Category: Reflections

When my youngest son was born, he was a tiny little thing – only 7 lbs to my older son’s nearly 8 lb birth weight – and held himself in the fetal position for months after his birth. At each checkup, my doctor would try to pull his legs down away from his chest to straighten them, worried about his physical development. He advised me to do the same whenever possible, but my son kept pulling them right back up again, as if he needed that skin to skin contact.

In addition to his tendency to hold himself in the fetal position, my son also grew into a colicky baby, who spent more time crying than he did anything else. During that first year of his life, I found it easiest to co-sleep with him. That way I could quickly cradle him whenever he cried, and vigorously jiggle my arms up and down until he settled again. He would resume crying again easily if I put him down too quickly, so I spent many hours dozing in an upright position, his tiny body clutched firmly in my arms.

I remember one time when he was about 8 or 9 months old and he contracted a fever. For long hours of the day and night, I would lie with his hot little body curled right up into my chest, just resting there. I felt so much love for him then, when I realized that the thing that brought him the most comfort was this simple, physical contact with me. Even now, we are still close. He contacts me every week, checking in with me to see how I’m doing. Sometimes now, it feels more like he’s the parent and I’m the child.

Clearly, my son has always needed close, physical connection. But it’s not just him. Connection is important to everyone. As social animals, we need emotional and physical contact with others in order to feel well, in order to be at our best. The pandemic was a good teacher in that respect. Those who were isolated and without a social bubble tended to fall into bouts of anxiety or depression, or both. Those who lived in a full household with plenty of social support weathered the storm more easily.

This is something that I’ve been reflecting on recently, as I think more and more about trauma and how to manage it. I used to think that trauma was an event. That it was something that happened to you, like a beating or a rape, or the sudden death of someone close to you. I thought that if you experienced something like this, you would naturally have trauma. But apparently, that’s not how it works.

Terrible events like these are certainly traumatic, but that doesn’t necessarily mean that they cause trauma. According to the American Psychological Association, trauma is not the event in and of itself, but the emotional response to that event. This means that we only experience trauma when we find ourselves without the resources or supports necessary to successfully navigate it. In short, we experience trauma when we are alone, or when we feel alone. We experience trauma when we lack connection.

Social support has repeatedly been shown to be one of the strongest protection factors against the development of PTSD. It’s an emotional regulator. It helps us feel stronger and more courageous than we could ever be on our own. And while compassionate support is powerful, it’s absence can be equally devastating.

I find that incredibly empowering. Every day, we have the opportunity to make a choice between kindness and compassion or its opposite. Within every hour, we can either save someone’s life, or make it worse. Which is why it’s so important to be mindful. Please remember that many are struggling right now. Please know that we all need care. And with that knowledge, proceed accordingly.

When I started my yoga teacher training more than a year ago, our instructors told us to be gentle with ourselves as we learned. They warned us not to be overly critical of ourselves if we failed to meet our goals, and to show ourselves compassion. At the time, it sounded like fluffy, airy-fairy yoga stuff to me.

I had always pushed myself very hard in school, forcing myself to give my absolute best to any assignment or project. I may not have had the highest marks in the class, but I was always up there in the Honour Roll, and I prided myself on that. If there was one thing people knew about me, it was that I did well in school.

That was just about the only part of me that most people knew, though. It was also the only part of my life where I felt I passed muster. I needed to do well in school. My fragile sense of self depended on it. Failure – even just mediocrity – was not an option.

It’s funny how strong those kind of past beliefs are. When I started my yoga teacher training, I could feel myself gearing up for the challenge just like I did when I was a teenager. I was determined to be the best in the class, and willing to put in whatever effort was required to wow my teachers.

But almost as soon as those thoughts crossed my mind, I could feel the fatigue welling up behind my eyes. I had Chronic Fatigue Syndrome. I had already spent all my available energy more than a decade ago. I didn’t have it in me to keep pushing myself so hard. If I did, I knew I would collapse from exhaustion before the program was even finished.

Why did I think I needed to do that? I guess you could say I was never told – or at least I never believed – that I was good enough on my own. I thought that if I didn’t stand out in some way, if I wasn’t special in some way, then I would never be loved. Certainly, I would never succeed.

That appears to be what our culture teaches us. If you aren’t exceptional in some way, you’re not wanted. Our children have to prove their excellence just to earn entry into schools and land low-paying jobs that we could have fallen into when we were young. As a result, they are developing physical and mental health problems that we previously didn’t see until middle age. I may have grown up a generation earlier, but I was still negatively affected by it.

