I Guess I Shouldn’t Be Surprised

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I guess I shouldn’t be surprised. Here it is the end of another year and as always it’s been a year of ups and downs. As I get older the downs are not quite so tragic, but I am grateful that the ups are just as wonderful as they were when I was young, maybe even more so.

Years ago, when I was in a bad way emotionally, someone suggested I read the book, The Road Less Traveled by M. Scott Peck. When I read the first line, “Life is difficult,” it was as if a door that I didn’t know was there opened up for me. I heaved a huge sigh of relief. I thought to myself, Life really is difficult and not just for me, but for everyone. This book, which suggests we can transcend the difficult times, was the beginning of a lifetime of self-examination through journaling, reading books by great teachers and looking at the world through a new lens from the many stories I read or watched. What I learned was, when bad, or even just annoying things happen, I get to make a choice. Will I try to control outside forces? Or the way I FEEL about what has happened? 

Trying to control events on the outside never works. As Arthur Brooks and Oprah Winfrey write in, Build the Life You Want, trying to control outside events is like trying to control the weather. The only “control” we have over our lives is our “reaction” to the weather. We can stand in the rain complaining and get drenched, or we can seek shelter, dry ourselves off and laugh at getting wet. In other words, the only thing we can competently control in our lives is how we react or respond to what happens to us. I’m not finished with the book yet, but I’m already seeing how I’ve chosen many of the techniques Brooks and Winfrey suggest to make our lives happier. Becoming happier is a process like becoming physically fit, learning a new language, or any other skill. 

As I wrote in the last post, we’ve lost several loved ones this year. On December 20th, we lost another one. I guess I shouldn’t be surprised. As I wrote earlier, life is a series of ups and downs. Learning to deal with all the emotions both happy and sad is an important skill.

Grief is always a difficult emotion to deal with, especially this time of year. But we can choose how we respond to the death of a loved one. Sometimes the pain is so acute that the feelings are overwhelming and we wish to get rid of them. But in reality, that’s not possible.

I remember when my father died, I knew it was coming, but I couldn’t imagine my life without him in it. He was my mentor. It’s hard to lose your mentor. Because I knew his time was near, my husband and I planned to visit him on the last weekend of my Fall break from teaching. He died the day before we were to arrive. That was a blow. As we drove up to Mom and Dad’s house and Mom was the only one standing on the porch to greet us, I felt like I was caught in a whirling vortex. My head was spinning and everything felt so unreal. That’s how I initially felt grief at not getting to talk with my dad one last time and say goodbye. And yet, as the weeks went by and the family reunion that we’d planned, hoping we’d all be able to say goodbye to Dad approached, I felt stronger. As we gathered, we wept and laughed remembering all the good times with our beloved, amazing husband/father/grandfather/uncle, James Calvin Sage. I have a picture of him on the credenza across from my desk. Sometimes I look at it and talk to him, asking his advice and telling him I miss him all these years later. Those initial acute emotions aren’t present any longer, but I still miss him. And I remember all the important things he taught me.

No matter what happens to us, we must decide, do we push the emotions away, or do we allow them to wash over us. I’ve always found that allowing myself to feel deeply distressing emotions while they are happening is the best way to move forward. It’s not easy to do. We’re taught to stuff our emotions as if showing them in public is a sign of weakness. But I learned that stuffing emotions doesn’t get rid of them. It just makes them grow and eventually resurface sometimes in very scary and detrimental ways. We can develop diseases trying to hide our traumas, grief, fear, and anger.

Whoever it was that suggested I read The Road Less Traveled, must have seen how very angry and miserable I was. One thing I discovered as I read the book was that I was holding a great deal of unresolved pain from things that had happened to me in my second and third years of college. I had been blessed to discover journaling and theatre, which helped, but there were still lots of negative emotions I had not dealt with. Facing those emotions after so many years was difficult, but little by little I began to feel lighter and happier. I made some big changes in the trajectory of my life and I’ve never regretted the path I chose. Which means that now, that I’m retired, doing lots of creative projects, I’m happier than I’ve ever been. I feel that I’m making a positive contribution to the world and that’s a really satisfying feeling.

I know that 2024 is probably going to be a challenging year like this year was, but looking back, has any year in your life been a breeze with no challenges? I can’t think of one where everything went completely smoothly with no problems whatsoever. So, here’s to embracing every challenge and joy in the coming year.

I hope you’re holiday season is bright and happy, but if not, I hope you are blessed with lots of loving support.

Blessings,

Lucinda Sage-Midgorden © 2023 

The Space Between Time

Lucinda is the author of The Space Between Time, an award finalist in the “Fiction: Fantasy” category of the 2017 Best Book Awards.

Have you ever experienced life shattering events? Yeah, after the last few years, most of us have. In The Space Between Time, Jenna Holden gets slammed by her fiancé walking out, her mother’s untimely death, and losing her job all in one week. But she receives unexpected help when she finds her three-times great-grandmother’s journals and begins the adventure of a lifetime.

The Space Between Time is available in all ebook formats at Smashwords and for Kindle at Amazon, or you can find the ebook at iBooks or Barnes and Noble. If you prefer a physical copy, you can find a print-on-demand version at Amazon. Stay tuned for news when the audiobook version is published.

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I’m so passionate about stories that I created the Story-Power podcast, Patreon Community, and Apple subscription so I’d have an excuse to talk story with other story lovers. Patreon is $5 a month for content not found on the Story-Power podcast, or on my Sage Woman Blog. The Apple subscription is $3 a month, again with content not found on the Story-Power podcast. If you’re passionate about stories, and want to talk about what you’ve learned from your favorites, come join me at patreon.com/StoryPower. Or, you can subscribe to the subscription on Apple podcast where Story-Power is published.