Not escaping

Finding ways to stay in the life we have

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A song I’ve been enjoying:

Polaroid from my old driveway in Santa Cruz, 2011.

I spent this week without cell service in one of my favorite places — Mendocino — with my family, our first trip just the three of us, under the redwoods with the coastal breeze and fog wrapping us up each morning. We stayed at the same place my partner and I spent our babymoon last year, this time returning with our baby, and it all felt so special and beautiful, so slow and soft. We carried her on shoulders through the forest behind our cabin, sat on the dirt watching chickens peck and prance, ate simple dinners in the glass house across the field, played the gong hanging from a redwood, meditated in the dome surrounded by trees, walked along the salty ocean, peeked into sweet shops, and felt peace weave itself into our bones. And then, we came home.

Something that often happens when I come home from a trip is a feeling of dread returning to my body — the thought that the bliss and peace is over and now we’re back here, in “real life”, with all our responsibilities and the onslaught of news and the stressors we can avoid while away. It’s like my body doesn’t want to let me stay in the places it feels most held, so it quickly rejects that it ever happened.

I’d like to believe I’m somehow above this, but I’m not. It came on strong this time and to be transparent, I spent most of yesterday pretty depressed. I was questioning the details of our life here, wondering why we can’t feel that depth of tranquility and beauty at home, asking myself if I’d ever have a sense of deep connection to the actual life I’m living instead of only to the life I lead while I’m away. These types of inquiries hurt; they make me forget that my life isn’t just stress, just regular, just challenging.

But this morning, I woke up feeling like myself again. I looked out our bedroom window and saw our own trees floating against a foggy backdrop. I noticed the art piece I was gifted for Mother’s Day hanging on the wall. I heard my daughter babbling from her crib to alert us she was awake. I smelled coffee being brewed and felt my linen sheets hugging my legs and saw my husband walk in with my favorite mug, and I took a breath. Oh, yes. This life I have also holds magic. This life I live is also beautiful and mystical, threaded with love and nature and connection, marked by mystery and wonder. The home I have is messier than a perfect AirBnB, not so meticulously styled and placed in the middle of a forest, yet it is where we laugh during breakfast and where I read my favorite books and where I walk through our garden, noticing new blooms. The schedule I have isn’t free and open for nothing but what the spirit wants, yet there is also space here. There is room here. There is peace here when I allow it to show itself — when I allow myself to receive it in the ways it shows up, instead of thinking it should look the way it does somewhere else for it to be meaningful.

I know I’m not the only one who experiences this — this sense of wondering what life would be like if it were always the way it is during those sweet weeks in those special places. I know I’m not the only one who occasionally feels like something big in my life is missing because it isn’t a constant vacation. I know I’m not the only one who feels a sense of FOMO for the way life gets to be when we don’t have the constraints of being a person in the actual day to day world we occupy.

This morning, I am asking myself: how can I remember my life isn’t something I need to escape? How can I remind myself my body isn’t something I need to escape? How can I trust the day-to-day monotony that comes with being a parent isn’t something I need to escape? Because when I let myself stay where I am, there is wisdom here, too. There is richness here, too. There is something to be gleaned in the life I have, not just in the leaving of it. There is goodness to be felt in the ordinary moments here, not just in the extraordinarily beautiful moments on vacation. There is peace to be found amongst the chaos of the world I live in, not just in the middle of a redwood grove on the coast. It’s hard to remember at times. And, it is true.

I also want to practice not thinking anything is wrong for having a hard time readjusting to the life I have after being away. We are conditioned to constantly believe our reactions and responses are bad, are un-evolved, are to be fixed and changed. What if they make sense based on the context we’re in? What if they just make us human? What if having a day where depression feels stronger after coming back from vacation doesn’t mean anything is actually wrong — doesn’t mean I’m not trying hard enough — doesn’t mean I’m not growing or healing or learning? Some things are just human things…. not things to fixate on and urgently shift. Not everything is a personal problem. Not everything needs to be judged and mulled over.

Sweet moments from our time away.

So, how can stay in the life we have?

We can create moments of ritual and ceremony to ground us in our life.
We can find presence, safety, and connection in our bodies.
We can access our capacity to choose, and choose what nourishes us where possible.
We can integrate elements that brings us peace into our daily lives.
We can find small, doable ways to create awe and wonder where we are.
We can practice acceptance for what is while holding space for what could be.
We can notice the delights and beauty we might be overlooking.
We can regularly plan special things to look forward to.
We can honor grief of what we miss while honoring gratitude for what we have.
We can let ourselves feel sad when sweet moments come to a close.
We can feel sadness without making it mean our entire life is sad.
We can allow ourselves to savor and slow down where we’re able to.
We can confront grief, challenge, and difficulty head-on.
We can accept help, accept support, accept not doing it all alone.
We can notice what we want to change and explore small steps toward that change.
We can recognize where we crave escaping and explore what we actually need.
We can let life be messy and let it suck sometimes and not make that mean there’s something wrong with the life we have.
We can remember a real, lived life doesn’t look like an Instagram post.
We can fill our space and time with as much nourishment and beauty as possible.
We can embrace the ebb and flow of being a living person.
We can allow ourselves to grow, heal, grieve, love, and fully exist, just as we are.
And yes, we can want to get away, escape, and leave it sometimes.

There is nothing more human than honoring our not-so-delightful feelings, letting our not-so-shareable parts be there, and allowing our not-so-pleasant experiences to exist as they are, while also letting those feelings, parts, and experiences shift and change when they’re ready to. There is such a balance between dwelling/staying stuck there and allowing ourselves to be there when we need to — between thinking everything is bad and noticing where certain things just don’t feel quite right — between wanting to leave our life and recognizing the things we may want to shift in order to create more alignment, presence, and peace in the not-so-perfect life we have.

As I continue re-emerging into my daily life, carrying the spaciousness of nature and my trip with me in my heart, I hope to return to these reminders — and I invite you to do the same if and when you need to. We all want to escape the life we have sometimes… it’s not a flaw or failure… and, we can honor that desire while also honoring our capacity to keep showing up for the life that is ours, knowing it can morph into deeper alignment with our desires, our vision, and our longing for what could be.

△ Care tactics: hacking in an ableist world

△ A love letter to public libraries

△ This sweet song:

△ This piece about not having kids

△ I signed up for a local knitting class and I am so excited to finally re-learn

△ August exploration:

△ The healing power of nature

△ The comment section of this exploration on daily rituals

△ The mornings of the past week spent in this stunning forest dome

△ In defense of daydreaming

△ Lillördag, the Swedish Word That Makes Every Day Feel Like the Weekend

With care,
Lisa