feelings, like, all the time, feelings and feelings and FEELINGS. I have feelings about the sunrises and how I feel when I drink coffee in the morning with my husband (always from matching cups, because I would definitely feel something if they didn't match). I have feelings when my stepdaughters and son-in-law have feelings. I have feelings about my dogs, the weather, my shoes, good food (or bad), my friends, my family, my garden. I have ALL the feelings about ALL the things, apparently. So do you, right? I daresay, even "what fresh hell is this?" has a feeling to it. Or perhaps, it is a feeling unto itself.
My favorite oldest stepdaughter, MPG, is wonderfully pregnant. Oh my, do I have big, beautiful feelings about that. Next level joy and excitement mixed with constant worry for the little mama and her little one, layered with the absolute knowledge that she and her husband will be outstanding parents to that little girl. And then I have feelings about it being a girl and everything that means in our world. (Don't worry, this blog isn't about that.)
MPG, the expectant mother, is a pre-kindergarten/kindergarten teacher. She helps her classroom of kids express their feelings by using an imaginary bubble of colors. Sometimes their bubble starts getting red, and they need to reset so they can figure out why they are so upset. I like that. Thinking of my emotions outside myself as a color hovering over my head. Wouldn't it be so much easier if that were real? We could see if someone was sad or scared or thrilled instead of trying to guess. So when someone asks you, "Is something wrong? Are you upset?" You can't get away with "No, I'm fine." when you really, really aren't.
For years now, as a person who has lived with depression (and tried to die from it), I've often been aggressively aware of my emotions. I feel the need to assess them almost constantly, to name them, to keep track of how long I've felt whatever I'm feeling. Sometimes, when I've had several days or weeks of apathy, I start feeling about my lack of feeling. Is exhausted an emotion, because, dang, I get so exhausted of my emotions.
As always, I've said all that to say this... sometimes, I feel something because I feel like that is how I'm supposed to feel. It's not even a conscious choice. It's almost like my brain or heart or whatever is steering the ship at any given moment starts running a formula. A plus B equals C. It must, because that's the expectation. It must because if it doesn't there's something wrong, right?
That's why much of what we watch is formulaic. I mean, Hallmark makes bank on those Christmas movies because they follow a well-worn path that evokes a consistent set of emotions all leading to the happily-ever-after ending. I'm not knocking it (no Mackenzie, I still won't watch them. Michaela and I will be over here...uh...not watching them.) There is comfort in knowing how you are supposed to feel and when you're supposed to feel it. Things like that give us a break from having to wait to see what happens next in our own lives to know what kind of sentiment to express next. Our real lives don't stay on the well-worn path. They twist and turn and sometimes head straight for a cliff.
Think about this... hometown team comes from behind and wins, you feel....? Survey says?! Elation and pride! They suffer a crushing defeat...heartbreak and pride.
Now try this one...I'm sitting in my bed at 3 am, writing this blog. My husband is sleeping (trying to) next to me, his hand on my leg. Six and a half years of marriage, and I still love the weight of his hand. It's so dark, I can barely see his face in the light of this computer screen. A cool breeze comes from the open window, because fall has made an appearance. I can smell the dampness from yesterday's rain. All is still and quiet except the soft snores of our dog curled up at my feet.
Did you ick or awwww? It's okay. You feel what you feel about it. Unless you don't. Unless you feel what you think you should feel about it. Our emotions have so many layers. They are born from our past and present. What's happening to us at this moment? What from our past colors how we see things now? We can feel indifferent about the hometown team analogy, because we have a lot going on right now that seems more important than sports. Or we can feel that deeply, because we used to love to watch our kid play basketball in junior high, and now she's grown and off making a life for herself, and we miss those feelings of elation and pride or heartbreak and pride that were tied to that part of our lives.
