Telling the Story Helps
Diana Instant+It feels like I've been away a long time. Two trips with a mad dash of work in between, and now I'm finally home. So yes, I've been gone, but I've also been hiding out a bit.
I couldn't tell what was happening a few weeks ago, I just felt really crumbly. My current of tears ran close to the surface and didn't need much provocation to overflow its banks and flood. I was ready to retreat from public view while I came unglued and then tried to figure out why.
Vacation seems like a good time to find refuge, to be in private, to hide out. But if one attempts to do so on a trip with more photographers than she can count, who are eager to upload their hundreds of photos from their time together on Flickr, I have now proven this plan to be less than sound.
Any understanding of what was happening evaded me, but I started to develop these funny symptoms, like wishing every photo of me online hid my face like this one, which is one of my favorites by Tracey Clark:
Or having fears about privacy and security that bordered on paranoia. I can't remember the last time I felt so anxious, fragile and exposed. Without a safe place to fall apart or figure it out, I just kept holding it together and make it through one moment and then another one after that.
I berated myself for my irrationality. Objectively, the things that were aggravating me were unobjectionable. But my body was tense, my thoughts were murky and my nerves were raw. Whatever was wrong was only getting worse.
Finally, I pulled it all into focus. I saw the whole year as a mural in my mind. I saw myself starting to tell stories on stage, and preparing over a dozen stories for the stage since. I saw myself pushing the limits of my comfort zones to grow into a new place in my marriage. I saw Fortunes, my most vulnerable work yet, being born and making its way into the hands of readers around the world. I saw the blog posts that bring me to the edge of terror when I hit "publish". And I saw my new project, in which I'm putting myself out in the most imperfect and unedited manner yet, making its way to the printer.
Together these things and others formed a giant vulnerability snowball that was getting bigger and bigger and moving faster and faster all the time. No wonder I was feeling crumbly. No wonder I was feeling tired. I'm working constantly at the edge of my capacity for vulnerability, pushing and stretching it relentlessly. It's in my work life, it's in my private life. It's hard to find a refuge left, a place where I can just be wordless and unseen. A time in which there is no force driving a forward motion.
I don't talk much about what it costs me to do what I do. Partly, it seems to me that the near-terror I sometimes feel must surely be dripping from every word or screaming out from every photograph. (I am told this is not so.) It also seems in poor taste to complain about a life which I have chosen, and I wouldn't want to appear to be complaining. And, if anyone suggested, Why don't you just stop already and do something else?, I might respond violently.
So please, allow me to be clear (or to at least make the attempt): This work that I do costs me something, something that I have not yet distinguished. This is not a complaint, but a confession. I delve the depths of my life and my mind like a hungry explorer, and I battle all kinds of silencing forces that are fixtures of my inner geography. I have an innate drive to live as if I am perpetually enrolled in the Advanced Course, and I don't know if the wiring on that bomb can be defused or not. It's certainly under examination.
I need to ground myself in some kind of balance, though. For all the risk-taking, I need some security. For all the vulnerability, I need to be revealed on my own terms, and not anyone else's. I'm just beginning to learn how to tend to these needs, and in the meantime I'm remembering the power of simply acknowledging my experience.
Telling the story helps.
Even if it takes a hard journey to find it.
Monday, August 31, 2009 at 2:37PM | Share Article 15 Comments | Email Article Print Article | Permalink
Reader Comments (15)
I'm so P*R*O*U*D of you. For telling your stories, for honoring your sacred space, for pushing the boundaries, for realizing that all this G*R*O*W*T*H requires retreat and repair (just like the muscles that work with weights do). There thread of YIN and YANG is interweaved through your post: blazing trails requires self sustenance. Leaping, exposing and sharing balancing with introspection, reflection and rest. It is A*L*O*T of interior work you are doing and while you realize it or not you are mentoring from a distance, me included. I am a Jen Lee protege.
I thank you for this and I adore you.
Trish
xoxo
Yes, yes, yes. "perpetually enrolled in the Advanced Course". I think I sit behind you in class. I have been admiring your curls. The cost is something is so deeply personal that it is not visible to others but it is there - oh, it is there. I think that when you are reaching so deeply into the well of vulnerability and daring that it requires a vigilant refilling, refreshing and sometimes just cocooning. It is the life breath of this curriculum. I find that when I am feeling the most like retreating, it is the time to reach out the farthest. I am inspired by the enviable community that you have created for yourself. They will carry you when you need a rest. Let them. Hugs to you.
jen, your bravery and honesty are a constant inspiration for me. Thank you for telling the story. Thank you for the work you do so amazingly well.
I really like this, Jen. I've been talking a lot with a friend about the energy we put out in the universe versus what we get back. We both tend to put out and put out (so to speak) and forget to either accept energy back or take the time/solace for renewal. Since becoming a single mother a year ago, I've found the latter especially hard to do. I just can't f ind it within myself much of the time to justify the need. I must admit that I find myself envious of your creative group and the way you take care of one another and meet up. What a huge gift! Thanks for this writing!
Jen, vulnerability is a constant when we are authentic and write authentically. My life has changed these past years so amazingly and my life is no longer hidden since I have been blogging. But I am scared to write the way you do and I don't know if I can put the words together so intricately like you just did. I need to hear, women need to hear but they have to understand what it takes to authentically share yourself. Love ya!
i know what it feels like to be always exposing yourself, always fearful of doing it, always fearful of not doing it... being driven beyond...
but your urge to find balance will sustain you and is so necessary... your words are precious
don't make them cost too much
i value them
Seems like it was a telling-the-story kind of day, eh? ;)
And my analyst dared ask me today WHY I was afraid of the process of trying to write something.....
I would be honoured if you had a look at my version of stories and their value....
http://morethingsithink.blogspot.com/2009/08/telling-our-stories.html
Of course - it makes perfect sense that as you plum the depths of your truth and push against the outer limits of your capacity to live in vulnerability that you will need to seek out new depths of solid ground and refuge. I wish you deep peace as you turn inwards to find that refuge.
Ironically, perhaps, I found your beautiful post here today because I follow you on Twitter, that strangely public yet contained space, and because I see you so often appear in the lives of friends and heroines of mine. Thank you for writing, for plumbing the depths and telling the truth.
Today I am writing a chapter of my memoir that touches on issues that are sensitive in my family. As I write I hear my inner censor all the way asking me to be careful not to say to much, urging me not to rock the boat. I'm committed to saying only what is needed for the story and to respecting the privacy of others, but I'm also committed to telling the truth of my story even when it is scary. Thank you for having the courage to do that and the honesty to share what it can cost to do so.
"Perpetually enrolled in the advanced course?" Oh how I can identify! Take things at yor own pace and don't worry about the rest. Your words inspire and inform, but they are YOUR words, to be released as you're ready, not on someone else's timetable.
Amen. Simple as that. Amen.
This is so, so beautiful. Makes me want to shout, "yes, I'm with ya!" Yay to you for acknowledging your truth right now, for what's brewing, for what you are living into. I hope that you receive/claim for yourself all that you need in this moment.
Sounds like you've done a lot this year and maybe it's time to rest and retract. Expand...and contract. Your body knows. It also sounds very much like the artist's journey on the edge. Namaste. This piece is beautiful.
your story is beautiful and true, a cartography of creativity. i resonate deeply with the 'giant vulnerability snowball' and 'silencing forces'. trusting today that my fears about being open, raw, tender are part of the process (and that dancing, writing, connecting, and simply resting help). thank you, jen.