Last day in California, sadly… flying to Portland with Aidan in a few hours.

I am feeling grateful for the time with family this week. It took me a few days to open up, but it was a beautiful moment when I did. I think we all needed to do the check-in. I forget how important it is for me to share my feelings, if I am to feel close to the people around me. So often I dance all around it, keeping things in the controlled rigid space – it makes me feel cold and rigid and faraway, like I am watching my life happening, like there is a machine operating my body and I am at the back of my awareness just watching things play out.

Cold. Sad. From the back of my awareness part of me aches and wants to cry out but forgets how to take back the reigns.

Is that state the autopilot?

I don’t really like the autopilot so much.

Emotions are scary. Sometimes I believe that the world can’t handle my feelings. But I’m coming to learn that they are really necessary to bring into my experience with people if I am to feel that truly connected feeling. The remedy for loneliness is exposure to the light – we can do it in solitude, coming back to ourselves and our consciousness in meditation, bathing ourselves in light, looking fearlessly at what’s there; and we can do it with others, by sharing what’s really going on with us… really.

Loneliness while surrounded by people is a very uncomfortable sensation. I used to react to those situations by running away. But I caught myself doing that yesterday, and realized that what I was doing was in direct contradiction to what I really wanted – I am with my family just for this week, and I want to connect with them – so I had to suck up my self-consciousness and try to ask for what I wanted, try to admit that I felt lonely and disconnected, and say “I want to spend time with you… more deeply”. Whatever came out was of course more messy and emotional than that. I feel very fortunate that I can cry in front of my family and they will recognize it as real. We hold space for each other. I think it’s probably pretty unique, as far as families go. So when I did that, the crying and sharing my feelings, we all checked in with each other… and then it was like we were all together, more deeply, for the first time in the week.

Just had a few minutes to drop in here and say hello… now it’s time to turn back to my family. What a joy that is 🙂