For the last few days I’ve been dealing with either a really nasty cold, or a low-level flu or some other thing that I don’t really have a name for. Sometimes I have a very high fever, often I feel quite fatigued and ever constant is an awful cough which sounds like I’m offering up a lung. It’s odd because I’m one of those people who ‘Never Get Sick.” What’s really odd is that this is the second time I’ve been knocked out by something within the last three months. The day I flew back from Europe in November I got hit with what I’m calling nasty European germs, and I was down for several days. I even took medication which I rarely do. I’ve had random colds over the years, but never anything like I’ve experienced recently.
This gets the mind to thinking. In the Year to Live practice we’re invited to experience any illness as if it were the end of our lives. How do we hold that? Do we fight it or can we stay with the realization that it’s a possibility. Because I’ve been so healthy all my life, I have this image of immortality somewhere in the recesses of my mind even though I practice with death and dying regularly. I even held onto this idea of ‘healthy person’ as part of my identity, or self view (sakkaya ditthi in Pali). I am healthy, therefore any time I am not healthy the mind would struggle against it or I would even deny it up to a certain point. My husband would joke that if I had a broken leg I would try to run it off rather than admit I could be human. And that’s just it; I don’t know where it came from but somewhere my conditioning led me to believe that being healthy made me a better person. When one has trouble with self-esteem, we’ll latch on to anything that works. I had imagined that aging would have played into this struggle and denial, but I’m surprised at how relaxed I am about being ill. No, it’s not fun, but I’m not swearing that I’m fine while carrying a 102 fever. That means that somewhere along the way in this practice I’ve become even more comfortable in acknowledging the diagnosis of Human Condition. I struggled with that for so many years for so many reasons. It hit me like a ton of bricks when I first realized that I had to let go of all my ideas of who I was and what that meant. Trust me; they didn’t go all at once, but slowly over time. And now this.
I’m sure aging has something to do with it, but maybe not. I find my mind trying to make excuses for why I’ve gotten ill (not working out as much or eating as well as I had been, etc.). But in reality, it just is. I’m not immortal or immune and there’s no need to be. I can be sick and vulnerable and let others offer kindness. I can let things go because I just can’t do them and it’s not the end of the world. That’s freedom. And I’m grateful that I’m not so sick that I don’t enjoy just crashing; it’s a gift I don’t give myself often enough.
So now I’m on the mend and getting used to being just like everyone else. I get sick too and it doesn’t mean a damn thing. It sure feels good.
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