Ballast

This was my first week back at my paid job following our winter break.

I started Monday with a session with my therapist. During the session I said something like, “I have to be radical. I cannot let work consume me this year and to do that I have to be radical. Or at least radical for me.”

What did I mean? On the one hand, I meant what you’d expect. I’m not going to lose myself to the job. It is a good job for an organization doing good work on a global scale, and we work at a fast and full pace all the time. There is always more work than there is time and due to the nature of the issues we are trying to address it is easy to turn your entire life over to our efforts. Indeed, some of my colleagues do just that because their work is what brings them ballast. Thank goodness for those colleagues. They are saving lives.

My experience is different though. I have always been a writer who needs to make a living. I have always been a writer who wants to make a living – as much as I have choice – doing good for the world. But it’s easy to lose oneself in “good” work, particularly when so much in the world feels broken and so many are suffering. It’s easy for the rhetoric of doing good work to pull me from those things in my life which provide me ballast like a Siren’s song.

In the meditation I’ve been doing this week, Ram Dass (I realize I’m very late to the Ram Dass game, forgive me. You find your teachers when you find them) he speaks about how you cannot help others in pain, distress, or discomfort if you cannot first process on a daily basis your own experiences. It is like the adage, put on your own oxygen mask first before you try to assist others, only the way Ram Dass says it doesn’t conjure images of planes on fire and falling out of the sky (which would be awkward in a meditation, I suppose). I made my bold statement to my therapist – “I’m going to be radical this year.” – before I found this Ram Dass meditation. So, when I did find it, I thought, yes! This is what I mean by radical. I want to radically take care of myself so that I can 1) make better art more consistently; 2) take better care of my general health day-over-day; and 3) be of better service to others (I’m also in the process of becoming a volunteer in my local hospice program, so truly, I have to get my ballast in order).

I made it until about Wednesday of this week before I felt myself falling into the behaviors I was hoping to leave behind this year. I started work early and didn’t leave until late because there was too much to do. I allowed work to occupy my thoughts and anxiety levels at all hours. I got sucked into the inevitable workplace drama which exists everywhere but is obviously THE WORST at whatever job it is you happen to be working now. I came home Wednesday with my adrenaline (and likely cortisol) high, my feelings hurt, my to-do list longer than when I started the day, and my energy levels depleted. My radical efforts Wednesday evening included making time for the Ram Dass meditation and managing to read a few pages of a book before falling asleep. I didn’t feel radical at all. I felt trapped and defeated.

I still feel a bit that way this Saturday morning, if I’m being honest. I made a weekend work to-do list yesterday before signing off for the week. Weekends are supposed to be for art, nature, reading, rest, and health.

My declarations of becoming radical included:

• I will do what I’m responsible for well, but I will not take on more than I am responsible for
• I will not engage in the workplace drama roller coaster. I will minimize the time I spend gossiping and complaining. I will mind my own business, do good work, and view the drama as clouds passing across the sky. Drama – it comes, it goes, it rarely actually ever really matters in the end.
• I will stop saying yes to more work simply because I want people to see me as a good person/like me
• I will reserve energy for my art by making decisions at and about work which prioritize the energy and time I need to do my art well (note that a weekend specific work to-do list does not in anyway contribute to this goal)
• I will commit to my art being the primary way I intend to contribute to helping a world in need of a new story
• I will commit to my art being the primary way I stay sane – create ballast – for myself in this often-overwhelming system in which we all try to thrive

As I write the above, I realize, perhaps I set my ambitions a bit high for week one back at work. Of course, I was going to get sucked into old ways of working and being. Of course, I’ll have to try again next week and aim to be not 100% successful, but perhaps 5% more successful than I was this week. Perhaps I need to add a commitment: I will commit to not being perfect in my journey toward finding more consistent ballast.

The invitation this week is to identify one radical way of being you want to cultivate. Questions to take with you on a walk in nature or write in response to could include:

1. When I am at my quietest internally, what do I know is true for myself about creating and maintaining ballast? Once I name those truths, what begins to emerge as changes I may need to make to provide more ballast for myself?
2. When I talk about my day, what am I saying? Where is the focus? Where is the energy? Is that where I want it to be?
3. What draws me to the drama, the unsteadiness of life? What is it about the energy of the drama that is so appealing, satisfying?
4. What is one thing (likely small) I can identify as essential to creating a consistent feeling of ballast for myself and how can I start doing that one thing today? Who do I need to tell about this activity? (We can’t make radical change in secret, I’m learning. That’s part of what makes it radical – others will witness it.). How will I make space in my current daily schedule for this activity?

If you want to check out the Ram Dass meditation, visit the Ram Dass Meditation Library and scroll until you get to the “Back to the Center” meditation.

May your ballast this week be a sense of deep patience with yourself.