I am Christmas Crazy this year. This is new.
It started a few weeks ago when I texted my BFF:
"Just bought the old MWS, Amy Grant, and James Last Christmas albums on my phone. But every time I start listening to them, I cry. Why does this keep happening?"
My BFF is all things music, including her own music school, (which she just won an award for) so I assumed she would have implicit understanding as to why this vexing phenomenon kept occurring.
She replied:
"Ya I know. Me too. A kinder simpler, easier time."
And I was relieved, at the very least, that I'm not completely losing my marbles.
But later that week, as I played these albums in my car, I began to think there's something even deeper going on in my connection to this music. Certain songs reflecting a magical quality still make my eyes sparkle and leave me with a sense of wonder, and that's where my tears kept spilling. I know I used to have the wonder when I was a kid, but the last few years I've been so beaten down by life, I had no magic left... no life left, really.
In my professional work, I teach a class to grade 10 students called, "Losing Yourself, Finding Yourself, and the Journey In Between." At the beginning of the class we talk about what it means to lose ourselves. Firstly, how do you even know what "yourself" is in the first place? Especially when you're in grade 10. So we start by connecting with who we really are, and I tell them "Who you really are is who you were when you were a little kid, just playing." And then we recount our favorite play activities: action figures/dolls, Lego, hide and seek, little green army men, etc. Then once we've re-connected with our inner little kid, we look at what separates us from that little kid: stress, bullying, trying to fit in, trauma, suffering, etc. We then look at numbing behaviours we engage in to relieve the suffering, and how if we never move beyond those numbing behaviours, we never get back to that little kid again (who you really are). (Materials credit: Brene Brown, Gabor Mate, Richard Rohr).
Back to the Christmas music, I realized the parts that caused me to cry were the parts that caused/created stillness, holiness, awe, magic, and tenderness. And as I kept experiencing the feeling of awe in the mysterious and magical components in the music, I realized that I have finally re-connected with my real self again. I, Karen, had come back to life after totally losing myself to trauma, heartbreak (read earlier blog entries) and suffering.
Okay. I was aware that I am feeling more like my old self since I started some naturopathic supplements in October (apparently I was a little dopamine deprived). But why have I failed to connect with Christmas for so long? Its not just the suffering and trauma of being a single parent to a non-verbal child with profound autism. Because I was struggling with lack of Christmas magic for much longer than that. And then I remembered that Christmas music was reviled in our home previously, including a ban on any singing along. I still played it quietly where it wouldn't upset others, but I couldn't express joy, delight, or childlike awe with it. Of course when one is in the midst of such dynamics, its nearly impossible to identify what's really going on in such circumstances, and I continued to mute Christmas so as to keep all members of the household unagitated. And as I stuffed my Christmas spirit further and further down, hid it away with my inner child, and waited until it was safe to come out again... And it wasn't safe to come out again until my neurotransmitters had re-balanced after the last 10 years of trauma.
It all made me think about what the true Spirit of Christmas really is. As a person of Christian heritage, I believe it starts with the birth of a little baby who brought new life to a weary world. (Of which we celebrate in winter, although it seems Jesus of Nazareth was more likely born in spring).
But the point is, celebration of new life.
Of fragility.
Of vulnerability.
Of fleeting awe.
Of mystery.
Of beauty.
Of the essence of life itself.
Merry Christmas!
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