What is lost can return

Trusting the losing, being open to the returning

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A song I’ve been enjoying:

HOPE in Point Reyes Station, 2006.

Current scene: in my office, morning light still filling the sky, cozy sweater keeping me warm, listening to instrumental music, grateful to be writing, to be saying the thing out loud again.

A few nights ago, my husband and I went on our first date night since our daughter was born almost a year ago. As we sat outside at the sweetest restaurant in Sonoma, sharing more plates than we could eat because we were so excited to be somewhere different, I realized I was returning to something I had lost. I was returning to something that felt so incredibly far away even a few months ago. I was returning to something I thought might never come back — something I doubted could ever be felt again while I was immersed in the underworld of postpartum and new motherhood.

What was I returning to? A sense of self outside of being a mother. A sense of partnership outside of co-parenting. Delighting in a meal that didn’t include cleaning half of my daughter’s meal off of the floor every night. Not putting her to bed for the first time in her life (which was both heartbreaking and freeing). The focus of conversation (mostly) being about something other than parenting. A whole life was returning and that dinner was just a small sliver reminding me of what’s true beyond a meal: what is lost can return again.

I feel other parts returning, too: my creativity, something I was certain would never take form within me again and something I’ve been missing so deeply. The energy to go places out of the way. A desire to cook new recipes. Yoga practice. Seeing my still-new body in a fresh light. Seeing my still-new self with a little more clarity. There has been an energy of returning lately that has nurtured my knowing of finding ourselves again after being lost — of trusting the whole of us will return, even after seasons of fragmentation, even when it will get lost again. The relief in this brings me to my knees.

I find myself in the lost places, the middle of one version of myself and another, sandwiched between Before and “After” more often than not. I’ve felt this beyond new motherhood: I’ve felt it during periods of depression and loneliness, during seasons of grief and stagnancy, during moments of self-doubt and questioning what’s true. I’ve spent so much time in the suspension — in the locale of not knowing, of questioning what’s next, of wondering when everything will seem solid, feeling desperate for some certainty yet slowly finding acceptance in just how little I know, and how this will always be true.

Part of this acceptance has been understanding that when things get lost, they can return again. When parts of me go missing, they often find their way back. When my identity feels like a smashed plate on the ground, in comes the binding glue, piecing it back together not in the exact shape it took before, but whole nonetheless. With new character, and new form, yet still intact with what once was.

Another part of this acceptance is embracing the reality that not everything we lose, whether within ourselves or in our lives, will return. Not everything will come back, or begin again, or circle back around. Some things, some parts, some people, some places, some roles and identities and ways of being will leave for good. There is grief here — there is confrontation of the impermanence of life here — there is the reality of not having control here. Yet what is also here is a reminder that perhaps, permanency isn’t required for something to be meaningful, to have mattered, to have shaped us. Perhaps never leaving isn’t a requirement for what it meant while it was here. Perhaps clinging to what we’re not meant to have, or do, or be, or hold forever is less about actually needing the thing forever, and more about our fear of being in the lost places again.

I’ve grown my reverence for the lost places. When it feels like nothing is changing, like there is no growth happening, like we’re stuck in an open wound with nothing seeming to fill it, I’ve come to trust just how much is happening underneath the surface that just isn’t showing itself yet. I’ve come to believe in the necessity of the lost places as part of the whole, instead of thinking they’re getting in the way of the whole. I’ve come to find a childlike sense of curiosity in not knowing, rather than seeing not knowing as something to fix or figure out. and I’ve come to forgive myself when I forget all of this — when I’m desperate, and clinging, and feeling wildly ripped apart while lost, thinking the only thing that will make it better is the returning.

I’ve also grown my trust in the returning. I’ve grown trust that what is needed will find its way back and what isn’t won’t, and one day I might understand why. I’ve grown trust in letting myself linger in the lost places instead of overreaching for certainty or being desperate for the return before it’s ready. I’ve grown trust in being able to find presence in the space, in the void, in the waiting. I’ve grown trust in my capacity to grieve when something truly isn’t coming back. And I’ve grown trust in noticing how the space where something once was is now open for something new to come in, which brings its own kind of healing, its own kind of aliveness, its own kind of return. And mostly. I’ve grown trust in being able to hold myself when I forget all of this — when I’m searching endlessly for an answer, when I’m going over every possible reroute in my mind that could bring it, or me, back — when I feel the sense of urgency pushing me toward forcing something that simply isn’t ready, or isn’t there.

