Before Me, Enough

Time in itself is non-existent. There is only the current of events which we measure with the time-concept. For the… man close to nature, the course of time is not an abstraction; the course of time is not an abstraction; for him there is only what is just before one, the now, and what is behind. He has no clock by which he could read the time with numbers; he is entirely in this stream of events which steadily flows on down into a dark hole. It meets us out of the dark future, flows through us, and sinks down behind us again into an endless darkness.

 ~ Children’s Dreams, C.G. Jung

No plans. No ambitions. No goals. No resolutions.

I don’t believe that I have the power to control whatever I will encounter as I stand at the confluence between the new year and the old one.

If I am fortunate and strong enough, I might be able to work with it, accept it, and allow the year ahead to transform me. I prepare myself for a few likelihoods, I prudently strategize in response to a few worries, I spin a few wishes.

But I am not resolute or resolved about anything.

It is likely, (but nothing is certain, God knows anything can happen) that by this time next year, I will have spent September through winter break as a new empty nester, as both of my young adult children are readying themselves to leave for schools out of state. Depending on their housing situation, the finicky cat and the big, goofy puppy may go with them – leaving the house unimaginably quieter than it is today.

Probably, my summer will be consumed by packing them up, traveling to their destinations, setting them up – and then - poof – setting them free.

I know it may not be permanent. My husband and I both bounced back home to live a time or two before we were securely anchored in our independent lives.  I have no need for my kids to travel a straight developmental line or follow a traditional trajectory. These are exceptional times, and they are exceptional people.

But one way or another, in the year ahead, my role as a mother raising up children will end. I will become a parent of adult children, and my role, wherever they live, will be more ancillary than primary.

Child-free living in a continuing pandemic, I can’t imagine anything more monk-like.

Maybe I’ll become a full-on anchorite.

What will emerge in the vacuum? What long foreclosed aspects of myself will return? To what ends will those energies be redirected?

I have no idea.

I have a few concerns as we cross over into the new year, and some thoughts about potential responses I might implement if needed.

The deterioration of Twitter has disrupted a large personal and professional network derailing my access to people who would amplify my writing and services or enroll in workshops. I don’t know yet how this will impact my income. I may not be able to schedule as many workshops if enrollment is too low.  I am hoping to sustain my current intermittent short-term, and by-donation fee model – as they feel both healthiest for me, and most ethical considering my circumstances and values. Maybe I will have to increase my “suggested donations” – which I have tried to keep affordable for folks with average resources.

I will of course need to pull my weight to get two kids through school simultaneously, but don’t currently feel that returning to long term weekly individual psychotherapy is a feasible or tolerable option. My belief and fidelity to that model has eroded over the past several years, and I know that I cannot carry the dependencies that I used to.

Monetizing this newsletter to some degree might be one possibility, although currently it feels like an undesirable one.  I truly don’t know how or if it would impact what I share here, if I could write as freely, or at all if I had to think about what my words were “worth” (or if I want to pay Substack’s fees). 

What will shake out? What will come through? What will shift or change?

I have no idea.

I also harbor some silly, almost ineffable wishes, that I sometimes hope will come true, although I am not holding my breath.  It is hard to even write them here, they feel so vague and unformed, although they are stubborn and persistent.

I wish for some infrastructure that I don’t have to create myself.  Some eclectic space or project, institution, or center that might house a few of my classes and workshops, support me in this new role as some weird kind of “teacher” and offer me a bit of professional shelter. Some colleagues to collaborate with. Some administrative support. Some affiliation or platform that I don’t have to build and maintain every single day entirely by myself.

A small floating platform where I can rest when I need to, instead of dogpaddling in the middle of the sea entirely on my own.

I mean, I’m proud of what I have accomplished all by myself – and I don’t have the ambition or the mojo to reach toward empire building at this phase of life. I don’t have the resources to hire assistants or webmasters, or editors or content producers. There isn’t much room for me to either rest or grow as things stand.

Which, frankly, is an extraordinary privilege. I’m fine. It is enough as it is, as it has been. And let’s face it, I have been an outside cat for a long time, I’ve worked for myself for almost thirty years. Just because I’m getting older and a little tired doesn’t mean I’m any more capable of coming indoors to work alongside other people. I might not even like it. I might feel smothered or exploited or pressured to make intolerable compromises.  

I have been, and likely will continue to be fine-enough on my own. Still, the fantasy of stumbling onto some place, some gig that could anchor me a bit keeps rising up and is sometimes hard to squelch.

What would it be like to be professionally supported? Is it even possible?

I have no idea.

I once said to my husband after I had been renting a temporary office for too long: “I need a new office and I’m not going to do a single thing about it.”   Thirty minutes later I got a call from a colleague asking if I wanted to go in with him on a basement suite in the West Village.

“Perfect.” I replied.

Life will unfold in its intended direction either way, and I’ll keep doing whatever I can do, whether I am on thick ice or thin.

We have no idea what this year will bring:

Crisis? Catastrophe? Revolution? Rescue? Respite?

Maybe there will be some break in this pandemic, some medical or environmental intervention that will fling the doors of my local community open again. Maybe the stochastic civil war will escalate. Maybe another zoonotic disease will spread around the world, or a wildfire will burn me out of my home. Maybe my cancer will catch flame and consume my central nervous system. Maybe dreams I didn’t even know I had will come true.

Whatever is likely, whatever we fear, whatever we wish – what comes next is always a mystery.

What roles will I be called to fulfill? What losses lie ahead? What miracles? What surprises?

I don’t have any idea at all, and I have come to find not knowing, and not needing to know, a relief. What good could it possibly do for me to try to control what comes next?

Believe me, it can be a comfort not to know.  Sometimes it is better to be surprised.

2023 will greet us all with its own forces - planetary, historical, political, medical – that will sweep us up and carry us wherever they wish.  And the forces that rise up from within - internal openings, responses, visions - they will carry us along their own course with comparable force, depositing us where they will.

Perhaps the primary task is simply to align ourselves with this stream of events, to move with them, embracing, or at least accepting whatever lies ahead, letting ourselves be carried instead of pretending we consciously steer our course by our resolve and effort.

Whether the future fulfills our wishes, faces us with our fears, or unfolds in expected or unexpected ways, may we all move with it, and let it move through us.

And may it be enough.