Grateful

I can't believe I haven't written anything since March. It's been a crazy time. I had lots of free time this last winter. I wasn't working (a job that is) and all my time basically went in to exercise and building the yurt (which I'm sitting in now writing this by the way). Since spring sprang it's been all go all the time. I like it, but it's probably too much.

In the last 7 months so many things I've been dreaming of have actualized it's a little hard to completely fathom. I build a yurt by hand and from scratch from materials I personally sourced from local land. I made nearly all of the components, purchasing only that which I could not feasibly make myself (certain pieces like the outer vinyl covers must be made from material not generally available to the public and must be purchased in large quantities from the manufacturer). I've also become very gainfully employed and more over I work on my own terms via a company I own on a project I like with people I respect and admire and I get paid more than I ever did as an "employee". I made several non-yurt changes to my land that has improved the quality. The sauna building though still incomplete is weather tight(ish) (it still needs Tyvek and windows and doors, but it has a good roof). And a well was dug that provides me nearly limitless fresh clean drinking water (though the infrastructure to pump it is still very primitive at least I don't have to haul it in from off site.)

I have so much to be grateful for it's ridiculous.

In my limited experience of life everything seems to come in cycles and waves. A wave of good followed by a wave of bad or not so good. It's not always regular like a perfect sine function and the bad doesn't always immediately proceed the good and vice versa. There can be good years and bad months or bad decades and good centuries. But I find in my life so far when things get really good you can count that some struggle and challenge is just over the horizon.

So it has been this last month. There have been 2 major challenges I've faced in the last month that have hit me very hard. And 1 challenge that has emanated from my poor initial reaction to the first 2.

Challenge the First

A marriage is a mutually beneficial partnership between to people that incorporates nearly every aspect of your life into the partnership. A married couple lives, eats, sleeps, plays, has sex, dreams, plans, suffers, celebrates, and believes together. When the constituent members of the partnership grow sufficiently different pieces of that list start to fall off.
Perhaps one member doesn't like the other's friends or family (or perhaps the feeling is mutual) celebrating together becomes difficult if not impossible.
Perhaps one member wants to live off grid in a yurt and the other thinks that's cool but is more interested in traveling the world and seeing everything there is out there. Planning and dreaming can be hard with such different goals and desires.
Perhaps one member adopts a very particular diet, perhaps even an extremely restrictive diet, because it works for them and they like it, but the other gains nothing from it and even feels worse eating in this way. Now eating together is not so simple either.
Suppose one member becomes convinced of a certain set of truths and the other is not, then they no longer believe together.
If one member of the partnership begins taking on challenges such as exercise as their primary form of play while the other is more interested in passive forms of play such as television and video games then how can these people enjoy each other in play? Suppose all of these things happen? Then what do you have? A partnership that is predicated on just cohabitation, and sex. Sexual attraction is complex and goes well beyond physical attraction for both men and women. So it should come as no surprise when the 2 partners in this failed partnership are no longer amorous towards each other with so little in common.
Now they just live together. And they start to wonder "why" and "mightn't it be better in the long run if we don't?"

So it falls apart and it can take years to ask that question, and years to act on it once you do.

But even with all of that it's still hard and it still hurts because in spite of everything you still love each other. But the challenge is no longer can you be together but can you be apart?

It's difficult to grow accustomed to being alone.
It's easy to forget that the other is not there anymore and you can happily be going about your business when suddenly you remember you're alone and it hits you in the pit of your stomach and makes you stop for a moment and reconsider it all.
I'm working through it.

Challenge the Second

Death is common. It happens. Everyday people die and everyday the people who loved those parted are wrenched from their unthinking happy lives into a state of existential grief. Death is not a curious inter-relationship between organisms like a marriage. It is an action in a much larger inter-relationship between all life and itself. It is necessary and at a cosmic scale it is beautiful. But it is a challenge for the living.

Particularly challenging is the suicide of a young person. Perhaps it is the thought of the shear opportunity cost their action has incurred.
Or maybe it's that they felt so much pain that they simply couldn't bare it and empathy comes to challenge the narrative of the feeler.
Maybe it's just addiction and the notion you'll never see them again.
Or is it justice and it's fury at the unfairness of it all?

Probably all of them. It's challenging, and for me it's hard knowing that I didn't do my best and I let down a friend and I let down myself. And I don't get another shot to make it right. I'm working through it.

Challenge the Third

Addiction is interesting. I'm not a neuroscientist but I have an abiding interest in the workings of the mind. I've not done significant reading or scholarly research because that kind of science is so very boring. I'm a DIY researcher and I've given my brain plenty to chew on and spent considerable time reflecting and meditating on it's reactions.

Addiction in my experience is the unconscious chemical machinery of the brain driving concious behavior to the detriment and against the wishes of the conscious.

We get addicted to everything that feels good. Food, sex, drugs, particular people, drinking, smoking, shopping, swiping, lifting, running, buying, selling, gaining, loosing.
Anything that feels good (and although I think I know the right names for the responsible chemicals, I probably don't so I refrain from using them here) is subject to addiction. Just give it a little thought and you'll see that I'm right. I struggle with addictive behavior. In particular, drinking and smoking.

But I see now that I have other addictions. Addiction to a particular person and addiction to a particular notion of how things are and where I fit. Withdrawal from those has lead me through shear stupidity to pick up some of the older easier addictions like smoking and drinking.
It's not ideal, and I'm not so pleased.
I'm working through it.

Working

I started with a list reasons for me to be grateful. And I am so very grateful. My life is truly blessed and I have little reason to complain. It challenging to be faced with loss. And although many have much more loss then me, their challenges are not mine to bare nor mine theirs. I say I'm working through it because that's exactly how I'm facing these challenges. If at the start of a marathon (something I have personal experience with) you speak of how hard it will be and you tell yourself all sorts of stories about how difficult a marathon is, then I guarantee it will be very hard for you. If you start a marathon with the simple thought "I'm going for a run" and mention nothing of the miles or the hours you'll enjoy it much more (it will eventually start to hurt, but you can always remind yourself that you're just out for a run).

So I'm out for a run. I'm working. I get up and drink coffee. I walk the dogs. I meditate. I do my chores. I go to work. I cook dinner. I stoke the fire. I read. I go to sleep. I'm just out for a run and I'm working through it. And I'm grateful.