And I mow more. It takes me hours. I mow. I stop and rest. Do things that need doing inside. Go back out. Mow. I’m out there in the heat in alternately flow-state rich then pushing, thinking, then not-thinking.
I’ve decided this: All that one organism processes in mere seconds could inhabit the earth three times over. One organism. One person. So, will there ever be a philosophy that honors all people and encompasses all realities? I doubt it.
For that matter, what exactly is a migraine or chronic fatigue syndrome? Is it possibly “chronic YOU MUST TAKE A BREAK” syndrome? Could it be: “You aren’t wired for the commonly accepted and expected routines, take a break or die at a younger age, you choose?” Is that what migraine is? CFS? For some of us, anyway? Combine it with any possible environmental influences, any likely soul storms and you’ve quite a planet to manage.
We cannot know, from one person to another, who processes how much and how intensely or how sensitively. But tests give us clues. Is it possible some of us process more at once, instead of here and there a bit and then more later? Does it create levels of fatigue at cellular levels, requiring downtime we cannot justify because of societal rigidity? So, we push. And we push. Does it then require the body to speak for us, a body more wise than our ignorant insistence on a concept of “productivity” birthed in an industrial age unpacking “humanity” in the wake of world wars? Who would we be without our reaction against and to our histories? Would we be softer where we are rigid? Harder where we atrophy?
Tests show that those known to be “highly sensitive” process and work with information at any and every given moment on levels not typical of most. The brain of an HSP functions differently. Much like one can have a certain rate of metabolism differing from another, some of us process life and sensory realities differently. It doesn’t make us “special.” We’re different. Our brains work differently. See what Dr. Elaine Aron says about it here: hsperson.com.
So, what of it all? What of our stories and history making us reactions instead of unfolding in the much-heralded power of now? I think both/and is the only path for me. I both hold to the power of now and the past’s wealth of wisdom, of conditioning on some levels. The truth is, we can partake of the energy of resilience in order to get through a tough time. But it is a long-term work of developing muscles that makes us people of substance. Development is arrested by environments and happenings in our pasts. We can overcome the energy of traumas but we still must develop along those lines that were arrested by real live in-your-face hijackings of flow. (Or consciously and lovingly opt not to, accepting our unique emergence as one formed by life.) They came either in the form of abusive relationships or simple excruciating sensitivity making what would be fine for one to be trauma for another. So, our power is now. We embrace love’s work and new energy while dissolving old beliefs, old vibes of helplessness. It doesn’t always make the pain go away. And it certainly doesn’t actually develop the muscles that require specific and detailed honing, conditioning and working. I mean personhood muscles. And we can’t know what we need to develop if we do not visit our pasts.
It seems to me we want to oversimplify life while we complicate things that are plain, simple, real. It’s hard work and it’s easy. Both/and is my song. Always will be. We cannot annihilate opposing forces. They must dance…
On with the lawn!!!!!!!!!!!
J. Ruth Kelly 
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