Expansion

Photo by Steven Ramon on Unsplash

You know that feeling when you're on the verge of something huge — a big life change, epiphany, whatever? That tingle in your guts? That feeling like you're going to piss yourself combined with feeling like you're going to throw up? All at the same fucking time? It's a lot. A LOT. I have it right now.

In the last month I have attempted battle with a ferocious bout of insomnia, thrown around the idea of cashing out my 401k and thoroughly researched writing the perfect resignation letter. Right now I am home on sick leave. I'm sure you can see where this is going even though it took me this whole month to get a clue. I am quitting my job.

I am on the brink of casting aside heavy chains — unworthiness, fear, the comfortable familiar, doubt... of swan diving into the massive unknown with faith that the net will appear... of throwing myself at the mercy of the universe. It is all very dramatic. 

Amidst all this drama and all of these changes, there is a calm and still point. It breathes on my neck and runs movie titles along the inside of my eyes with words like travel and write. It leaves audio inside my head with ideas about people and experience and inspiration. This calm and still point, I'll call it "the center", has somehow managed to gain control of all my faculties and senses at various points of the day. Occasionally it directs my gaze to a magazine cover where the headline is "10 ways to change your life now". It guides my channel surfing to an episode of Super Soul Sunday where Oprah is having a conversation with Michael Bernard Beckwith; the topic is the power of intention and asking the universe the right questions — in particular, the question "what is my gift to share". It allows me to stumble upon a just-formed Facebook group called 1 Step Away. The inaugural post features an interview with Anthony Bourdain describing how he wrote that very first piece: it didn't go anywhere, his mom convinced him to send it to the New Yorker and bing bam boom he is the Anthony Bourdain we all know today. He was just "one step away" the whole time. 

Which is all to say here I am. At the beginning.

I can't see what is ahead and I am shaking with sheer terror and adrenaline-fueled anticipation. January 31st is when I will be paid my bonus from the past year and that little voice inside me — "the center", keeper of the spiritual brass balls and badass maximus — is telling me that is the day I will be submitting my letter of resignation. 

My blood is vibrating; the rumble in my guts unmistakable. I can't quite catch my breath and I frequently reach out to grip steady objects for support in the event my knees completely buckle and I collapse. "The center" or rather, MY center, is growing. It once inhabited a small part of my insides and now it courses through the network of my lymphatic system. A parasite in reverse — eating away the dead parts that maintained a most unfortunate stasis for so many years. Each nibble brings me a little closer to life, to spirit, to the potential I have always sensed and never quite touched. 

Here we go.