Fearless

Despite the revelations in my first post, I am not fearless.  Far from it.  I am a Pisces and we seem to be nervous creatures by nature.  I read somewhere that Pisces come into the world with a subconscious fear (of what exactly I'm not sure...probably anything, and it seems in my case everything) but we have to learn to let it go.  I can relate to this.

It's interesting to me that I'm surrounded by seemingly fearless people...my mom, my brother, my Rick.  They go through life with this grounding trust.  They are rooted to the earth, but not of the earth, and are thus faithful and practical and rational.  They don't worry about things outside of their control...they just enjoy the experience.  I struggle greatly with this.  My method is to fight like hell against the fear and do things anyways, but I have to say it's not always an enjoyable experience.

They say we come into the world with everything we need to be successful in our personal journeys.  I think that's why we're given certain people....to mirror what we need to learn - so we can see it and hear it.  The lesson is to feel it...to know it within ourselves.  Here, I'm still learning.

After I sorted out my issue with dependence, my biggest hang up with actually going and having this treatment has been the getting to and from Bangkok.  It's a 15 hour flight to Hong Kong and then another two and half to Bangkok.  I struggle with flying (and it's not just the bathrooms), it's the whole being thousands of feet up in the sky in a speeding hunk of metal that defies my logic (which is obviously flawed, because clearly this phenomenon is possible).  Anyways, the concept of 15 hours in flight was pretty much unfathomable to me.  I would have moments where I would think everything I've done today - gotten up, gone to work, done a million little things, come home - still doesn't add up to 15 hours, and all this time I would be on a plane.  Not only is there the question of what do you do for 15 hours on a plane, but for me there was the question of could I stay calm for 15 hours.  I know what panic feels like, and unfortunately, even though I am able to recognize the feeling, and sit with it, I can't always make it go away.  And the idea of being in panic mode for 15 hours was, well, making me panic.

I should probably back up and add that last Sunday I hit a pretty big current in my swim.  I got sick.  What timing, right!?  Chills, sore throat, full on head cold.  Nothing about the week prior to leaving went as planned.  I missed my last day of work, I went through all of the final prepping and packing in a fog, and I didn't start to feel well enough to even make the trip until the day before we left.  Plus, you have to be well to have the treatment.  The idea of being sent home after arriving was starting to weigh on me.

My Beth asked me what I thought the lesson was in all of this, and to be honest, I have no idea.  In AA they say: shit happens.  Sometimes you just have to deal.  Everything in life doesn't always go as planned - you have to adjust along the way.  I can assure you I wasn't this rational about it until I started to feel better and after I talked to my coordinator and found out it was okay to be a little under the weather - I could still come.  Before this I was pretty much oscillating between complete devastation and utter frustration, and required a pep talk every 20 minutes to stay on track (thanks Rick!).  But that's why we have people.  Sometimes we just need someone else to say it's all going to be okay.

So, we left.  We made it on board our flight, a red eye with Cathay Pacific, and I have to say the silver lining of being sick was I was pretty exhausted and it didn't leave a lot of energy for freaking out.  I was calmer than I thought I'd be.  I wish I could say I slept, but unfortunately that was not the case - not a wink.  The first few hours were, however, a little rough.  I only started to panic once...and it was about the bathrooms.  I was starting to have doubts about how I was going to get to it, in it and out of it, all while the flight was in motion (even with assistance I'm unsteady on my feet, so imagine adding the motion of a moving plane and a little mild turbulence). But once we did it, and I discovered we could, I felt a lot better.  They have a little on board wheelchair that they can use to wheel you right up to the bathroom.  (As an aside to all the airlines of the world, it's kind of amazing that in this day in age you don't have a larger bathroom, with accessibility in mind.  If either my mom or I were an inch larger in any direction, I honestly don't know if it would have worked - puts a whole new spin on up close and personal.  My mother deserves a medal, by the way...I've never seen a woman work harder to make something happen.)

So this is my favorite part.  A few hours in, I was teetering in my anxiety with flying.  I was given all kinds of in flight entertainment by my dear ones - movies, magazines, games...music.  I was listening to a new playlist, trying to fall asleep (trying to keep it together), and then this happened:

Was There Nothing? by Asgeir.  Right there, I found my peace - and I knew it in the first ten seconds.  This is why music is my soul's love - it can move us to feel things.  And in this case, it could do for me what I couldn't do for myself - calm.

It honestly brought tears to my eyes.  And then I was reminded of one of my favorite books of all time, The Alchemist, and how the old man tells Santiago that the place that brings you to tears is where you'll find your treasure.  I'm often moved to tears. But I guess that's because there is treasure everywhere....even 30,000 feet above the Pacific.  What a peaceful world it would be if I could remember that...all the time.

In the end, our actual flight (the one that existed in reality and not inside my head) was very smooth.  I thought the Cathay Pacific staff was really lovely, and had I been less nervous there were a lot of decent amenities.  The movie selection was nice, they had Haagen Dazs ice cream (I was too nervous to have any) and they gave us lots of little accouterments (blanket...toothbrush...even socks!).  And eventually, we actually made it to Bangkok...safe and sound.