Listening to the Body, Listening to the Soul

11 things that culminate with "keep going"

1. Yesterday, I ran two miles, quite slowly, around Puffer’s Pond. This was a first since I had Covid three months ago, and it felt like a significant milestone. Today, I did it again, through some local fields and conservation land before a short stretch of road. I have missed running! I have also been listening to my body, and my body has not been interested in running. Or much walking, for that matter. My body has been interested in napping :)

2. After blood work recently concluded that I have neither a UTI nor a tick-borne illness, it seems that in all likelihood I’m experiencing long Covid (and low vitamin D – welcome to New England in December). Functionally, this means that I’ve joined the ranks of one of the 20% of American adults who’ve had Covid for whom this is the case. Within this statistic is a huge range of symptoms, that impact people’s lives to varying degrees in terms of specifics and severity.

3. What I’ve missed about running: The steadiness of it. The music, sometimes, and silence at others. Being in conversation with the trees and moving through space. The footfall, the heartbeat, the breathing, the time alone in motion. At the same time, I am intent on paying attention to how I feel and not pushing.

4. Mind you, I crashed pretty hard yesterday afternoon, after said run and Shabbat morning services and lunch at the synagogue. Two hours of deep sleep, eye mask and all, on the couch, the kind of sleep where you wake up and think it’s morning, or have no idea for a minute what day it is or where you are.

5. All of this is an exercise in staying present. (What isn’t??!) In other words, not to project ahead, wondering or worrying about when, or whether, this will resolve, and instead opting to do what I can to take care of myself in the moment. Not to mention that some of the symptoms that have been most prevalent for me exist in a kind of Venn diagram with perimenopause, and at the end of the day, the cause is probably less important than my response to it.

6. Gentle, gentle, gentle. Fierce, fierce, fierce. Always, holding two things in one hand, or one thing in each hand, or maybe, finally, just opening my hands and letting everything go, if even for a moment.

7. Let go or be dragged.

8. A client recently commented that she often feels a “push-pull” in my writing. It was an interesting thing to hear reflected. I immediately remembered a paper I wrote in college, about The Brothers Karamazov. It had to do with dichotomies. I think I have been obsessed with dichotomies my whole life. Maybe it’s my Libra moon at work – this quest for balance and constant awareness of things that are seemingly opposites but are perhaps less that and more interrelated. I mean, I was the kid who wrote precocious, brooding poems about light and shadow. If nothing else, I’ve been consistent!

9. Instead of “no, but,” I think my mantra is more “yes, and…” The key for me, in growing older, is holding that push-pull without the struggle. It is so much about creating more space internally, and finding more ease with contradictions, both in here and out there.

10. That growing ease, I’m noticing lately, is leading me toward a desire to continue learning, being of service, loving and supporting my family members, and moving slowly and steadily in the direction of my soul’s deepest whispers.

11. This morning, as I ran, a stick in the road caught my eye. It formed a perfectly shaped arrow. “Keep going,” I heard. “I will,” I said out loud to the crows, the water flowing under the ice, the narrow bridge just up ahead, as I made my way home.

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To all who celebrate Christmas, may your holiday be peaceful and bright. ✨

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