To much of a good thing?
Now I sit in pandemic land. I cannot visit with friends. I cannot take the trip of a lifetime- 4 countries in 6 weeks. I cannot ski. I cannot go to sangha to visit with my fellow Buddhists. I cannot shop (unless it’s the grocery store or Home Depot). I cannot go out to restaurants. I cannot go to yoga classes. I cannot teach yoga classes. I cannot go to meetups. I cannot take a road trip and visit my son. I cannot get on an airplane. I cannot go to a violin lesson. I cannot get anything dry cleaned- I don’t really dry clean anything these days anyway but if I wanted to I cannot.
What can I do? Oh lots of things. I can make art glass. I can practice my violin. I can practice yoga on my own, with my yoga teachers on Zoom, or with a random yoga teacher on YouTube. I can cook. I can eat. I can write blogs (though I seem to have some serious writers block in all of this time to do things). I can read. I can watch all that stuff on Netflix I wanted to watch. I can call family. I can call friends. I can clean my house. I can take care of those baseboards that I never bother to clean. I can straighten out my closet. I can straighten out my pantry.
None of these activities involve people. I love people. I’m an extroverted extrovert. Yes, you read that right. I get my energy from hangout with other people. What fills my bucket? Sundays. I start at 8 AM teaching yoga. At 9 AM the yoga crew and I walk to a coffee shop and get coffee. At 10 we meet with our Buddhist Sangha. At noon I run home and change and then run the Dharma coffee- a relaxed discussion with Sangha members at a local coffee shop. Now my Sundays don’t include any of these activities in person 😕
I am fortunate. My daughter is here staying with me. We get to go on walks together and do yoga together. We’ve had some beautiful deep conversations. I am grateful for her company. I also have That One Guy (TOG) in my life. He visits often. I am thankful that they are both here for me. Without them I would be completely isolated. That said just having 2 people in my life (even these most important people) doesn’t fill my extroverted cup full enough.
All is not lost however. We now have technology that let’s us communicate remotely. With tools like Zoom, Skype, FaceTime, and Webex we can still connect and meet online. My Buddhist Sangha is meeting virtually every Sunday at 10 AM. My favorite yoga teachers teach online. My non-violent communication group is now doing a weekly Zoom meeting instead of the regular monthly meet at a group member’s house event. I even have a couple of meetups (including my writing meetup where I write blog posts like these) meeting online. While it isn’t in person it is virtually in person. We can see each other’s faces, we can speak to each other, and show yoga poses. It’s nice to know I am doing yoga with my friends even when their mats aren’t a few feet away from mine. I even teach my own yoga classes online.
A weird thing has happened since we have started going electronic. It has become sort of an electronic explosion. I receive daily emails and texts from friends who are teaching yoga or offering a space to talk about how all of this “stuff” is impacting me. Don’t get me wrong- I am extremely grateful for this day and age where we can still connect when we are social distancing or sheltering in place. I love yoga and my sangha and the effort to keep that normalcy in place. But I’m also feeling overwhelmed. If I wanted it I could do yoga with my friends every single day at multiple times during the day. I’ve had to turn down one yoga teacher to go to the event of another yoga teacher. I’ve had to move events around because there are multiple online events at the same time.
I also feel that for me, there is just too much trying to make me feel better. I hear from self help authors, philosophers, and well-meaning friends with recommendations for articles and classes on dealing with aloneness and pandemic stress. I am wondering - how much of this stuff do I need? How much of it is noise vs. helpful for me? If I am constantly doing all this self care when does it become just an echo chamber or an escape of the reality that this pandemic is just hard?
My sangha is now doing morning meditations- 2 a morning actually. There is one at 7 and one at 8. You get to chose which one you want (or both I guess if you feel the need). I am responsible for leading 1 or 2 of them a week. I also have attended them as a participant. They are beautiful experiences. We see each other on the screen. Then we sit for 20 minutes in silent meditation “virtually” together. Afterwards we have an opportunity to share what is going on in our lives. I find these meditations valuable. Even with all the time I have on my hands, making an intentional effort to just “sit” brings me some peace. Then holding space for others as they share what is going on in their lives and having the opportunity to share my own thoughts when I feel encouraged to do so feels vulnerable and connecting. This experience is the closest thing I have to actually being connected with other people. I feel so full of joy when my time with them is done. But that’s just it, then the time is done. I close my screen and I am back to where I was beforehand. I still have some fullness in my heart but not like it was during the meditation session. Sadly the feeling fades over time- an hour or so. Interestingly though I don’t necessarily feel like I have go take one of those classes I’m getting emails about. I find myself forcing creativity or sitting with the aloneness. I am learning to focus on the present- thinking about how long we will be in this isolated state does me no good. Instead I try to focus on my resiliency during the days that have passed.