Finding My Way Back Home
Mr. Duffy “lived at a little distance from his body, regarding his own acts with doubtful side-glances.”
How did James Joyce know when he wrote Dubliners what life would be like in 2020?
These days, it’s easy to plow forward so fast that we forget we are carrying around a body with us. There is always something juicy to watch, think about, scroll past, or respond to—a way to engage the brain. Who wants to stay in the rest of the body, especially in these times?
A massage therapist, Richard, once told me headaches come when my energy is too centered in my head—when I am not grounded in my body. He was right. Whenever I am super stressed and pushing myself, I’m also usually hanging out in my head too much at the same time.
I can even play tennis that way. (Worth noting: This is when I am the worst—when I’m somewhere else, thinking about clients, or meetings, or work—when I’m not really on the tennis court). In those moments, I might say to my partner several games in, “Sorry, I know I’m not here yet. I think I’m still in the car.”
I was once playing in a mixed districts tournament and missing shots left and right in the first set, and my partner Bob said to me, “When you show up, boy, are they going to be surprised!”
This is a life lesson for me—because I can live quite adequately somewhere just above or outside my head. But it also seems like a good year to experiment with coming back to my body. When I do yoga, exercise, do yard work, garden, sleep—those are some ways to come back. But what else can support us in this time?
My latest practice for presence is hiking. This summer, my boyfriend and I started hiking the 48 4000-footers in the White Mountains. A friend’s son was finishing his 48th and we offered to come along to celebrate. But we had to practice by doing one first—Mount Pierce—and after finishing Mount Jefferson as well, I figured, “Why not 46 more?”
If you hike, you appreciate why you must be in the body for it. One sloppy move and you can wedge your foot under a tree root or slip on scree. I’ve only face planted twice—and both times it was when I was moving too quickly down the steep, always-granite-ridden path.
We have bagged 15 peaks and I’m hooked. But hiking the Whites will be on hold soon for the winter: I don’t want to actually die while in my body hiking. But we will take up some more local, easier trails with less than 80-mph winds soon.
And I’m going to keep exploring other ways to be in my body. Martial arts is great for this. Or doing anything by hand—woodworking, sculpting, maybe even writing with a pen.
Me and Mr. Duffy and our pal James Joyce—who might have lived a short distance from his body in the early 1900s—together, we are all finding our way home.