on the floor and close my eyes and really focus on it. And when you really analyze fear you realize, first, that it is only a natural part of us. And second, that it is the sister of hope. Because both are born from the uncertain fabric of life.
In Tibetan the word re-dok is a portmanteau of the words rewa (hope) and dokpa (fear), acknowledging they coexist and both stem from essentially the same thing—uncertainty. When we analyze rather than evade our darkest fears, we learn that even our largest demons are not as invincible as they first appear. Often, when we stare at them, deeply, they disintegrate before our eyes.
Remember
There will be other days. And other feelings.
Opposites
What would “big” mean if there was no “small”? Opposites rely on each other to exist. In Taoist philosophy, the dualistic energies of yin and yang are opposites but also interdependent. Day needs night and night needs day. The dark shadows in a painting by Tintoretto accentuate the light. The mute silence of Maya Angelou’s childhood led to her determination to use her voice.
In this world of interdependence opposite emotions are also connected. As William Blake put it, “Joy and woe are woven fine.” I know this. Because one of the reasons I love life is because I was once suicidal. I have sincerely known more moments of contentment in my life for having gone through years of hell. I now avoid trying to see myself as one thing or the other. I am not a happy person or a sad person. I am not a calm person or a fearful person. I am a happy-sad-calm-fearful person. I let myself feel it all, and that way I am always open to new feelings. Nothing gets clogged in the pipe. No single feeling becomes the only feeling, if you let it all happen. And the way to let it all happen is to see the value in it all. To see the way the dark might lead to light. And the way present pain might lead to future hope.
Love/despair
Albert Camus said, “There is no love of life without despair of life.” When I first came across that quote I thought it was empty and pretentious and more than a little bleak. But as I grew older the words became truer. My love of life stems almost directly from despair. In the sense that I am grateful for better times having known terrible times. But in a deeper sense too. In the sense that pleasure and despair are contained in the same whole, and when we start to see the connections between all things, when we see how opposites are contained within each other, when we see the way everything connects, we can feel more empowered at our lowest points.
Possibility
The existential philosopher Rollo May believed that we often mistake opposites. “Hate is not the opposite of love,” he said, “apathy is.” He also pointed out that courage and fear aren’t opposites, as fear is an essential component of bravery, and that the truly courageous are those who experience fear and move through it. He was most informative of all, though, when arguing for the compatibility of joy and despair.
“Joy is the experience of possibility,” he wrote, “the consciousness of one’s freedom as one confronts one’s destiny. In this sense despair . . . can lead to joy. After despair, the one thing left is possibility.”
The door
Everything in front of us is defined by possibility. We are never inside the future. We are outside the door. We have our hand on the handle. We are turning the handle. But we never know what is on the other side of the door. It may be a room similar to the one we are standing in, or it might be a room we have never seen before. It might not be a room at all. It might be an orchard bearing all the ripe fruits of our labor. It might be wasteland. But we can never be sure. And even if we end up somewhere we don’t want to be, we can be thankful for the knowledge that another door exists. And another beautiful handle, waiting to be turned.
The messy miracle of being here
The Western idea of self-empowerment requires you to become better, discover your inner billionaire, get beach-bodied, work, upgrade. It says the present is not enough. It’s self-loathing masquerading as salvation.
We need self-acceptance. Self-compassion. Our present bodies and minds and lives are not things we have