writing for self-discovery

Time passes. Covid remains. I adjust.

For thirty years I’ve been digging around in my psyche, excavating fascinating beliefs about myself lodged there, some true, many not.

By my 70th birthday, in my opinion, I’d achieved a decent level of awareness, had banished the more bothersome demons, and was living my dream life in paradise.

Then Covid hit. I quickly discovered what I didn’t know that I didn’t know about me. I didn’t know that overnight, trauma would erase the progress I’d made and send me careening back thirty-plus years to my un-awakened past.

In that state, I made impulsive decisions based on fears I thought I’d overcome.

Now, seven months later, the more progressed me has been restored and I’m in awe of human resilience – our ability to adapt to bizarre circumstances that defy imagination.

• I automatically don the mask when I leave my house and have gotten accustomed, here in Bali, to seeing almost everyone’s nose and mouth covered, some more creatively than others.

• I think twice before I meet with a friend if I’ve been in contact with anyone other than Ketut whose village still has no cases of the virus. I don’t want to be the one responsible for spreading this plague.

• Even in my own house compulsive hand-washing has become second-nature.

I’ve reached a level of contentment just to be in the present with the way things are because the way things are isn’t 100% bad.

This was recently made clear to me during meditation – that I must accept and unify the dualities in life. Every circumstance has it’s positives and negatives, pros and cons, gifts and challenges.

Acceptance. Allowing what is to just be, without judging it as bad or good, without assigning blame, without getting attached to one outcome or another. Acceptance without expectation. Acceptance with gratitude.

Adopting that attitude creates a peaceful heart.

But for me, there’s a ramp-up mechanism that goes beyond peace and takes me straight to the next level – joy. I heard it in operation this morning.

Hack.

Hack.

Hack.

I ignored it for a while, then curiosity got the best of me and I looked out the window toward the back garden. In the far righthand corner I could see the shivering tops of a two-story cluster of bamboo.

I dashed downstairs, picked my way through stacks of downed trees, and there it was. There HE was. Ketut. The ramp-up mechanism himself,

Uh-huh. See what I mean? What man, woman, or beast could resist THAT FACE? He radiates pure joy and it’s highly contagious, especially without a mask.