..scootch, scootch, stall; scootch, stall, catastrophic reversal; bog, bog, scootch.”
Anne Lamott, Grace (Eventually): Thoughts on Faith

In her book, Grace (Eventually), Thoughts on Faith, Anne Lamott tells the story of how when she and her 10 year old son moved into their new house he was afraid to sleep in his new bedroom which was much further away from hers than in their old house – separated by two rooms and two short hallways.

They devised a plan to get him to sleep in his room. He slept in a sleeping bag which on the first night was on her bed. Each night they would move it about 3 feet.  First to the foot of her bed. The next to the floor next to her bed. He made it to the door on the fourth night but stayed there for two nights before he could make it into the hallway. The were three nights in the hallway and another four  during which he traversed the living room with “four three-foot scootches, one stall, and a one night when he had to drag his sleeping bag three feet”.

I absolutely love this story. What a brave sweet boy he was. The quote at the beginning of the post is how Anne describes her own attempts to make progress in her life , “with family, in work, relationships, self-image“.

Over the past year I’ve been scootching along very nicely in all areas of my life. Yes there have been some stalls, but they haven’t lasted long and I’ve been able to get myself scootching along again without to much trouble.

Over the last month or so however I’ve had a series of catastrophic reversals.  After having moved pretty far along in several areas like diet and self-image it all went to hell in the proverbial hand basket.

My self-esteem has taken a self-inflicted and deadly beating.

All the ways in which I feed my soul – writing, reading, meditation, exercise have been grossly neglected if not eliminated.

My diet has had the most catastrophic reversal of all. I stopped eating the minimum 50% raw food diet I’d been aiming for. I stopped drinking my daily beloved green-smoothies which make me feel so good. I stopped eating fresh fruit and vegetables and drinking enough water.

Its not just a case of me not eating the healthy, nurturing food that I’ve been trying to make my primary source of nourishment – I actually regressed to the point of eating and drinking things I’d long given up.  In the past month I think I’ve had 4 sodas (pop/cola/soft-drinks). Those who know me will be shocked, knowing that I gave up soda several years ago. It has been the one vice which I have never felt a desire to pick-up. I have eaten candy. Lots of it. Something I don’t particularly like. But I did it anyway.

Last weekend, I set out on a quest for my old nemesis – Popeye’s fried chicken. It wasn’t easy. It required a special trip to a mall that I happen to know has a Popeyes in it. I spent 20 minutes driving around this gargantuan mall in search of the food court and because it was so busy I had to walk though acres of parking in sub-zero temperatures. (OK maybe they weren’t sub-zero but it sure felt like it.) Obviously I was jonesing pretty badly for that southern fried chicken and was willing to go to any lengths to get it. Even braving the frigid cold.

What has happened to make me regress in this insane way?

I don’t know. All I can tell you is that the regression has spread like a petroleum-fueled blaze. So powerful and quick has it been that I’ve only been able to watch in horror as one act of self-violation has led to another.  And as it has spread I’ve felt more and more awful. My body is staging a revolt. My digestive system has all but gone on strike. My skin is losing its brightness and dark circles are starting to reappear under my eyes. I have no energy. My mind is fogged over and moves with the speed of an ant that’s been thrown into a vat of molasses. Depression has crept in and shrouded me in its pervasive cloak. I have been feeling like shyte in body, mind and soul.

The good news is that I’ve stopped to take a breath and refocus on what I’m scootching towards. I’m stopping the madness.

In Anne Lamott’s essay, after a massive binge involving fried apple-fritters, Ben & Jerry’s ice cream and fried jalapeno poppers – she finds herself immersed in “waves of nausea and self-loathing”.  She calls a friend who says:

“You struggled through something really miserable. You told the truth when its to tempting to cover up and disguise it. You said ‘This is the mess of my life, and I need help.’ And now you’re being helped.”

So I guess I’m telling the truth and asking for help. It certainly helps to “talk” about it. I feel better. And as a wise friend advised me, I’m not going to beat myself up for beating myself up.

