Dead Weight
As I write this I can see the outline of where my dreamcatcher used to hang, just to the right of my window. I took it off my wall yesterday, wrapped it in paper, and placed it in a box. If I stare intently, I can see the actual lines that made up the inner web of the dreamcatcher. The ring that held the web together. The strings that dangled from the ring — beads and feathers and ribbons. Everywhere you look, it appears I stenciled my walls with smoke. I couldn’t fathom why my walls were so alarmingly dirty. All the wildfires, my sister said. And then I had immediate concern for my lungs.
Packing has been slow. Buy the boxes one day. Pack all of my treasured books another. Sell a piece of furniture here, a piece of furniture there. Before I even thought about packing, I went on a purging rampage. Nothing was safe. All of my wedding photos? Trash. All of the cards I ever saved? Goodbye. Orphaned cords and necklaces I never wore and DVD’s that can’t be played? Gone. Each pile of donated goods, each bag of trash that went into my alley, every possession I had that I considered heavily: Save or don’t save? They symbolized a transformation, and like a snake shedding its skin, I became deeply curious about what I held onto and why.
Moving out of the place I had with my ex-husband felt like a hurricane. I threw stuff into boxes, taped them shut, and hid them in the closet of my new apartment. Eight months later I put the unopened boxes onto a moving truck and they made their 2,019 mile journey to the west coast where I unloaded them and put them into a new closet. It has been three years since I moved out of the condo with my ex-husband. When faced with another 2,320 mile journey back east, it made me wonder: How long will I keep carting around this dead weight? Like I put on a new pair of sunglasses, I started to regard every single thing I owned with a new perspective. Is this worth putting into a box so it can sit in storage on a peninsula within a peninsula for an indeterminate amount of time? Most often, the answer was no. I relinquished countless notes from my ex, apologies after a big fight. I thanked them for reminding me just how much we didn’t work. I saw cards from my mother, bee stings that made me wince. I looked at the books that I was hanging onto. The End of Print, How to Fold, The Holy Bible. All pieces of my past.
What gave me pause were the pieces of my life that represented who I am now. I bought every single piece of furniture on my own and assembled it with my own sweat. I watched two young girls walk away with my patio set, a set that I pined for and waited to purchase until I had the money. They pranced off with it while I taped my mouth shut. Screaming on the inside, But wait! I worked so hard for that! It’s mine! When my sister had a garage sale a few months back, my 3-year-old niece watched as another young boy played with her bike that was up for sale. “I don’t like that little human playing with my bike,” she said. And I felt the exact same way as I watched countless people walk away with pieces of my life. Each sale brought me back to the moment I purchased it, how many swear words I muttered as I put it together, how I disassembled it when I moved. They weren’t just walking away with a piece of furniture. They were walking away with what I made it mean. My freedom. My pride. I allowed these items to make up my identity. And then a funny thing happened when I watched my things disappear. I kept breathing, I kept functioning, I kept living. I stayed...me. I just...let go.
Aparigraha is the Sanskrit word for non-attachment, or non-possessiveness. It’s one of the yamas, which is part of the 8-limbed yogic path, as described in Patanjali’s Yoga Sutras. Yamas are often described as moral codes and describe our relationship to the outer world. Along the 8-limbed path, in addition to these moral codes, we have the physical practice of yoga (asana), the practice of breathing (pranayama), varying forms of meditation and building awareness, and then at the end of the 8-limbed path we have samadhi: bliss! The Sutras, in short, say that if we implement these practices of self-awareness, movement, breathwork, meditation, etc., then bliss will be attainable. More ease, less suffering, an abundance of joy. And the Sutras go on to tell you how. Your guidebook, in very poetic threads, on how to live as a Yogi.
I spend an ample amount of time trying to create more ease in my life. Less suffering. I cross and re-cross my legs a hundred times as I sit for countless hours on Zoom. I change my clothes, put on my glasses, take them off, pour a cup of coffee, warm it up, wait for it to cool, turn the heat up, open the window, music on, music off, don’t answer that call, time for a snack. When I really scratch beneath the surface, my motivation for almost anything I do is to set myself up for greater joy and ease, from as simple as my physical existence to as layered as my relationship to self, with others, with the world.
What traps me and has the complete opposite effect is when I attach to how something should be. When I cling so tightly to an ideal that I smother my own flame. I learn repeatedly in all of the work I do with Landmark that all we ever have are the facts of what happened and the story around what I make it all mean. For instance, the fact is that I sold a piece of furniture and watched two women walk away with something that I once owned. What I made it mean is that I have nothing, I am unidentifiable without my possessions, my furniture provides me a false sense of support and I will never own anything I love again. A little ridiculous when put into words, no? The story we create. The meaning we impose on any situation. That’s where the freedom lies. I felt my body seize when I looked at my empty patio and then walked into my near-empty apartment. But after recognizing it, sitting with it, practicing aparigraha, non-attachment, I could level my head and actually get to the other side where living lean can have a different meaning. Not one of lack, but one of space. Where empty means possibility. Where fewer possessions means freedom. It’s like the ghost of my dreamcatcher on the wall. I can let the past haunt me and the remnants of what used to be hold so much weight. Or I can wipe the smoke away. I can slap on a fresh coat of paint. I can begin again.
