For most of my life I have not really enjoyed being here, being alive. There were scattered moments of enjoyment, but not a lot of full, deep enjoyment. I never really enjoyed what most people seemed to enjoy, and wondered why I was different. I just saw life as often painful and this world as a mostly a shitty place.
I think the reason for my lack of life enjoyment has been partially trauma, but also a deep longing for something deeper than what surface life has to offer. I never felt I could rest and enjoy life, because there was always a deeper, restless calling of great dissatisfaction; a knowing that there must be something more. A feeling of being a restless wanderer who can never find a home.
Lately I feel like there is something unraveling within me. I guess it started a few years ago, but it was slow and mostly imperceptible; now it's unwinding like thread from a spool. I go back and forth between the pain of life, allowing myself to feel the current emerging aspect of pain, and just a joy of being alive I can't recall feeling as deeply before. I feel like I am being unraveled by the Divine.
Earlier today I went rollerskating outside for the first time since I was about 9 years old. I had to relearn how to skate again because it has been so long. I even fell a couple times. I just felt so good being alive and doing something so simple; just focusing on the movement of my body gliding along, and sometimes falling along :). I felt this glorious simplicity of feeling life through my senses in the form of wind, sun, heat, pleasure, and pain.
My spiritual teacher has this phrase he uses often: "fully human, fully divine". It means that we can be both in our bodies, embracing our pain and our imperfect humanity, as well as aware of the transcendent. I am starting to realize that it also means that the divine can be felt and experienced in every part of embodied life. You could call it a non-dual embodied experience of the immanent and transcendent.
I feel like I am stepping into a new life. I think I will continue going through phases of pain, but I see now that these phases are just opening me up to more aliveness. Rumi says to allow any emotion in your "guesthouse", because each guest "may be clearing you out for some new delight". I am working on making my guesthouse emotionally, mentally, physically and spiritually all-inclusive.
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