loves me. Or, despite the fact that I don’t live in the city I’d prefer to, I am blessed to live in my favorite neighborhood in this town, with my son and daughter in law two miles away, my sister and nephew just blocks away, my other nephews and their partners a short distance away, and my other son coming back home to rest and recharge before moving onto his next adventure- things and people I would not be able to enjoy if I had gotten what I wanted and lived in Chicago.
It’s not that I still don’t want that dream job or dream home in my dream city with my dream relationship, it’s just that once I stopped trying so hard to achieve them and just sat in the present moment without expecting anything else out of it, the more beautiful the moment became, and the more wonders the Universe revealed to me.
And that may well be the real secret to happiness. Because there’s more beauty, surprise and joy to be found when we stop Knowing and Seeking and start Allowing and Being.
As Jessa Reed, my “Woo Woo Guru” says, sometimes when you find yourself rushing out of control down the river, the best thing to do is pick up your legs and just float.