Katabasis Central: The Hanged Man

The most challenging action for me is non-action, no question. I was talking with a sponsee recently about sitting in discomfort without trying to do anything about it. The longer I've stayed sober, the more enduring and resilient is my ability to tolerate discomfort. I think discomfort is a natural part of life, and I think a lot of my alcoholic, drug addicted, sex addicted, gambling addicted acting out was to try to get out of discomfort or at least try to manage it, at all costs.

I got you, boo. It can't be like this forever. Hang on.

Another startling realization that I had while I was talking with this sponsee is that I have lived most of my life with a malevolent companion. An imaginary friend of the worst kind. Most people take one look at Charon and shudder, finding him frightening-- but this malevolent companion of mine is much uglier and more destructive. It's that voice. "You are worthless. You are unlovable and not capable of love. You have nothing to offer anyone-- who do you think you're fooling? You deserve to be alone. You're a failure and you always will be. You can never get anything right. You're not normal. You're sick. You're a freak."

The malevolent companion sometimes even says that I might as well be dead. With some counseling and magic little buproprion pills and prayer, meditation, step work, service work-- that dagger-like statement has been a lot less frequent. So I have that going for me, which is nice.

So my sponsee and I were talking about discomfort, self loathing, self sabotage, how to just sit in it and accept it as what is going on and observe it without judgment. Because so many of my behaviors are reactive otherwise. "I'll show them!" I say, well, really, I want to prove the malevolent companion wrong. But the thing about the malevolent companion is he's infinite, he's bottomless, he's wily, he'll never be impressed no matter what I do. I mean, what are malevolent companions for, after all? The malevolent companion is not subject to defeat via exertion. The moment of acceptance is the only amulet that works against him. As infinite as the malevolent companion is, humility is also infinite, endless, always satisfied, always welcoming.

On Monday, I cleared a major hurdle in the PhD process that had been weighing on me for the past 9 months-- advancing to candidacy. I did take myself out to dinner but it was awful (food was gross and other tables of people talking pro-Trump) and I felt vaguely guilty anyway. And then, straightaway, Tuesday morning, I was busting my ass trying to raise money, anxious and despairing. I didn't give myself any room to really breathe and enjoy the milestone. No space to regard myself positively for what I had accomplished.

Anyway, not doing anything at all. I rarely even ask what would happen if I just don't do anything. I am usually thinking about what I have to do to fix this or that, or to communicate this or that, or to react to this, respond to that. It's my default-- surely, something could be done to get rid of this discomfort (and don't call me Shirley). But what about just not doing anything and letting everything be exactly as it is and just observing? Accepting. Eventually, natural action seems to arise. It is smoother and much more graceful.

And I don't mean not doing anything as a way of just procrastinating and avoiding and letting anxiety build and amping up the food for that old malevolent companion. I mean the skillful deployment of the fine art of graceful retreat. Of hanging.