It’s the road, not the destination

Chaos is a tantalizing thing. When our foundations are destabilized, our clinging to any semblance of stability ensures continued chaos. To the point that when we finally experience peace, it feels…wrong.

My back is in the best place it has been in two years. I’ve found a routine that supports me, moves me along, and just kind of works. It’s stabilizing, it’s effective, and it’s not sexy - it’s easy, in fact. Almost boring.

And in that, I’m finding that it’s time to update my needs, intentions, and goals. Not because I don’t still need to prioritize the strength and stability of my spine. Not because the quality of my life still doesn’t come down to how good my back is doing day-to-day.

Because now that my back is really stabilized, I can actually think about other things. One of the most important moments of my life recently occurred last Wednesday. I was at a playground with the boys.

They were playing, making friends, and getting into hijinx. And I was watching Timberwolves preseason basketball. And I just sat there watching the game on my phone, looking up during commercial breaks to check in on the boys, pausing to get them snacks, entertaining Casper occasionally as he came to watch with me briefly.

And that was it. I didn’t think about my back. At all. I just sat on a park bench for the better part of an hour, on a beautiful fall day.

Even three months ago, I would have had to get up and stretch every 10 minutes, move my body, and find a new way to sit. A night alone with both boys would have been something to recover from, not something that brought peace into my life. My foundation had to be managed, constantly.

And I didn’t realize just how exhausting that had become for me. I didn’t know how much unease I carried in my body. I was sick of it. I was especially sick of talking about it.

I’ll most likely do my back routine for the rest of my life, and I’m fine with that to be honest. I can manage it even without special equipment, and it responds to treatment. It supports me in other ways too.

Cold plunge, inversion table, walks, strengthening. These are all things that are just obviously good for my all around wellbeing anyways.

I don’t think those are the things that really helped me turn the page though. The big shift occurred when I began telling myself a different story.

Peace is not the destination, it’s the road that we walk

(Wookiefoot, “The Road”)

My family and I spent a day on a farm a while back. Sort of last minute, and so fun for all of us. Historically, spending extended time in the car has been a problem for me.

At one point, I was sitting on the ground with a group of people, and I noticed my back. It wasn’t painful, it wasn’t tight. I just felt something. And right away, I started telling a story about this noticing. This is bad. I need to make it stop. This is a problem. And in that moment, I paused that story.

I breathed deep into my lower back.

And I remembered the wonder of my body.

I remembered that my back had been doing really well, that I actually wasn’t currently struggling with my back. I remembered that my back has been incredibly responsive to treatment. I remembered how much I wanted to be exactly where I was.

And I changed the story. My back is responding exactly how it’s supposed to. How could it not? It’s my body. And there’s nothing wrong with feeling sensation in the area where I’ve experienced pain.

Not only did I tell a new story, I chose to live in that new story.

I began telling a story of peace, not conflict. The same story that I was acting out at the playground with my boys. At the park, though, it just happened spontaneously, a result of my practice.

And now that I am making consistent commitments to a story and foundation of peace in my life, I feel stable, sturdy, and strong. I feel more capable of taking on new challenges. The stability of my foundation no longer feels like something that can be compromised. It is not in peril. I am not at risk of losing my footing any longer.

Things that have been off limits for a long time are suddenly available to me. Things that have been hard now nourish me. And things that I had to constantly manage now manage themselves.

And I can tell a new story. Finally.