Lesson in Survival, by Joni Mitchell plays on Pandora, the icy rain clinks against the window pane, the sound of cars on the busy street outside remind me that there is a life outside my room, outside my head. Cars drive on, life moves, I am not stuck in the feelings of fear that wash over me. I connect to my teenage self, the one that took the bus to the record store to buy For The Roses, the Joni Mitchell LP, the too serious and often sad 13 year old who then took the bus home and listened to the beautiful song, Lesson in Survival, knowing somehow I would grow up and live.
Lesson in survival, when I’ve come to a place in my life, once again, where the road ahead is not as clear as I think I’d like it to be. So, I am hesitant, afraid, feeling alone and weary. There is only so far ahead that we can create a game plan for. We make our plans, they unfold, here we are in the dream that we held so dear, days, weeks, months or years before. So, I try to pause, and know, and feel it in my bones, that here I am. So, I need to rest, if only I will permit myself, this small luxury. Listen to the rain, the icy cold, the cacophony, the meter that changes all on its own.
I have created a life that is too crazy for even me to live. Too much to do, too much to prove. Now how to untangle the good from the bad, the real from the projected, the authentic energy that will reverberate like a good chord, from the clanging that drowns out the untrue beliefs I hold onto, that I can’t yet deconstruct. Do I really want a doctorate degree, what in the end will this mean, to me? How can I stop trying so hard to move the pieces into a place that feels like open space? How to just stop by the side of the road, breathe in, breathe out, and let those who will, take a minute to bask in the moment, living, instead of surviving, come sit beside me.
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