Fear of falling

A few years ago I was doing some research in the highlands of Chiapas, Mexico. A lot of the people I wanted to talk to lived in remote areas where roads were more like trails and walks were more like hikes. I remember walking through the woods along a beautiful stream. The water was clear and cold, I was tempted to drink from it as I might have when I was a child drinking straight from Lake Pend Oreille. However, among other nasty diseases, leptospirosis is known to run in those waters. I would have to settle for hopping across the stones and over to the other side of the stream where a woman half my size and twice my age was selling commercially bottled water chilled by the stream. My travel companion, in nothing more than simple leather sandals skipped lightly from one stone to the next until she arrived on the opposite side of the stream. I - dressed in supposedly skid-free soled hiking boots (i.e. the so called appropriate footwear for this terrain) - found myself slipping and sliding from one stone to another. I did exactly what I should not do, I went rigid, resisted falling, waved my arms around and...by some miracle did not fall into the stream, but rather stumbled gracelessly up the other side.

As I sat drinking my cool water, I thought about what had happened. Why had Caro been able to skip across so lightly while I struggled to stay out of the water? It wasn’t the shoes, that’s for damn sure. The difference was inside. She was not afraid to fall, I was. But we all know that the worst thing you can do in a fall is to try to control it. Going rigid is the worst thing to do if you want to regain your balance.

Of those who’ve sought to bring Buddhist thinking to westerners Pema Chodron is among my favorites.  She often reminds her readers that control is an illusion and that one must aim to relinquish control, or rather, the idea that one can be in control. I was trying to keep myself from falling because I am afraid of it, but by actively trying to prevent it I was making it happen. Balance is related to flow and fluidity, trust in the body and in finding your own center. It is not about control.

Over the years I’ve learned that when a desire to be in control gets the better of me, things don’t work out so well. A dunk in the stream would not have been the worst outcome I’ve brought on myself.  

So, if what I want to achieve leaping before looking without falling, I am going to have to stop being afraid of falling, aren’t I?

Lesson learned: No leaping and fearing. The only way to leap is with trust that you can land on the other side, or at the bottom, in good form.

Change gon' come...

You know that feeling you get when you know change is coming and it's what you are looking for, but you don't know what shape it's going to come in? The feeling of fear mixed with curiosity is intense. I´ve been in Mexico for nine years. When I arrived here I did not speak the language, I did not know anyone, and I was not all together welcome, though people were very nice to me. For a protracted period of time I felt somehow mute and muted. Not being able to communicate, not being sure of my place in the new environment, and having no idea what to believe of the crazy things people kept saying to me about the dangers of Mexico City, I found myself living in a queazy space of uncertainty and doubt. Simply venturing out to buy an umbrella was an exercise in courage and adventure given my limitations at that time. And yet, I did go out and buy an umbrella. And I got on a bus and went to another town. And when I got to that town, I took my little phrase book with me and I got lost, and wound up with food I did not think I was asking for. But I ended up with a full belly, got where I was going to, and even made some new acquaintances. By the time I returned to the big taco after that trip I had decided that there was nothing for it but to trust my instincts and assume that at least most of the basic rules for the streetwise applied just as well in Mexico City as they would in New York City (pre-Guliani New York, that is).

Recently this image has been making the rounds on facebook:

I think it is spot on.
In the summer of 2003 I made a leap into the unknown - it was so unknown that I had no idea how to fathom it ahead of time. If I had, I might not have made the leap. Now, nine years later, I am so glad that I did. In those intervening years I´ve grown and learned and become more of the person I want to be. There's no way to know if I could have achieved that had I opted to stay in a zone of comforting, if dissatisfying, familiarity. Since I arrived in Mexico I have had to jump off into the unknown countless times. Sometimes into harrowing experiences I hope I´ll never have to go through again, other times into the greatest adventures of my life. If magic is an ingredient in an interesting life, then you have to step out of, fall out of, be dragged out of your comfort zone.

Now that I've made the decision to make a new leap I am feeling more and more at ease with the choice. To all who may read this I wish you a joyous and purposeful 2013. I have high hopes for the coming days and months, not just for me but for all of us.