Feelings
"True feeling justifies whatever it may cost." - May Sarton
There are moments throughout my day when an image from the past suddenly comes to mind, and all that lies beneath the surface starts to bubble up. These moments don't feel as overwhelming as they used to, but my instinct is to resist them all the same.
When I was younger, the only time of day I began to witness the true experience of my life was in the evening. Only in the quiet isolation of my room, when the walls of my exhausted nervous system were down, did I start to allow myself to feel at all. And even then, I shoved those feelings away as quickly as they came forward.
In my family, feelings were restrained. I come from people, who came from people, whose challenges in life taught them from an early age never fully to surrender to their emotions.
On my father's side, my grandfather won medals for his efforts during wars, and my grandmother spent her childhood separated from all of her siblings as an orphan. On my mother's side, my grandmother was a single mother of two who worked multiple jobs to support her family. All of them were loving, but each had a hardened exterior developed over time to survive.
"Tough but loving" was the most common description for almost any family member.
Growing up, I noticed my family's resistance to feeling most in the stifled expressions I witnessed daily. I watched each of my parents hold back their tears, muffle their screams, and bite their tongues more times than I can remember. It wasn't until their emotions boiled over that I saw how much they had been holding deep within.
My favorite memories are the ones where each of my parents laughed deeply and freely. It was rare, especially since most of the time, both covered their mouths almost immediately because their insecurity over their teeth outweighed their joy in the moment.
But a few times throughout my life, I saw their genuine, uninhibited laughter. In those moments, I witnessed their freedom.
I have spent most of my life viewing the world through my mind, not my heart.
Logically, I understood what a feeling was and how certain events would connect to specific emotions. But I never had access to them. It wasn't a conscious act of avoidance. Somewhere along the way, I just started to believe that I wasn't a sensitive person and that I wasn't built to feel.
I spent so much of my life focused on surviving that I never got around to the feeling part after the fact.
I lived with a weight on my chest, a constant stress on my shoulders, and a belief that if I shed a single tear, I would never stop crying.
It wasn't until I started to lose the people I loved that I saw just how emotionally repressed I was. It was almost too easy to go on with my days as if nothing happened. In an instant, a piece of my foundation was gone and I continued as if the ground I was standing on wasn't actively shaking.
My father's death was a turning point in my life. I realized that by not allowing myself to feel the pain of losing him I also wasn't allowing myself to feel the depth of how much I loved him. At any point in the grief process, if you asked me what I would do with even five more minutes with my father, I would immediately tell you that I would spend it sharing just how much I love him. And yet, that feeling was what I denied myself for fear of all the others that accompanied it.
Last night, as I lay in bed, images of my mother flashed suddenly in my mind. She passed away suddenly in March, and while I have enough experience with grief at this point to know that it is never logical, a part of me still hasn't fully realized that she is gone.
Logically, I knew she was sick. Logically, there were about one hundred different ways that I could tell the story of her passing in a way that I held gratitude for. And yet, I knew her in a way that almost no one did. I knew her fears, especially around dying, and all of the hopes she had for the future.
So, it is messy and complicated, which is what most feelings are.
I don't want to live my life as a shell of a person out of fear that I might experience feelings that bring me to my knees.
I don't want to restrain myself from loving people with everything inside me out of fear of losing them.
Most of all, I don't want to avoid the memories of those I have already lost because they remind me that a part of my heart will never be the same without them.
So as the feelings and images of my mother crept into my mind and body last night, I chose a different path. I allowed myself to feel them cautiously and intentionally. Until the images faded away and the signals within me stopped firing. It was uncomfortable and yet no worse than I would have initially imagined.
What I am learning is that I not only have the capacity to feel but also the need to—in every moment and in every way possible.
I can't undo the past or bring my family members back, but I can choose my relationship with them as I move forward in life.
I am learning to hold myself in the moments that I feel the loss of those I love, and by allowing myself to do so, in a way that allows them to do what physically is no longer possible: to hold me back.
With Love,
Clayton
One Brave Truth…
As the theme of my first newsletter was "Bravery," I wanted to include a section where I admitted “One Brave Truth” each week. Something in addition to my newsletter that has been sitting within the privacy of my heart that I wouldn’t normally share publicly:
My brave truth this week is that the response to this newsletter has been overwhelming. For people to take the time to even submit an email to support something that I believe in is already challenging enough for me to acknowledge. One follower in particular was a friend of my parents, someone they spoke of with great admiration throughout their lives. I had no idea who this would reach, but having support from such an unexpected place reminded me how loved my parents were and the ripples they still remain even in their absence.
My eyes well up every time I think about it.
Something That Inspired Me This Week…
If you know me, you know that I love sports and everything beautiful they represent: the athleticism, the perseverance, the stories of people overcoming their circumstances and performing in the moments that matter most.
I recently started a playlist on YouTube called “Dharma Winks,” which is comprised of videos that inspire me creatively so that on the days I feel lost, I can see examples of people putting their art into the world.
Although the list mostly comprises musicians and comedians, I knew it wouldn’t be long until certain moments in athletics were added in. I have loved watching the Olympics over the past few weeks, and nothing stood out more than watching the Men’s 400M Final. I have never seen the embodiment of “refusing to lose” more in my entire life. This race is one that I am sure I will come back to for decades to come.