Why are we doing this to ourselves? How can we change?

Well, I don’t know how to change a culture, but we can at least change our own attitude. Studies show that being critical with yourself actually makes you work less effectively. It makes you so afraid of failure that you stop trying.

On the other hand, when you can show yourself some compassion and forgiveness, it actually helps you to relax so you can perform better. You aren’t so stressed and afraid that you view every failure as the end of the road. Instead, you’re able to see it as an opportunity for growth.

It seems counter-intuitive. Many people think that if they aren’t strict enough with themselves, they’ll just lie back and never achieve anything. But in the long run, pushing yourself too hard doesn’t make you do better. It only makes you sick. Like me.

I want you to put your hands over your heart right now and think back to a time when you felt loved, by a friend, or a relative, or even just a pet. Breathe deeply now and allow the remembrance of that love to enter your heart. Breathe it in and really feel it. Know that you are a good person. Know that you are lovable and worthy just as you are.

Somehow, we have to learn to soften towards ourselves a little more. To give ourselves a little more space, to breathe and to just be. To show ourselves a little more compassion. Maybe that is the only way we can begin to turn this world around. Because if we can learn to treat ourselves better, then maybe we’ll start to treat everyone else better too.

A number of years ago, I took this short, half-day mosaic course. In the course, we were shown how to glue multiple pieces of coloured glass onto a wooden slate, in a variety of suggested patterns, in order to create a beautiful piece of artwork.

We seven students sat together at the back of the store, at a cozy wooden table covered in tiny glass shards in a rainbow of different shades. It was so satisfying to pluck colours out of the pile, one by one, and arrange them, just so, into a completely new form. I still have the picture frames I made that day.

I was very drawn to mosaic building during those initial years of my illness because I felt so broken myself. My life, which had seemed full and vibrant until then, had collapsed so suddenly and completely that it took me years to adjust. I just didn’t know how to make myself whole again, either physically or psychologically. By gluing coloured pieces of glass, side by side, on a piece of wood, I felt I could somehow put all the broken pieces of myself back together again too.

At that time, all kinds of broken things began to fascinate me. Broken shells on the beach, broken and discarded plastic cups in the park, trees with their branches broken off, broken sidewalks. When I discovered Kintsugi, the Japanese practice of piecing together broken pottery with gold or silver lacquer, I felt the hand of God pointing at me. Brokenness began to seem sacred.

There’s that famous poem by Leonard Cohen:

Ring the bells that still can ring
Forget your perfect offering
There is a crack, a crack in everything
That’s how the light gets in.

Life is so fragile, and humans are such delicate creatures. Things can break in an instant. We have all lost things we can never recover, and broken things that can never be put back together again. Bodies get sick, milk spills, people mistreat you, relationships fade. The trick is learning how to be okay with all that brokenness. In being able to see the beauty behind it and within it.

I always hoped I’d find a cure for Chronic Fatigue Syndrome. I never really did. But what I did learn, was how to love myself despite my brokenness. I learned to become more present, since the present is all we really have. I learned how to sit with the inevitable pain of existence and not run away. I learned to love, fiercely, with the deep knowing that it will end. I learned how to show myself, and others, compassion.

Finally, I’ve learned that I don’t need to be fixed. I can be fragile and still have value. I can be broken and still be loved. In fact, I now see my fragility and brokenness as a strength. Unlike the selfish and brittle hardness of power, a whole lot of softness and love can come out of fragility. And by accepting my own fragility, I can teach others to love and accept theirs as well. That is truly a gift.

My mother died this past November. She’s still here, though. I can feel her all around me. She sits beside me as I work. She watches over me while I sleep. Now that she’s gone, she flits through the air around me and watches over me 24 hours a day. She says to me “Ah! So that’s how it is! I can see now. I didn’t understand before.” And finally, after all these years, after all of our many strained and painful conversations, I feel like I am seen.

It was never like that when she was alive. Back then, no matter how clearly I tried to speak, no matter how closely she tried to listen, it always seemed that we just couldn’t understand one another. There was always a wall between us that prevented full comprehension.

And yet, we were close. I think you could say that. We certainly tried. For many years, I called her every week and we would talk for hours. Even when she moved into a nursing home, we still talked every week, or emailed one another, or both.