I am being helped. Going to my writing group yesterday helped push my reset button. Picking up a couple of my favorite books helped. Eating  a fresh persimmon for breakfast helped. Help is always at hand.

Isn’t this what life is like for many of us though?  The constant steady scootching; the frustration of stalls and bogs and the devastation of catastrophic reversal.

The only thing I’ve been able to figure out is that you have to keep on scootching. You have to be kind to yourself, remember what it is that you are scootching towards and recognize how damn far you’ve scootched already!

“Art is man’s constant effort to create for himself a different order of reality from that which is given to him.”

“If my mind is crowded with ideas or thoughts or plans or other people’s creations there is less room for my own.  And it is my own mind and journey that I wish to experience, because it is from this vantage point that I can most truly engage others.

Alice Walker
We Are the Ones We Have Been Waiting For: Inner Light in a Time of Darkness

Paulo Coelho
The Zahir

 

 

 

When I was a teenager, someone gave me this little spiral bound notebook as a gift. I started using it to write down my favorite quotes and passages from the books I read. Pretty easy to do considering that I always had a book attached to my face. (Not much has changed in that regard).  At the time I didn’t think too much about why I started doing that. I was just writing down the words that “spoke” to me on some level.

Sometimes it was something that made me laugh, or cry. Something that inspired me, or seemed profound to my teenage mind.  A lot of times it was an exquisite juxtaposition of words that was so beautiful I couldn’t stand it.

I don’t remember when I stopped using this notebook. I think it was in college when the majority of my reading became academic, and when I wasn’t reading I was too busy partying to read  Now that I have a “library”, I have been inspired to pick this habit up again. My relationship with my books has been renewed. I often find myself “visiting” with my books. Running my hands over them and picking one out at random, letting it fall open to a page and seeing where I land. This renewed relationhip has brought me back to collecting the quotes I love in my little notebook.  It’s also made me wonder what it is about  about reading someone else’s words that is so powerful. What makes someone want to write down those words, read them repeatedly and even share them with other people? What comfort do we get from this?

There is the obvious inspiration that we often get when we read certain things. An emotion is triggered. Happiness, inspiration, sadness, nostalgia, laughter, contemplation. Often the words serve as a reminder of some notion we want to hold in the forefront of our minds. Sometimes its a cue, a trigger for something. I have quotes that serve as anchors when I’m experiencing a certain state of mind. When I am feeling insecure, unworthy and generally unfabulous, for example, there is no quote that brings me greater comfort than this famous Marianne Williamson quote:

Our deepest fear is not that we are inadequate. Our deepest fear is that we are powerful beyond measure. It is our light, not our darkness that most frightens us. We ask ourselves, Who am I to be brilliant, gorgeous, talented, fabulous? Actually, who are you not to be? You are a child of God. Your playing small does not serve the world. There is nothing enlightened about shrinking so that other people won’t feel insecure around you. We are all meant to shine, as children do. We were born to make manifest the glory of God that is within us. It’s not just in some of us; it’s in everyone. And as we let our own light shine, we unconsciously give other people permission to do the same. As we are liberated from our own fear, our presence automatically liberates others.

For me however, the most powerful way in which quotes seem to impact me is by expressing something that I am unable to say for myself. In fact in most cases, I’m not even aware that there is something unsaid floating around in my being until I read something. Many of the most profound realizations I’ve had in my life have come from reading someone else’s words and recognizing that they were saying exactly what I needed to say, but couldn’t.  I’ve read passages that confirmed something I may have known in the deepest part of me, but could never articulate.  It’s as if the reading of a passage unlocks the box in my subconscious where that knowing is stored. Once it is unlocked, there is a sense of recognition and I think to myself “I know this to be true”.Â

Anais Nin said it best when she said:

The role of a writer is not to say what we all can say, but what we are unable to say

It occurs to me that my favorite writers and books are those those which seem to say all the things I am unable to, for whatever reason.  Those whose words unlock the hidden secrets of my own knowing and help me to to tap into my own wisdom. This is the power of other people’s words!

I will start sharing some of my favorite quotes. I’d love to hear what some of yours are too.