For the ones experiencing an existential crisis
Ohmygahhhhh (flailing my arms at the entirety of existence)
I feel it coming on. Suddenly my physical body doesn’t weigh as much. The reality of my tiny speck-ness is feeling a little too literal. My minds eye holds an image of a grand Universe filled with plants and stars and dust. And then there’s me. Tiny. Insignificant. Somehow claustrophobic at the thought that I am floating amid all this grandness.
Deep breaths. You are here. You are now. But still… Sometimes the embodiment of Oneness mixed with tininess makes my stomach hurt and my brain flip upside down.
This past weekend I went to Jackson Hole, Wyoming for the first time. The magnificence of mountains and valleys and buckets of powdery snow juxtaposed with a starry sky and massive mammals… Wow. I look down at my hand on a car ride home from the mountain thinking “I am so tiny. This body isn’t the whole story. And where the hell am I really?!”
Have I read one too many spiritual texts explaining to me that what I see in the stars is no different than what I see in the mirror? Am I taking this image all too seriously? What happened to this being for FUN?! Cue the anxiety of being a little too aware.
And then Ram Dass says “the flash light never shines upon itself.” So my awareness acts as an asymptote — getting closer and closer to the OG point of consciousness but never quite reaching.
Last year I learned that I’m a Life Path 33. Apparently it means I’m wise or something but that I’ll also go through quite a few Karmic lessons to really embody such a powerful life path. On my bad days I think, god damnit this is a lot of work. Bring me the easy route.
But on the days where I take care of my vessel and strike a deal with my highest Self to believe that this is all going right — then I think, how epic that the Universe chose my clump of cells to carry this lesson and perspective.
So back to dealing with an existential crisis (btw, we’ve been here before.)
The planets are shifting again. A new paradigm is settling in. And here you are: observing, feeling, experiencing, and trying to make sense of it all. That last part is usually where it goes wrong. I don’t think our minds were ever meant to take this whole consciousness thing on by itself… Because every time I stop trying to wrap my mind and opt for losing it instead, that’s when the exhalation takes place and existential dread melts into beingness. The texture shifts from WTF to ahhh…
It’s body-led existence. No longer fighting the visceral symptoms but accepting them as IT. I’m onto something I think… Because in looking back on today’s inexplicable feelings of wonkiness, I see a pattern:
Mistaking your very real humanness for a need to diagnose. A pathologizing of the awakening process. When will we stop portraying symptoms as a sickness and see them as what they truly are: the cure? The path home. The entire point.
Maybe I am here to have an existential feeling of tiny, insignificantness to know that God made us this way on purpose. To learn to laugh amid suffering. To stop gripping so tightly to a preconceived idea of reality. To just fucking send it anyway because you are here and you are now!!!
GOD DAMNIT JUST LET IT RIP. LET IT RUN WILD AND CRAZY AND IN EVERY NONSENSICAL WAY POSSIBLE.
*Cue howling at the moon and screaming into the ocean*
Ahhh, that feels better, doesn’t it? Accept the insanity of being alive and shake off the false stories. We’re okay. We’re still breathing. We’re on the same team.
So when the next existential bout sneaks up on you, just remember that this whole thing (waving my arms around frantically at existence) is a game of hide and seek. Peek-a-boo! Remember the flashlight that Ram Dass talked about? Don’t strain so hard to shine upon yourself. It’s kind of impossible and would probably hurt a lot of you really tried.
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That felt really good to write. Thanks for reading this far. I love you and I see you. Welcome in if you’re new. I’m sharing my unfiltered experience of consciousness here, amongst other spiritually-inclined things.
Xo,
BS
Bella Solanot