Losing sight of parts of ourselves holds a specific kind of pain — one that mixes grief and desperation. It is such a hard place to be. It is so hard to reach toward trust when you’re actually in the lost places. It is so hard to invite in new ways of seeing things, new ways of holding yourself, new ways of approaching what hasn’t yet returned. And in the society we live in, being lost is held as a personal failure, so of course we’re desperate to never find ourselves in that place.

Yet losing and finding ourselves is one of the most human processes we will move through, over and over again. It is organic and part of nature, inherent and inevitable. Losing and finding ourselves is a sign we’re alive. A sign we’re moving, even when we’re perceiving ourselves as stuck. A sign we’re integrating and remembering, learning and unlearning, holding on and letting go, being swept into the ocean and spit back onto land.

What if losing ourselves isn’t failure, but surrender?
What if losing ourselves isn’t a set-back, but part of it all?
What if losing ourselves isn’t negative, but necessary?
What if losing ourselves isn’t wrong, but a map toward deeper alignment?
What if losing ourselves isn’t bad, but a signal of letting go?
What if losing ourselves isn’t something to try and avoid, but is something to lean into, to learn from, to trust, to have reverence for, to allow?

And,

What if finding ourselves doesn’t need to be forced?
What if finding ourselves isn’t the ultimate goal?
What if finding ourselves isn’t permanent?
What if finding ourselves happens over and over again?
What if finding ourselves won’t last long before the next version forms?
What if finding ourselves is a recurring practice, not a destination?
What if finding ourselves is only part of the whole?

I think of all I’ve gained from being in this lost place over the last year, and how it has brought so much difficulty and also so much more clarity on what matters. I think of all I’ve let go of that I thought I needed. I think of all I’ve moved through that brought me just a little bit closer to the core of myself, the version underneath the piles of protection on top, the version that has been asking to emerge. And I see now that being in the lost places is simply part of all of it — not a barrier but a map. Not a moral failing but a teacher. Not a sign of something being wrong, but a sign of being a person willing to fully show up to my life. And what else is there?

None of this is to bypass the pain of being lost, the grief of what doesn’t return, or the deep emptiness we can feel when the open wounds aren’t yet being filled. Yet it is to honor that maybe, the lost places hold more than just pain. They hold more than just grief. They hold more than just what hurts. Even when we can’t see it yet.

May you trust what is coming, even when you don’t see it yet.
May you let go and receive, let go and receive, let go and receive.
May you allow what leaves to return when it’s ready.
May you allow what leaves to never return again if it isn’t meant to.
May you grieve what is lost so it becomes more than pain.
May you hold yourself in the lost places.
May you notice the return when it happens, even slowly, even barely.
May you lose and find yourself over and over as a reminder that nothing lasts forever, that some things will come back, that you are wildly alive.

I’m still a little lost. Maybe a lot lost. Parts of me I miss still haven’t returned. And right now, it doesn’t feel so scary. The desperation has faded. And I’m just here, open to what is coming, grieving what isn’t, so wildly alive.

△ The calm place on the internet

△ On creative work as therapeutic release

△ How to make, and keep, friends in adulthood

△ Messiness is not a moral failing:

△ I’ve re-read this essay many times

△ How we’re draining language of its power

△ “Hello, Body...I’m Home. I’ll take care of you.” A video I watch often.

△ “If every issue was seen through an Earth-related lens, what might we learn? We wouldn’t put down our myriad priorities, but maybe we would reframe and redistribute our time to more accurately account for the care of our only home, currently crumbling and buckling, infested and burning and flooding in every room. Our home, too, is wailing.” This piece from adrienne maree brown

△ Don't question the magic of Hocus Pocus

△ Photos from my husband and I’s first date night since our daughter was born. From left to right: In the restaurant bathroom having an existential crisis about not putting my baby to bed for the first time in her life; a life-changing melon salad; ambiance.

First date night in over a year; a reminder that what’s lost can return.

With care,
Lisa