The saying, “caught up in my feels,” captures so simply
something far deeper in complexity. It conveys a full experience perfectly when
nestled sweetly in context. Feelings snare so randomly it seems. At least for
me. I could be monotonously carrying out daily routine. Then something benign
snags and jerks my emotional attention. As if teleported, a memory gets
speedily recalled and those triggered emotions are cascading over me again. I'm
caught. What now?
Since I have been heavily into deep and mind-bending
thinking lately, this simple little idea exploded all over the insides of my
head. Honestly, I’m starting to panic a little about where my thoughts take me.
This one, was kind of cute, though. In a little piano/writing session this
afternoon, the melody I was playing struggled to identify the intent of the energy.
It was one of those easy melodies that you would maybe find yourself idly
humming without conscious awareness. I la-la’d the melody and searched
for words to describe the emotion my body was trying to translate.
It shouldn’t shock any reader of mine to believe me when I say
the initial gravitational pull was toward the sadder, darker side of my emotional
trove. It was this exact predictability in my own behavior that forced me to
stop and be in those feelings for a moment and fight away from the context. Instead
of trying to find words to portray a story that matched the sad energy, I allowed
myself to just play and sit with it. What now? I just felt the disappointment
for a little bit. I didn’t think about what caused the disappointment. The
exercise of isolating cause and effect on deeply entrenched neuropathways is
exhausting, but totally worth it.
Letting that emotion out for some fresh air, I learned
something about one of the bricks in my boundaries. Seeing Disappointment for what
it is and not how it is helped me understand more fully what other
emotions are connected to it. I sat in overlapping emotions. They started to evolve
and reveal their ties to each other. What was wonderful to allow to manifest,
was though the emotion began in negativity, there were pathways tied to
positive emotions as well. Feeling their uniqueness as oneness. This is how I want
to be in my feels. Not all of them! That’s too much. But the big ones.
The ones that reach out and cry for attention.
The way my brain has been processing information lately
feels very weird, but familiar at the same time. This time alone without the
kids has certainly been interesting. While I had certain intentions for the short
window of free time, it appears the universe had others. I spent the first
couple of weeks fighting it. Whining about being bored. Feeling sort of sorry
for myself with all this QUIET! My word, it’s quiet. Then I came across a
message that hit me right in the feels. I am in an isolation phase because I need
it. What I’m writing you now, has taken me a couple of weeks to string
together. My emotions are having a walkabout and I’m listening.
It's been a full year since I left Arizona. This has by far
been the fastest time travel so far. Life is beautiful and changing constantly.
There are many more experiences coming my way. I am in a very ripe season of
family. My family. The family I made. I can’t think of a time that I have ever
truly seen my children the way I do now. Their layers are evident, and I am
loving getting to really know them. I like being in these feelings and not in
those experiences. Growing up takes a long time.
