am i ever going to stop feeling like this?

Am I ever going to stop feeling like this?

This is what my 5 year old child asked when she was able to calm her breath enough to form words.
After the screaming – the crying – the throwing herself on the floor. Her anger, her sadness – All her feelings – being given form.

Yes. You. Will. I answer with a sureness I rarely feel about myself. I assure her with the confidence I can feel when I see her wholeness – a wholeness I know from these five and a half years of answering named and unnamed question.

Am I ever going to stop feeling like this?

Can I come closer? I am here to hug you and hold you for as long as you need it. I’m going to try to put a boundary around the feelings – offer you a chance to drop back into your body, at this moment, in this space.
I hope each time I hold you, that ALL of you learns what being held can do. I hope that it equips you to hold others.

Am I ever going to stop feeling like this?

Yes you will. But you will feel it again. And sometimes, the feelings are going to last longer and be deeper. You can choose the work of avoiding them – but I worry that each time you do you will close yourself off from parts of your own complexity, and from seeing the complexity of others.
The feelings will come again, and each time I hope you learn a bit more how to lean into what they have to teach you. That you learn how to work with them, not hurting others, hurting yourself, because of them. I hope you can learn how hear the big feelings of others, how to listen to what their feelings have to teach you.

Am I ever going to stop feeling like this?

Sometimes you won’t. It will go in waves, but there are some feelings that stick around. I hope you will learn what it is to sit with them, to not fear them. I hope they can become one of your guides, helping you find others to join in embodied hope of a different world. And a place where it is safe for everyone to feel.

 

2019 – SFAI140 (Santa Fe Art Institute)

you can watch it here.