I have always been focused on the polar ends of the spectrum of life’s scale. The really big questions – Why? How? For what purpose? – have often fascinated me. At the same time, it’s easy for me to get preoccupied with the very micro – the font on my Christmas card, how to put a widget on the side of my blog, the exact correct length of a pair of pants, why a person said X instead of Y.
This theme ran through my academic perambulations as well. I was torn between majoring in English, where the tension was between a book’s grand sweeping theme and the exact cadence of each sentence, and Chemistry, where we talked about Hydrogen, the element the entire Universe is composed of, as well as titrated exact measurements of specific chemicals and added them to reactions at precisely 45 seconds.
It also informs how I react to people. When I first meet someone, I generally have a strong reaction to the energy that I receive from them. That, and I notice things like their hands and their email address and the way they hold their body (though, weirdly, I almost never notice people’s eye color). This is true with my dear friends, too: I react to changes in their mood, which I perceive acutely and can sense when someone walks in the room, but I am also very tuned into the much smaller details, some superficial and some not, of their being.
I realize, however, that much of life happens in the middle of the poles of macro and micro. This is where my footing is unsteady. Maybe because of my historical discomfort here, maybe because I know intuitively that the real, messy stuff of life is in the middle. I don’t know why, but I realize this is a weakness for me and I need to engage in it.
Also, I thought a lot last night (in my insomniac hours, again, Julie, hello!) that when my sadness sometimes threatens to swamp me, I think of it only in the Big terms. I think: wow, I am so sad, I am forfeiting my childrens’ childhoods being sad, I must fix this and I must fix it NOW, by simply Not Being Sad. And, as is probably no surprise to any of you with more wisdom than I have, that has not been working. Last night I considered that perhaps I should start with the very small and see if I can chip away at the Big Sadness that way. So maybe I will focus on fresh air every day, eating food (last night my husband called me at 7:30 on his way home and asked what I’d had for dinner – only when I spoke to him did I realize I simply had not had any food all day long. I truly just forgot), seeing friends (I think I may have overcorrected, in my zealous desire for room to write and read, and have lost touch with how seeing a good friend can be positively life-giving), getting exercise.
So that is today’s intention. Perhaps, by actively ignoring the big for a while, I can refuse to let it drown me (easier said than done, of course). Perhaps, by choosing instead to focus on the very little and granular, I can inch my way into the middle, where I am sure there is joy to be found. I am learning that for me, being present can be an act of sheer will. Maybe the same is true for where I turn my firehose of attention.
