Marriage and Spiritual Identity

I'm reading a book called, The Power of Myth by Joseph Campbell. This book is actually a transcript of conversations Bill Moyers had with Cambell in the late 80's for a PBS series that was produced. In one part, Campbell uses marriage as an example of how myth puts your mind in touch with the experience of being alive. While reading his description of marriage, I realized this is exactly how Jack and I thought of marriage. This is how we were in our marriage. This is how we behaved in our marriage. This is why it is so difficult for me to seperate from him even though he is no longer here on a day to day basis. We were committed to not just being together, but being one. I'm figuring out how to do the day to day without him. I have yet to figure out how to make ME whole and don't know if it is even possible.

Here's the excerpt:

Marriage. The myth tells you what it is. It's the reunion of the separated duad. Originally you were one. You are now two in the world, but the recognition of the spiritual identity is what marriage is. It's different from a love affair. It has nothing to do with that. It's another mythological plane of experience. When people get married because they think it's a long-time love affair, they'll be divorced very soon, because all love affairs end in disappointment. But marriage is recognition of a spiritual identity. If we live a proper life, if our minds are on the right qualities in regarding the person of the opposite sex, we will find our proper male or female counterpart. But if we are distracted by certain sensuous interests, we'll marry the wrong person. By marrying the right person, we reconstruct the image of the incarnate God, and that's what marriage is.

I would say that if the marriage isn't the first priority in your life, you're not married. The marriage means the two that are one, the two become one flesh. If the marriage lasts long enough, and if you are acquiescing constantly to it instead of to individual personal whim, you come to realize that that is true- the two really are one. One not only biologically but spiritually. Primarily spiritually. The biological is the distraction which may lead you to the wrong identification.

There are two completely different stages of marriage. First is the youthful marriage following the wonderful impulse that nature has given us in the interplay of the sexes biologically in order to produce children. But there comes a time when the child graduates from the family and the couple is left. I've been amazed at the number of my friends who in their forties or fifties go apart. They have had a perfectly decent life together with the chld, but they interpreted their union in terms of their relationship through the child. They did not interpret it in terms of their own personal relationship to each other.

Marriage is a relationship. When you make the sacrifice in marriage, you're sacrificing not to each other but to unity in a relationship. The Chinese image of the Tao, with the dark and light interacting - that's the relationship of yang and yin, male and female, which is what a marriage is. And that's what you have become when you have married. You're no longer this one alone; your identity is in a relationship. Marriage is not a simple love affair, it's an ordeal, and the ordeal is the sacrifice of ego to a relationship in which two have become one.

Marriage is not incompatible with the idea of doing one's own thing since it's not simply one's own thing. It is, the two together as one. And that's a purely mythological image signifying the sacrifice of the visible entity for the transcendent good. This is something that becomes beautifully realized in the second stage of marriage, what I call the alchemical stage, of the two experiencing that they are one. If they are still living as they were in the primary stage of marriage, they will go apart when their children leave.

Marriage is primarily a spiritual exercise, and the society is supposed to help us have the realization. Man should not be in the service of society, society should be in the service of man.

Sunny Weather, Sunny Mood

It's been beautiful weather here the last couple of days. Sunny and warm. The kind of days that remind me why it's so incredible to live here. The kind of days that make me feel blessed. At my core, I am a sun-based, warm weather gal. My life changed the first time I saw a palm tree. It was my first airplane trip, first spring break from college, going to see my love (who eventually became the hubby). When I saw that palm tree as I looked out the window of the airplane, I wondered why no one had ever told me about palm trees before. I think I knew in that moment that my life had so much possibility when before it all seemed so limited. Within 4 months I had moved to that same place. I saw palm trees everyday and still do. Now I even have them in my yard. I can see them from every window of my house. They're still one of the most beautiful trees in the world to me.

It's amazing how a beautiful day can lift your mood. Many things seem possible when the weather is in concert with your true self.

WHAM. BAM. Reliving. Over and over and over.

One of the things that comes with putting yourself out in the world is that you are tested. If you've gone through a traumatic experience the tests become really hard. Beyond anything you've ever experienced before. Early on as a grieving widow, you are raw. Every nerve ending is open non-stop. You're offended by everything and nothing. You're sensitive to things you've never been sensitive about before. Everything revolves around your loss and what's happened. Then you start healing. You feel a bit more normal. You feel like you are recovering and turning corners, making progress, learning to live with it. There are days you actually feel happy and hopeful. Then, WHAM. BAM. Something happens and you feel like you haven't made any progress. That you haven't really recovered at all. That you will never live a normal, happy life again.

There is one trigger for me that can still send me reeling. It always involves being part of a social situation that I can't control. Do you have any idea how often people in general talk about accidents? Or, throw around the phrase "like a deer in the headlights"? For the most part, I've learned how to deal with these conversations. I don't acknowledge or participate in the conversation. Or I try to change the subject. But the reality is I am always jolted out of being in the moment and back to July 1st, 2004 with these topics and comments.

