The race of the tigers

A ten-year-old: “Now I understand, grown-ups only see the bad.”

I look deep into his eyes and feel regret that this is the impression he has been left with. I try to explain that it has been evolutionarily important to notice the tiger and the dangers in order to stay alive. The human brain has spent more time in that programme, and in those moments when mechanicalness takes over, the tiger-seeking programme gets free rein, and it really can seem that only the bad is being looked for. The brain wants to carry out the task it was given, and in some moments I am not fully present myself to give it better instructions. Some days are harder than others.

He understood me and was compassionate, but it kept haunting me. Is it really so?

November is dark. It is that time of year where the importance of the inner light decides how we cope with it. Whether depression sets in, or we see possibilities.

Sometimes, though, noticing those possibilities takes an enormous effort, and at other times we do not want to see them, because it is so comfortable to sit in the familiar marinade of the pains inside us. This is not a reproach, but an understanding that these too are simply part of us and need attention. In order to cope better, the brain tries to find logic. Who did what and which situation did not support me, and thanks to that I am now in my swamp and perhaps do not even want to climb out, and besides, it would be better if someone else did something to end this agony.

The honest truth, though, is that there is no culprit. A stew of emotions, hormones and energies invisible to the eye has cooked up a soup that bodily discomfort can spice up further. Together it makes a proper autumn depression. It is not really about autumn or the darkness outside, the root cause lies inside each of us. Those seeds that will push up bright green shoots next spring need care right now. But without fertile ground nothing grows.

So I do not think that going somewhere else to look for “sun” would actually solve why the November darkness feels so crushing. And why do more and more tigers appear every day?

There are of course many tools for turning this situation into good ground for new seeds. This time I did two things. First I decided to write down every detail of my swamp, everything with which I reduce my own strength and rob my energy. I write with a pencil in a notebook, gasping for air in the middle of a wave of despair, that everything is completely hopeless and only a long dark tunnel looms ahead.

And then at the same time I notice that some part of me is grinning at it. “Really, is all of it bad and you can do nothing about it?” Of course, I am sure of myself and I carry on. I took all the manifestations of my tigers of that moment very seriously and got them out of me. On paper, though, they changed shape and seemed like kittens that only need to be picked up. I still treated them with respect, because all of it is part of me. And plastering over those places or saying that they do not exist does not resolve anything, it creates an inner volcano that is only waiting to erupt at the most unsuitable moment.

You simply have to be brave with yourself in order to understand and acknowledge what you actually need in that moment. Is it understanding? Is it connection? Is it life force? Is it rest? Or something else.

I will make a guess that whatever it is that you truly need right now, when you do not get it, the mood is bad, making positive contact with anyone else is hard, and hopelessness appears. Sitting alone in your eternal dark swamp. But no one else can help us if it is not expressed to them, they cannot read thoughts and they do not have to. One part of every change is the courage to admit that we want to create it.

The second tool I used was a couple of days later, when I had already grown tired of the marinade of my swamp, and it happened very spontaneously.

I began to list everything in my life that is good or wonderful, and that list was long.

It seems so absurdly simple, but it worked, and when I finally finished, I felt such great gratitude towards my life and that moment that it already put a smile on my face.

Gratitude itself is the most powerful healer!

Until we meet!