It’s been a couple of weeks since I sat at my computer struggling to write this post. My upper back ached, eyes were dry, and I felt lost. I sat there, trying to make sense of returning from our first big trip since before the pandemic.
Over the years, there have been plenty of airplane rides but I had never before boarded on my birthday. But I did it to attend my niece’s wedding in Arizona. We stayed on a few days to visit and played sixteen rounds of Pepper, eight won by the men and eight won by the women.
On the return trip, our airplane touched down a day later than planned at 1:00 AM. We then waited a good twenty minutes for a taxi to arrive. Waking up later that morning, I felt exhausted. The fatigue plagued me for days.
I had loved spending time with my sister Nyla, her husband Buddy and their extended family. There were three children, who brought their youthful energy. One was a long-legged boy who was everywhere at once; another a young girl who during an imaginative game, pretended to be a waitress and insisted there were no cheeseburgers, all she had was waffles. I miss having that ebullient energy in my life.
Since we returned home, I’ve been fixating on my lethargy, at times asking myself if the trip was worth the tiredness I was experiencing. Of course, I always answered yes, but it was evident to even me that it was not a whole-hearted yes. I yearned for my energy to return. For example, I only completed one load of laundry and I love doing laundry! I wanted to work on this post and on my book but I kept needing to lie down: morning nap, afternoon nap, early to bed. When I glanced at the pile of summer clothes I wore in Arizona, I knew I needed to put them back downstairs for the winter, but I was just too fatigued.
For over a week, I didn’t accept the fact that what was happening to me was normal. I berated myself for not feeling better already. I couldn’t remember how to be with what was.
Once my energy began to return a bit, I asked myself why I had suffered so much? I had a good experience on the trip. Everyone I talked to reassured me that travel takes a lot of energy. But I felt unsettled.
One morning when I was wrapping up my meditation period, I remembered a Buddhist parable that talks about how, when we meet misfortune, we are often struck by two arrows. The first arrow is the event that caused our suffering. In my case, the first arrow would be the trip that exhausted me. Since fatigue is a natural result of participating in more activity than one is used to, we don’t have a choice about feeling tired. So, first arrows are usually not things we can control.
The second arrow is how we respond to the effects of the first arrow. Because I didn’t accept that my body and mind were tired and needed rest, and thought something was wrong with me, I added suffering to the effects of what was happening.
I hope I’ve learned from this experience and from the parable.
Do you have a second arrow that makes your suffering worse?
IMAGE: I wanted to take a picture of my closet that featured summer clothes still lurking there but had trouble working the camera on my phone! I decided not to invite a second arrow by deciding to give up and find a picture in my files. This heart I found in Greece.
