There’s a woman I’m in community with, I’ll call her Candy. She shows up to our weekly gatherings and her presence and participation is such a gift. I find her fun and delightful. Typically we don’t come to community with our resumes in hand and tell everyone what we’ve got going on, but we do have a segment of our gatherings for offerings, invitations and requests.
I sense from what Candy’s shared over the months that she is a studied yoga teacher and has many modalities of spiritual practice and teaching she has offered over the years, but presently is in a healing/rebuilding stage in her life. That was certainly me when my life felt like it fell apart and I moved up here to the North Pole to simplify and heal after my gay divorce.
I’ve noticed Candy apologizing for not having more to offer to our group and I always think to myself how much her presence simply is a gift. Even if she didn’t have her various backgrounds she’s just a kind, thoughtful, present, fun human to share space with.
I facilitated our circle once and she virtually crawled in saying she was surfing the crimson wave and had so little energy, but her presence right next to me was quite reassuring even with low energy during menstruation.
All of these thoughts have sparked me reflecting about how I don’t need to be perfect to show up. If my blog over these past 16 years has a theme it’s about recovering from perfectionism.
I noticed on my Land there’s always so much leftover after our potlucks we’re begging people to take food home with them. In the past few healing years I’ve boldly shown up to potlucks even when I didn’t have time to make something to contribute. (Most of the folks here are retired, I’m still working.) I find myself welcomed and enjoy the chance to connect with neighbors.
I have some friends who host community meals. Their food needs are so specific that it’s hard to make something to contribute unless I have a lot of time and grocery money but they actually don’t need or want meal contributions. I check in about what I can bring but mostly they just say “yourself!”
Mr. Rogers said “The best gift you can give is your authentic self.”
In these last few healing years I’ve learned the value first hand of simply showing up and letting my honest self be what I can offer. More when I can!
I look back at the pace of my life prior to 2020 and I wonder how I could have managed to override my body so thoroughly. It’s like once I got up here to the North Pole (after 20 years in Los Angeles & NYC) with affordable rent and deeply curtailed my cost of living (there’s freedom in frugality) I got to nourish and heal from burn out. I think I’ve been burnt out since I was 7 years old.
I heard a tweet “Maybe you’re not burnt out; maybe your body is just done being exploited.”
For a few years I got caught in a deep vulnerability/cringe response about blogging because so much of my archives were written before I learned more. I’m always learning! Having compassion for every version of myself has been such a challenge. I’m getting to a place where I trust that what I’ve shared was honest for me at the time and hopefully when / if it reaches someone I have tools and wisdom to offer them from that honest version of myself. I probably got some stuff wrong and that’s okay. I’m gonna keep learning and getting better and more compassionate.
Even being a Deadhead has taught me about imperfection–Jerome John Garcia (known as “Jerry”) screwed up on the lyrics to Ripple during a show I was listening to from the 70s and it just made the show that much more special and unique.
Anyway, the joy I feel when Candy shows up has me reflecting on all the ways we bring value when we are willing to show up as our imperfect, human selves.
Community means you keep showing up. If you want community you need to BE community (Myleik taught me that) and that means we all get to be imperfect, together.
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