The one about my writing in bed...if you've lost your partner, that could be an absolute gut-punch (I'm sorry if I did that to you.). If you are struggling in your relationship, reading that could just flat out make you furious (red bubble!). You could feel totally grossed out. (I can just HEAR favorite youngest stepdaughter now...ewwww, STOP IT!) Maybe you can relate, so you did the awwww. Or it could be all of that or even none of it. You do you, boo.
We're almost to the point, I promise. This week I started a new job. My second new job this year. My third job in 32 years. The first job lasted 30. I have big feelings about it. It's scary, it's sad, it's exciting. It's a lot.
My first day at this third new job in my lifetime was Monday. With a week of hindsight, I can say I like it. I'm optimistic that I will love it. It's challenging and different, yet familiar enough to be somewhat comfortable. At the end of the first week, my brain is exhausted, but I feel a sense of pride that this old girl is learning new tricks. Pride isn't something I've given myself an allowance to feel in the past. But this Lisa allows it now. She let's me feel what I'm feeling without as much expectation and judgement. I don't have to feel what the formula says. I get to just be in it.
Want to know the crazy part? I didn't give myself permission to really decide what I feel until just this past Monday. Seriously. The first day of the new job, I had an epiphany of sorts or rather I was given one. That morning, I happened to run into a beautiful soul who reads this blog. Her daughters are longtime friends of mine. When I told her about my new job, she and her husband immediately cheered. They literally cheered. She asked how I was feeling, and I said what I believed was expected, the A plus B equals C answer...excited and nervous. Because the unknown plus change equals excited and nervous, right? That's how someone would write that scene, yes?
When I answered DKD's question with "excited, nervous" she simply said, "I find the older I get, I don't really get nervous about most things anymore." Wait. What? She doesn't WHAT?! She didn't realize how wonderfully profound that statement was. I sat with it for a moment and realized I really wasn't nervous, or rather I was only nervous about figuring out where to park. And I wasn't really nervous about THAT, I just didn't know where to go. That's not nerves, that's a need for information. The people that hired me weren't going to kill and eat me if I made mistakes. They could tell me I wasn't working out for them, but I wouldn't die from it. I've had years of experience, and most people genuinely hope you succeed, especially, I'd think, people who just hired you to do work for them. I felt solidly good about starting this new job. Huh. That's something good new, not scary new.
I wasn't nervous, yet I felt that I should be, because I've always thought that my self-confidence would be seen as arrogance, so it was important to be nervous in order to show humility. That's some kind of algebra or geometry or whatever other math is out there. That's fancy calculator math. It's self-sabotaging math. I thought that my formula A plus B equaled C, when in truth, it equaled nonsense. So how do we get to DKD's level of not-nervousness? Perhaps we start by not putting expectations on other's feelings. We stop believing we need to have an opinion on what someone else's answers to their own equations are. We stop saying things like "They moved on rather quickly, don't you think" or "Did you see what she was wearing? Who does she think she is?" or "He seems a bit full of himself, bragging about that." We let people feel whatever the fresh hell they want to feel, because we don't have to have feelings about other's feelings. Hey, eyes on your own paper.
Maybe in not assigning a faulty formula to others, we can begin to re-write our own emotional spreadsheet. We can actually delete that thing altogether. Instead, we can just be and feel and act in a truly unadulterated, authentic way.
If someone wouldn't have shown me a new way to emotionally math, I would have convinced myself I truly was nervous, and I would have acted with that nervousness. At worst, that might have caused me to fail before I started, at best, it would have made me miss the goodness I felt walking out to my car in the spot where they told me to park when I simply asked them. I would have missed that very good beginning.
I certainly wouldn't be sitting in this bed, writing this blog, with my husband's hand still on my leg, my little dog snoring, and the sky even darker, because it's just before the dawn.
As for me, the bubble above my head is the color of sunrise with a hint of coffee with too much creamer in a blue cup that matches his. It's the color of possible and hopeful and excited with little to no nervous and certainly no hell.
Thank you DKD. I will carry your wisdom in my heart and call up the sound of you cheering me on when I'm truly feeling I need it.
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