Then there is the mother of all topics. Accidents or near-accidents involving deer. Believe it or not, it's a pretty common topic. Maybe animals are a common, socially acceptable topic. I mean, it's amazing how simple, ordinary conversation can roll around to some story about some accident. Or some movie scene that involved an accident. Or, some replay of seeing a deer near the road the other day. Maybe the cosmic forces come together to torture just me. When these conversations take place, or conversations about accidents get into the nitty gritty, my entire being is screaming at me to RUN. GET UP NOW AND GET THE H*LL OUT OF HERE. But I don't. Social ettiquete usually has me glued in place. Or, I wait for an appopriate moment to excuse myself. I mean it's not anyone's fault. But in one fell swoop I am another person. I am the Heidi from 2004. I am the Heidi who wants to throw up. I am the Heidi who is reliving the most traumatic event of her life. In order to preserve myself, I go inside. I stop talking. I don't make eye contact. I try not to listen (but of course I can't put my fingers in my ears and go, la, la, la, I can't hear you...). I shut down. I am toast. I am done. When these conversations happen, my entire mood changes and I know it will be changed for at least a few days. Whatever social activity I've been participating in is ruined. I just want to go home where I feel safe and can recover.

These incidents force me to remember. It turns on the running video tape. The tap to all the feelings is on wide open. They force me to relive and then try to recover. Again. On top of remembering and visualizing the details from the accident and hearing the news, I am also forced to remember I am not normal. My life is not normal. I am not one of these people. I feel like I have this secret internal life that I can't talk about in situations like this. My husband died. In a pretty ugly way. And, yes. It's still shocking even to me. Somehow I must learn how to handle these situations differently. Maybe I must learn to take care of myself and my needs instead of worrying about ruining everyone else's lunch or dinner or fun time. Maybe I just need to remove myself from the situation regardless of how tacky or disrespectful it may seem.

In moments like this it seems like my life is a never ending cycle. Relive, endure, recover. Relive, endure, recover.

"If I Could Become A Drinker, I Would" and other musings

Here are some random thoughts and questions from my personal journal of the past year (which is 2 years after The Night It All Changed). It's amazing what flows out if you take pen to paper. I don't often go back and read. It can give me perspective on how much I've healed, but it's very painful too. Don't know why I'm putting it out here, just am.

It should have been me. Not him. Me.

I don't know God. I don't think I ever did.

Gone. All gone. Him. Me. Us. Gone.

Walking in circles. That's what it feels like. Walking in circles.

Is it possible to recover from empty? It doesn't seem so.

If I could become a drinker, I would. But, I can't.

Stepping into the FEAR. That's what I must figure out how to do. Then just do it.

Life is hard. You can strive to make it easy. But it just isn't. Not all the time.

Pain can be bigger, deeper and more painful than one can ever imagine.

Mental health is fragile.

The word 'strong' is an over-used word.

Love is a driving force.

Life is very long - and very short - all at once.

I'm trying very hard not to hate my life.

How do you live life missing someone so much?

Widow busy is different than regular busy. Don't know if I will be un-busy ever again.

I feel an overwhelming need to lay down for a long time to recuperate, rest and recover. But that means I will be laying down for the rest of my life.

Forever is a very long time.

Too much head talk to oneself is a recipe for craziness.

I can't find my place. My place is a place that no longer exists. How to live in a place that doesn't exist?

It's all very, very scary.

Grief is relentless. So is life. So is death.

A line from a book: "And her soul wept." I can relate. Except mine keeps weeping.

I am more than alone. I am without.

I don't know how to renew my soul.

How do you not continuously focus on the loss?

Maybe there are no answers. Just questions.

Lost In Translation

I had some interesting conversations yesterday. They both made me realize I have no way to translate how it feels to be a young widow. At times it feels like I have an outer life that fits with society's expectations (and my own) but an inner life that can't be understood (not even by me) and makes me different from everyone else.

At lunch with a new girlfriend yesterday I found I couldn't describe with the right words, or stories, or analogies the way it has felt to be me the past 2-1/2 years. I struggled for a way to convey the true nature of the trauma, experience and feelings. This isn't the first time I've tried to convey it. This isn't the only time I feel like I failed. I was grateful for her questions because it's nice to have someone care. But once again, I tried to translate it but couldn't. There is never the moment where you can tell that someone gets it or even has a glimpse. They want to, they try, but it just doesn't seem the words exist. Maybe that's why I journal and blog and post to my online widow board. I'm still trying to translate it all through words. But how do you translate intensly shocking, deep, and personal feelings and experiences just through words? I don't know. Maybe I need to just accept that it doesn't matter if I can translate it. It just matters that people care about me.

Later I had dinner with friends from my old young widow grief support group. One of the women described it as, "Pandora's box has been opened for us and there's no closing it now. We know things and have wisdom others don't." It changes everything. It changes the way you look at situations, the conversations you engage in (or don't) with people, the goals or experiences you want to have, the way you are in the world. We then talked about how do we walk in a world where we feel like we are on one side of the glass looking out at everyone else. One widow says it helps her to be honest. To tell it like it is from her perspective. She doesn't hold back her opinion. She tells people to live now because it could all be over. She is honest and doesn't care what people think about her.

Us YW's are in a unique position. We have been forced into introspection, reflection and feeling our feelings. The rest of the world thinks all of that is an option.