let the waves come

dispatch 35

Jan 18, 2023

hello friends,

This is the last snooze of January, the month that (in my world at least) seemingly won’t end. But, I’m coming off a sweet little weekend with a lot of nesting and organizing and joy in this home, and I’m starting to notice the light coming back. The day I’m writing this, sunset will finally be back to 5pm. Spring is a long way away, but its inevitability feels comforting to me during these gray months. There are even some buds starting on some of the earlier plants if I look closely. We’re months from their blooming but just knowing they’re there and they’re ready is enough. It reminds me that it’s okay to stay cocooned for a little while longer.

This week’s essay is about a dream I keep having and therapy, and being more careful of where I seek self-worth.

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a photo of a beach, the waves are crashing on the sand, the sky is blue and cloudless with the sun bright and a small plane in the distance. — Forever craving those long island beaches

let the waves come

On the inhale I am standing at the shore. My feet are bare in the wet sand, and from the horizon the waves come tumbling; rolling into and over each other, playful in their power. On the exhale the water withdraws and my feet are encased in sand. I can feel my body standing still but it feels like I am being pulled backwards through time, through space, through everything I know. Waves feel like time travel in the way that they bend everything.

I’ve had this dream almost every night for weeks. Just me, on the shore of the gray Northeastern winter ocean. I’m not sure what it’s supposed to mean or if it means anything at all, just that I don’t have recurring dreams often which makes this seem important. In the waking hours too I can feel that I am standing on the edge of something. Some change that is still finding its shape.

Winter is a generative time for me. Something about the inside of it all, and the darkness means that I am stuck with myself. In summer I want to be outside with my hands in the dirt. In the sun, I become a feeling thing, a thing without pause. But winter is for thinking. Winter is for reckoning, with ourselves and with everything. In winter, I sit in my room with the big questions and none of us reach for the door. If I can sit long enough, maybe the answers will stay here too.

Last week my therapist asked me if I want a job or a career. Before she even finished the question, the word “job” jumped from my lips so quickly that we both laughed at the knowing that was present in my lack of pause. There is something deeper though, in the ways that I feel like I legitimize myself with a career. How a career feels like the thing that I am supposed to want. How I “prove” my okayness in the light of recovery, of gender, of queerness. There is a part of me that still thinks it needs to prove that I can take care of myself. There is a part of me that still wants to win this thing we’re all collectively struggling through. Or maybe, more truthfully, I forget that it isn’t set up for any of us to win.

I have a pattern of seeking what feels expected of me until I hold it in my hands and realize it is not mine. The fancy college I dropped out of when the drinking got too bad. The marriage and the house with all of those trappings of success which I could not wait to be out of. I have overhauled my life so many times and each time that I do I get a new piece right. Each time, I let go of something that I thought I had to choose.

But first, I walk right into lives that are not mine and wonder why they do not fit. I want so badly to do the right thing that I forget myself in the process. I don’t want a career, I want a life. I’m working on untangling all of the voices that tell me work success can affirm my worth or my competence. That I need to affirm my worth or competence at all.

Sometimes, you wake up from some recurring dream about water and realize you’re 34 and you’re still seeking that brief moment of approval that came with bringing home a good report card. Still seeking that quick hit of feeling exceptional that comes from being the best at something, from doing something right. I am seeking to outsource my self worth yet again. But outsourcing my life has never led to my happiness. I think my life is for exploring other paths.

What is the tendency that keeps me stuck here? What might it mean to let go of being approved of in yet another way? What would be lost and what would be gained in the shifting? How could I heal that kid who hid her strange to play at being normal?

Every night sleep comes and I curl my toes into the sand at the edge of something vast. Things change, they stay the same. I am moving and I am still, and the waves will just keep coming no matter what it is I do. I can try to be still or I can let myself be moved.

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