The Emotional World Is Not Flat, Either
Sometimes, we act as if the world of our emotions is flat, a two-dimensional sort of place. We may very badly want something to turn out a particular way. That desired outcome stands in the future, on the edge of a flat world. We picture it turning out the “wrong” way, and believe that we will then fall off the edge of the earth, life will end, we will cease to exist. Perhaps we are afraid of not getting something we want: a job, a baby, a certain partner. Maybe we are afraid of losing something we have: a job, a baby, a certain partner. Either way, there are certain outcomes we are not willing to open up to as even remotely possible, and we brace ourselves against these possibilities with all of our might. Sometimes, we live in so much fear of loss, that we don’t even know what we have, while we have it.
Occasionally, even though we have braced ourselves against it, we still lose what we thought we could never live without. I remember going through a particular break-up when I was younger. I had come to depend on this person- let’s call him Jack- for things that I really needed from myself. I spent much of the relationship feeling fearful about my own world falling apart if it ended. When Jack left, the end was not nearly as awful as the anticipation and fear had been. Over time, I began to discover things about myself, my own potential, and the world around me. An exciting chapter in my life started to unfold. Had the relationship continued, I would probably have let my full internal potential continue to be eclipsed by my fear of future external loss.
When a feared loss comes to fruition, we may feel devastated at first- and we need the time to feel the devastation, and mourn our loss. Eventually we discover that we didn’t fall off the face of the earth after all. We are still here, and life is still going on. Mourning our loss was excruciatingly painful, but we are still alive- even without that which we thought made life possible. It may take a while to re-orient ourselves to a new life, but at our core, there is still something solid inside of ourselves to hold on to. When we tap into that solid part of ourselves, we plant the seed of meaning that will grow from the pain of our loss.