I always knew what my mother really wanted of me, though. She wanted me to pay her a nice long visit. Not one of those short, little weekend visits that we often did. She wanted me to sleep over and spend an entire week with her. Just the two of us; her and me. She wanted me to play piano duets with her. She wanted me to sit in the dining room and keep her company while she ate. She wanted to show me off to the nurses. Would that really have been so bad?

Somehow, the very idea of spending a full week with my mother completely exhausted me. I knew what she wanted. Just like when I was a child, she would want me to be her little helper, listen to her, and fetch things for her. She would want me to sit there quietly while she talked about her life. Then, once she had finished venting all of her feelings, she would want to pry into my life, asking me all sorts of uncomfortable questions about the particular things I did each day. There always seemed to be something about me that she didn’t quite understand, something that she wasn’t quite happy with. It was dispiriting. I always left my mother feeling more exhausted than when I came.

And so, I put off that much-wanted visit for years. And when I finally acquiesced, it was really too late. By that time, she was already dying. In earnest.

For the first couple of days that I was there, I was still able to speak with her. In between nurse check-ins, and the administering of medications, she would ask me to play piano for her. Once, she asked me to sit closer, and then even closer, until my face was so close to hers we could bump noses with one another. With her piercing blue-green eyes, she looked at me fixedly for a long moment, as if she was memorizing my face. And then, just a suddenly, she broke contact and laid back in her bed without saying a word.

I think that was the last time she was able to truly look at me. After that, she quietly slipped under the veil. Suddenly, she was too weak to remain conscious. She would still move her head to look up at me, smile, and say “hello” each morning, but there would often be no other response from her for the rest of the day.

I stayed by her side and tried to communicate with her as best I could, just as I have always done throughout my life. I sang to her, and read to her. On some days, either my brother or my father would be there too, and we would all talk together. And even though she couldn’t speak, it always felt like my mother was right there, listening, just waiting to jump into the conversation. Just waiting to put in her two cents worth.

My mother loved me. I know she loved me. She loved me beyond measure. I was her daughter. Her only daughter. And she wanted me so badly. There was a primal hunger there, a hunger I never seemed able to fill. No matter what I did, no matter how hard I tried to please her, she always seemed to want more. It was as if I could never really satisfy her. I could never be the daughter, the person, she truly wanted me to be. I could only be myself, and somehow, that never seemed to be enough.

There was a period there when my mother’s Parkinson’s was worsening, but she was still able to walk around. This was years before she entered the nursing home. She had started to have problems with her vision, and would see double most of the time. “I know you’re not here, but I can see you out of the corner of my eye,” she would say to me over the phone, “It’s like you’re sitting right next to me, yet when I turn my head, you’re gone”. It both pained and pleased me that I was the one she was trying to see. That it was me she so desperately wanted to catch hold of. It meant I was important to her. It meant that, even though I may have failed her in many and varied ways, I still meant a lot to her.

It’s funny how things change. Because that’s the way I feel about her now. If I look around quickly, it’s like she’s right there and I just missed her. Like I couldn’t quite catch her out of the corner of my eye. Mostly though, I just feel her presence all around me. Like she’s sitting next to me, watching me with interest, keeping me company, offering guidance and love. Tragically, it’s only through her death, that I finally feel heard and understood. It’s only through her death that I fully feel the power of her love.

We are now a couple of weeks into the year 2023, and I’m feeling the pressure to create a New Year’s Resolution, as I always do. It happens every January. Our success-oriented culture encourages us to take stock of our lives, and implement changes to improve who we are. To become more accomplished. To become more successful. To create superior versions of ourselves.

Except that this year, I’ve decided to sit that whole thing out. I’m weary of trying to improve myself and become a better ‘me’. I’m tired to trying to be fitter, or happier, or healthier. At the age of 52, I am finally starting to accept myself for the way I am, deficiencies and all. So, instead of trying to fit into someone else’s cookie cutter version of how they think I should be, or look, or act, I have decided to stick with what I’ve got and be happy as I am. It just feels right to me right now.

My mother died 7 weeks ago. This has no doubt affected my thinking. At the time of her passing, I thought I was handling it well. I was supported by kind family and friends who checked in on me constantly to see how I was doing. I spilled out my heart to them and was pleased that I was able to let it all go. I was living in the moment, feeling all the emotions and not holding anything back, just letting it all pass through me. I was fully present and felt completely alive.

