Yesterday just felt like a shitshow, but I guess some days are like that...
even in Australia
even during a pandemic quarantine.
It just felt like all the wrongs were happening.
(And even though they were wrongs in my world, I know full-well they were minor wrongs compared to the frustrations that other people are dealing with in the midst of the pandemic.)
The computer (due to the latest update) no longer reads my iPod, which I didn't discover until after I'd done a phone interview for a magazine article and needed to transfer the audio file to the computer.
So that frustration then bled into other frustrations and responsibilities (like G having teletherapy and me trying to get the boys to do some school work), all of which would feel petty and minor under normal circumstances but feel monumental right now.
And then I read Twitter about the president suggesting life go back to normal by Easter, and that just completely set me off in anger.
I felt like I was standing on a precipice, screaming into the void that if the economy is bad now, just imagine what it will be if the health care system completely collapses and if people are dying by the multiple hundreds each day.
Inside my head, I was screaming that only the most inhumane people would say sacrifice the elders. I was screaming about the absurdity of people who claim to value "all life" and then take risks with other people's lives (by not quarantining until they get the official word that they have coronavirus; I'm talking about you, Rand Paul.)
And while I was internally railing, I recognized with greater clarity than I usually have how little control I have over anything.
But I never have control, whether there is a pandemic or not.
The great delusion we tell ourselves is that we can control our lives.
We control our choices, but we don't control the outcomes of our choices.
A person can make all the "right" choices and life still goes in whatever direction it goes.
The person who eats right, exercises, and doesn't smoke, can have a fatal heart attack at age 40.
Certain choices may help propel life in a certain direction, but not necessarily and with no guarantees.
The boys have rediscovered the old Xbox and, because it is older than the hills, it promptly died when they turned it on and tried to use it.
This brought G to tears because he closely associates things with his childhood memories.
If something breaks or I get rid of it, he has always said I'm destroying his "childhood."
His therapist is working with him on understanding that everything changes; we lose everything.
Because OCD is all about wanting to have control over everything; wanting things that don't make sense to make sense.
Sometimes it seems like OCD therapy combined with the principles of Buddhism.
Last night, when I comforted G about his sadness over the Xbox breaking, I told him about Buddhism and impermanence.
Nothing lasts.
Everything changes.
Everything dies or breaks or falls apart.
The memories are not in the Xbox but inside his head and heart.
(I didn't add that one day those will be lost to impermanence when he dies because that is just too, too heavy right now.)
In telling him about this, it served as therapy for me.
A reminder that this moment in time is impermanent.
I am impermanent.
My grasping at control is futile.
I can only make my own choices, which are to quarantine and keep my family safe.
I cannot control anything else.
Craving, grasping and clinging cause me suffering.
even during a pandemic quarantine.
It just felt like all the wrongs were happening.
(And even though they were wrongs in my world, I know full-well they were minor wrongs compared to the frustrations that other people are dealing with in the midst of the pandemic.)
The computer (due to the latest update) no longer reads my iPod, which I didn't discover until after I'd done a phone interview for a magazine article and needed to transfer the audio file to the computer.
So that frustration then bled into other frustrations and responsibilities (like G having teletherapy and me trying to get the boys to do some school work), all of which would feel petty and minor under normal circumstances but feel monumental right now.
And then I read Twitter about the president suggesting life go back to normal by Easter, and that just completely set me off in anger.
I felt like I was standing on a precipice, screaming into the void that if the economy is bad now, just imagine what it will be if the health care system completely collapses and if people are dying by the multiple hundreds each day.
Inside my head, I was screaming that only the most inhumane people would say sacrifice the elders. I was screaming about the absurdity of people who claim to value "all life" and then take risks with other people's lives (by not quarantining until they get the official word that they have coronavirus; I'm talking about you, Rand Paul.)
And while I was internally railing, I recognized with greater clarity than I usually have how little control I have over anything.
But I never have control, whether there is a pandemic or not.
The great delusion we tell ourselves is that we can control our lives.
We control our choices, but we don't control the outcomes of our choices.
A person can make all the "right" choices and life still goes in whatever direction it goes.
The person who eats right, exercises, and doesn't smoke, can have a fatal heart attack at age 40.
Certain choices may help propel life in a certain direction, but not necessarily and with no guarantees.
The boys have rediscovered the old Xbox and, because it is older than the hills, it promptly died when they turned it on and tried to use it.
This brought G to tears because he closely associates things with his childhood memories.
If something breaks or I get rid of it, he has always said I'm destroying his "childhood."
His therapist is working with him on understanding that everything changes; we lose everything.
Because OCD is all about wanting to have control over everything; wanting things that don't make sense to make sense.
Sometimes it seems like OCD therapy combined with the principles of Buddhism.
Last night, when I comforted G about his sadness over the Xbox breaking, I told him about Buddhism and impermanence.
Nothing lasts.
Everything changes.
Everything dies or breaks or falls apart.
The memories are not in the Xbox but inside his head and heart.
(I didn't add that one day those will be lost to impermanence when he dies because that is just too, too heavy right now.)
In telling him about this, it served as therapy for me.
A reminder that this moment in time is impermanent.
I am impermanent.
My grasping at control is futile.
I can only make my own choices, which are to quarantine and keep my family safe.
I cannot control anything else.
Craving, grasping and clinging cause me suffering.
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