Episode 41: My Ego Dies At The End, Shower Ghosts & LSD

SHOWER HAUNTINGS!!! Half human, half raw precipice, half flower. ADVENTURE BOOTS!!! Empty dumpsters! EGO DEATH!!! I AM NOT A GHOST HUNTER!!! LSD TRIPS!!! “One lonely pizza for one lonely woman.” TRANSCENDENCE OF SELF!!! The Now. THAT CHAIR!!! Time is no linear. & CONFUSING PHILOSOPHY!!! 

Excerpt 1:

Alright who's ready… I know I’m not. So… I’ve spent a lot, a lot, of this week sitting alone in silence crying, or not crying, and just sitting. 

It’s not nearly as depressing as it sounds, I promise. I mean contrary to, well, my entire life… I actually enjoy my own company. 

And I would honestly RATHER be alone than with a bunch of people that are only half interested in me, or be forced to compromise my integrity. 

And as I went to pick up my pizza from the shop across the street from my office, after a totally amazing yoga class, I walked through the door and looked over to see the one lone pizza in the to go pizza warmer… I pointed at it. “That’s mine I think, one lonely little pizza.” And let’s not make that, “One lonely pizza for one lonely girl joke.” ohh wait I already made it. WELP, awkward, and now I’ve already left without my keys. Anddddd scene. 

This week I’ve spent a whole lot of time alone, like I said, which means I’m EXTRA AWKWARD. Today I went almost the entire day without speaking to another person. And I’ve also spent a lot of time relishing in delicious meals with friends, sinking into my body, expanding my senses, and listening, deeply listening to what it was that my heart was trying to tell me. 

And folks, the jury is in and my heart is WEIRD. 

I went from totally fine and perfectly streamlined and compartmentalized, to crying in my car at the drop of a hat. And I know what your thinking… no it’s not HORMONES, it’s just a lot of unprocessed stuff finally coming up to be looked at in a safer container. 

Often when something heartbreaking happens, we don’t have the capacity to process or handle it in the moment, or even for many years after. In order to truly process something properly, you must be in a safe space; aware enough to hold yourself, and present enough to know you will be ok. Here, in this safe space you have created for yourself, you can process these feelings, these emotions, and they will not break you. This is why I have periodically done yoga since I was a teenager. Just me and my mat — having a conversation with my body. 

So in some ways that’s what’s happening. I’ve finally created enough space within myself, to hold the reality of my pain. 

And WOOOO BOY it’s all right there. Memories from 9 years ago like it was yesterday. 

I keep returning, to this one perfect little moment: It’s something o’clock in the morning. The sun pouring into the window in the shower.The room was a little chilly, sparse, and contained nothing except the bare essentials. I slip into the shower. “M” smiles, crooked, totally charming already wet and covered in soap. I remember the water, glistening off of his perfectly proportioned muscles in the sunlight, lean and functional. I remember the steam filling up the room. I remember the smell of the soap, the temperature of the water. He kisses me and continues washing his hair, slicks it back and grins. I start with the soap, gently washing my hands, and arms, my stomach and legs. An act of intention. He watches me sideways, comes and runs his hands over my shoulders. He says, “Aren’t you going to wash your feet? You should always wash them, they carry you everywhere you go. It’s an act of love.” 

An act of love. 

Existing in the same space as you was an act of love. 

Tonight, Bahkti, devotional yoga, the teacher asked us to devote our practice. To something, anything, a person, a feeling, a place. 

It has been years since I have honestly taken refuge on a yoga mat. 

And there I was. And the only thing I could feel was an overwhelming twinge in my chest. Everything compounded at once. With you at the center of it. 

All of the people who have left, all of the lies, all of the heartbreak. All of the pain of  love that will never be. And there you are. The core. The center. The heart of it. I can still feel you. 

Do I devote my practice to you, or to my heartache? Do I devote my practice to moving through this, holding this with grace?

And now, sitting alone in my living room. Eating a pizza, my dog lying on the floor with her paw at a cross. I sit in silence. As I have a lot this week. And again I am haunted by something that is gone. But this time, the difference is, that it is because I can hold it now. I can break and still stand strong. I can break and I will still be safe here. Alone in this room. Staring at the void, you know, as I do. 

And I wonder, will you be home for Christmas. 15 miles down the road. And I wonder if you think of me. Or what you think of me. I wonder if you are haunted by that same shower. If you can still feel my hands running down your arms. If the smile spread across my face is burned into the back of your head. Memoirs you never could let go of. 

But I will never ask you. 

I mean I STOPPED MYSELF LIKE 10 TIMES FROM SENDING YOU A MESSAGE this week. 

Don’t get me wrong. 

But I won’t. Because you would have to come to me. Say it to my face. I miss your voice. I miss the feeling of your hair between my fingers. 

I am not chasing anything that is not mine any longer. 

I am not a ghost hunter. 

I am a flesh and blood woman. 

No matter how stripped down I get. No matter how raw.

I am still real,

here,

present. 

And maybe, maybe you have returned to teach me, again how to love. 

How to touch the objects of the world. How to feel through them. 

Maybe you have come back to remind me, of what love should feel like. Of what it does feel like. Maybe you have come back to remind me that I don’t need another person to be in love with the world. You who brushed off the soles of your feet and bowed your head to the universe in gratitude and devotion every night before you got in bed. 

You taught me how to love the world. 

Now maybe it’s time I learned to do it for myself. 

Like I said last week. I guess my only job now is to become love.

And I think we start becoming love by paying attention. 

And so it is, that I am finally paying attention. To all of it. To you, to that shower, to your bed on the floor, to the books on your bookshelf, to the texture of the sheepskin under my feet. To the silence. 

And I can hear it whisper, everything is happening exactly as it is meant to, even if you want to resist that, it is still true. 

But for a moment, come with me, through a series of songs I’ve been listening to lately. 

Here’s Alaska, by Caiola followed by My Ego Dies At The End, by Jensen McRay 

Both of these songs hit something momentarily perfect. Alaska feels exactly like this whole experience of emotion. And My Ego, well, I mean I air my dirty laundry on public radio every week. I think part of my ego died a long time ago. I mean I’m crying on public radio for lord’s sake. I mean no one with any inflated sense of self would want to do this, IT’S A LOT. 

But at any rate, both of these songs feel right,

right now. 

So here they are.”