Learning to Love Uncomfortable Feelings

November and December haven’t been happy months for me, for a few years now. Traumatic things have happened. I have lost a lot of people (including a special fur person) lately – and not just in November and December, although that is when their absence is most keenly felt. Every year lately at this time my spirits take a dive as I can’t seem to help reliving the past and the ghosts of all those feelings come back for an extended visit.

And it really doesn’t help that the rest of North America (at least according to what is blasted all over the media) goes into Holiday-crazy overdrive right after Halloween with a non-stop blitz of over-spending/over-eating/over-scheduling/over-everything until it seems like everyone is looking forward to having a magical time of it and I’m the only one that just can’t catch that buzz.

No matter how hard I try to fake it till I make it, I just don’t make it…anymore. I used to, though. I wasn’t born a bah-humbug. I was  a certifiable Christmas freak in my younger days, before life beat the snot outta me over and over again.

At this time of year I do grieve the loss of my former joyful Christmas-anticipating self on top of everything/everyone else I am grieving.  I’m not normally down so I’m not very good at dealing with myself when I am. It makes me uncomfortable.

Then a link to this post arrived in my Inbox today: In Love with the Heartbreaking Beauty of Discomfort. 

Life is hard, dammit. And beautiful. And it is a privilege to have known and loved and lost souls and then to grieve them.

I’m gonna get back into a meditation practice and let my thoughts and feelings bubble up as I know they’re gonna do when I try to quiet my mind. And I’m going to notice and acknowledge them and practice gratitude for the heartbreaking beauty of this experience.

Thank you Leo of Zen Habits. Thank you Discomfort. Thank you Life.

Rock on,

The WB