But over the last number of weeks, my grief has become heavier. No longer the sharp pain I felt at her passing, it is now more of sadness, a weariness. More worrisome, I’ve been feeling numb and fatigued, a sure sign of nervous exhaustion. I know all the characteristics now. I’ve been down this road before. I know that if I don’t stop and take care of myself, worse symptoms will arrive before long.

And so, feeling the full weight of all that stress, and grief, and sadness, I’ve decided that this year, I will not try to become a better ‘me’. I will not push myself into exhaustion. I will not become more pleasing to others at the expense of myself.

This year, I want sit still enough to hear the deep whisperings of my own heart. I want to hear my own breathing and watch what is going on in my own mind. I want to sit still enough, with openness, curiosity and kindness, until I can hear my own voice. This year, I will listen.

Is happy the new wealthy? Is it possible that our thinking has finally evolved to the point that pleasure and well-being are rated more highly then the number of digits in our bank account?

Wealth and happiness are usually equated in our minds, which is why there is often great difficulty separating the two concepts. When asked what they think will increase their level of happiness, most people reflexively mention money without even giving it much thought. We dream of winning the lottery, of being able to afford a bigger home, or a better car, or an extended European vacation. And while all those things might initially help to increase our happiness, studies show they only go so far. Once a certain level of income is reached – usually about $75,000/year – happiness peaks. After that point, more money won’t really make you any happier. The bigger house no longer satisfies, the better car turns out to be a gas guzzler, and your mood dips back to where it was before as soon as you get back from that European vacation.

Similarly, at a nation-level, countries have traditionally used rising GDP as a sign of increased happiness and prosperity among their citizens. Yet, in spite of rising GDP in the United States, life expectancy is falling and rates of depression are soaring. In fact, the link between a growing economy and increased happiness is more tenuous than most would have you believe. According to The Economist, “the world’s population looks roughly equally divided between places where happiness and incomes have moved in the same direction over the past ten years, and places where they have diverged”. Clearly, financial prosperity is not the most reliable indicator of happiness.

Knowing this, it would behoove us to break apart this assumed link. Rather than spend our time working long hours, desperate for that big promotion, maybe our efforts would be better spent elsewhere.

A new study published in The Lancet directs us towards a better way to get happy and stay happy. In this study, it was found that the amount of exercise you get each week is a better predictor of happiness than how much money you make each year. More than 1.2 Americans were asked how much they exercised each week, which was then measured against how many times they felt emotionally unwell during the last 30 days (due to stress, depression or other emotional problems). Participants were also asked about their incomes.

After all the data was examined, it was found that people who exercised regularly were depressed fewer days each year than their non-exercising counterparts, regardless of their income. In fact, the researchers felt comfortable stating [that] “the difference between working out and not working out is the same as between individuals with a difference in household income of more than U.S. $25,000”.

Would you like to know which types of exercises were most beneficial for increasing happiness? They tended to be team sports, likely because of the increased socialization associated with these forms of physical exercise. But cycling and aerobics also rated highly, despite the fact that these activities are not team sports. For the best effect on your mood, aim to exercise 3-5 times per week, lasting no more than 30 – 60 minutes each time. People who exercised longer than that actually had worse happiness scores than people who weren’t particularly active at all, suggesting that social pressure or obsessive compulsive disorder may have been triggered in these instances, decreasing mood.

Interestingly, this study correlates well with ancient Chinese thinking regarding depression. For centuries, Chinese medicine has considered depression to be caused by “blocked liver energy”, which is why movement of any sort will get qi moving and blood circulating, improving mood. Also, herbs which are particularly effective at moving stagnation in the liver, such as those in our Chinese Bitters and Curcuma tinctures, should help to resolve depression more quickly. Curcuma is so well known for its help during depressive episodes, that the direct translation of the pinyin term for the herb is “gold for depression”. Naturally, since increased movement is key in this condition, these tinctures are best used in conjunction with a program of daily exercise.

So, if you are feeling a little low lately, it might help to know that you can increase your happiness quite simply and cheaply – just by moving more. It’s really a rather old lesson, taught to us by ancestors generations back, who felt happiest while working the fields, stalking prey, or just plain walking for many kilometers at a time. It’s a simple lesson, but in our more stationary world, we keep forgetting it. The key to happiness relies more on blood flow than cash flow. Money may be helpful, but movement is absolutely necessary.