Others are a holy mystery
I went to a dream work class last night and felt as if I had been dropped in another world – a world of youth where the closest and most intimate relationships are still those with parents. I felt so removed from the consciousness of the crowd that I came home quietly and after putting Tin to bed, I soon crawled into my own with my quiet thoughts, just hoping to get lost in my dreams.
On my bed is a notebook and a pen. I’ve been recording my dreams lately while reading Rodger Kamenetz’s The History of Last Night’s Dream. In the notebook is a dream about my mother, who showed up to reprimand me for letting go of family members. She said you have one time in your life where you can recall what you’ve done. I woke from the dream feeling guilty and anxious and wrote it down. There are also dreams of Steve where I’m driving the car, but he has his foot on the pedal; there are my usual suspects who want to kill me, the murderers who turn out to slay me in all sorts of sordid ways, and then there are dreams of me with children and babies. I went to last night’s class hoping for a revelation about my dreams, instead I felt a long way from me.
As I listened to others reveal their vulnerabilities – the zaftig girl who worried she took up too much room by speaking so she apologized before and after everything she said; the gal with the runny nose who apologized in advance for bringing her infection into a crowd, but insisted she had to be there … who then revealed her anxiety revolves around her father who is an alien, which means she is part alien — and then there were the others who swung from self-deprecating talk to navel gazing.
I was tossed into a sea of group narrative all the while smelling the fumes from the threadbare carpet.
I did hear one thing the moderator said and that was – the basis of many judgments, anger, and desire are based on a lie. A lie we tell ourselves. I was speaking to a dear friend about this today – my lie with my family was always to be as accommodating as possible and never needy. There was too much chaos and as my father raged and my mother drank, and my brothers and sister rebelled there was little for the youngest child to do but make herself accommodating. I learned to cook, to clean, to smile an awful lot.
All of this didn’t matter last night when I was preparing for sleep – I had interviewed someone earlier in the week who changed from friendly to rogue in a matter of days. My days had been crowded out before they even began so that it felt like I was on a treadmill going nowhere. And that dream about my mother – who I always welcome into my dreams – was disturbing in its realness.
My friend said she was in the throes of the same dynamics – trying to categorize those she alienates from those who alienate her and that she took solace in a note on the bulletin board where she meditates that reads: “Others are a holy mystery.”
I’d like to leave it all there – whatever my mother is saying from the grave, whatever residue is left from my marriage to Steve, whatever this person I interviewed had trouble reading that she herself said, whatever the dream youth have to work through, I leave it to them – others are a holy mystery.
My journey is to do me. I’ve come to believe that my life of selflessly caring for others at the expense of myself was indeed a rather controlling and selfish act – and that I had a motive, a lie I told myself, if I don’t need anybody then they can’t let me down.
What I didn’t realize is that all these people I invited in and loved and made sure I didn’t expressly need anything from, certainly could not prop me up when the going got rough, and everybody needs somebody sometimes, especially me.
I go back to the message a friend sent me that is always boomeranging back into my conversation – Do you, Rachel. Mind your business, Rachel, and don’t mind others. Show up for yourself and against the odds, the great odds, you will have lived your own, unique life.
