Duality Within Uncertainty

I am fortunate enough to have returned home to a safe space, and I'm incredibly grateful for it. Amidst and beyond this oasis though, there's a lot of fear, danger, etc taking a toll on my mind. I've been observing my emotions a lot lately (since, well, there's not a lot of things distracting me from them right now, so why not?). I think the best way to sum it up would be to say they've been confusingly polar. Over time through meditation, writing, and conversations with friends, I've realized that the polarity of my emotions and the scenario I'm facing are parallel.

It's no myth that the danger is real. Sometimes, despite the weightiness - or perhaps because of it - we feel untouchable. When things like this occur they typically sound so outrageous and distant that they'll never affect us (what a privilege it is to live in a first world country!). Yet here we are, the whole world "stopped".

Without the distractions of predictability and routine, we face an opportunity to question the reflex to run away from ourselves. Our thoughts, our fears, our confusion. It's difficult to sit with that stuff. We often unknowingly and habitually end up numbing our minds to avoid our thoughts, but they always creep back up in the end. By monitoring them more consistently, we can be proactive instead of dealing with them all at once when they inevitably overflow. You might even have a greater opportunity to learn from them, as opposed to simply relieving yourself for the meantime and letting the cycle restart (reminds be a bit of the Sanskrit term samsara).

The future is gone - not that it ever existed to begin with, it was always just a story. Nevertheless, something we fondly hold on to has left us: our concept of the yet-to-be-manifested. We have become aware of how what really exists outside of the present is... nothing. Our future is dead and, with that, so are our egos which we have projected on to that future. No wonder people have been identifying it as grief, part of who we thought we were is literally gone.

Uncertainty and nothingness.

Think about those words for a minute.

What do they mean to you?

When analyzed, these are actually quite neutral terms.

When our minds start to play with these terms, a dualistic nature may arise. "There is nothing bad here, but also there is nothing good." We're so used to duality that anything existing outside of it is seen as undefinable and out of our control. To take back control, we often try to dualize anyways and say "lack of good = bad".

We are always looking to be full, but perhaps an empty glass was never objectively bad to begin with.

Turbulent times require a lot more living in the moment, but when you start to think about the future try to get comfortable with the uncertainty and nothingness. Allow the glass not to be full. When thoughts and emotions arise, don't indulge in duality. Instead, acknowledge their presence and welcome them in as their own - they're likely trying to tell you something. Now is the opportunity to break those mental patterns and allow your feelings to be your guru. Our bodies are very intelligent and often good at signaling what we need (even if it's just a good cry paired with some acceptance). Are they telling you something you intuitively disagree with? Maybe there's a leftover mental pattern no longer serving you that you can release (some spring cleaning for the mind, so to speak!).

Let's take this time to go inward, so that when we emerge we may bloom from the inside out.

Deep breaths,

Hannah