pain Archives - Owl Medicine: Shamanic Healing

Like Pacha, I just want to hide my head – Photo: L. Weikel

Effects of Stress

Sometimes the effects of stress we’re feeling come out in ways we don’t expect. And sometimes we don’t even realize we’re feeling stress, since technically, for all intents and purposes, we’re doing well.

I know that’s true with me. I’ve noticed over the past several days that my jaw and teeth ache on one side in particular – and I’m pretty sure it’s because I’ve been clenching my teeth while I sleep. It’s become obvious I’m going to have to resurrect my mouth guard from the bowels of my bedside table.

Let’s face it: I have no reason to clench my teeth. Sure, we’re all at risk – all of us, all over the world – when the amoral brutality of an unchecked dictator continues unabated. This is especially true when you consider that he has more nuclear weapons than anyone else in the world at his disposal. But that’s such a broad-stroked, bordering-on-amorphous threat to our existence that it’s honestly not something I feel warrants clenched teeth.

That’s why I’m surprised I’m clenching.

The Innocents

Don’t get me wrong. It’s not just kids and animals. Given the fabricated pretext of the invasion, I doubt you could characterize anyone in Ukraine as ‘guilty’ of provoking the Russian war on Ukraine. But the images of families being split up, mothers lugging babies and toddlers, and people carrying their pets miles and miles (because they’re family too) brings me to an edge within myself.

I feel stress when even considering how we would manage transporting our three cats and two pups if faced with similar forced refugee circumstances. What if we had to run to Massachusetts or New Mexico or Oregon for safety? How would we keep our family of familiars safe and together? How would we all manage to weather the brutal cold and snowstorm that’s hitting our area at this very moment?

Yes, from thousands of miles away, we can make donations of money or items needed to rebuild lives after escaping with essentially nothing but the clothes on their backs. Diapers, sanitary products, warm clothes, food – for people and for those beloved pets – can at least be provided in a stop-gap fashion. But there’s so much to life and living we take for granted. Right down to the ache in my face from clenching my teeth. It’s nothing compared to the pain and wounds of those enduring this hell first-hand.

I want to end on a positive thought – but all I can think is, “Peace Eagles.”

(T+95)

Remember to Heal

No, I’m not suggesting that you’ve forgotten that you need to heal something you’ve put on the back burner. The title I chose for tonight’s post is a reminder of the words President-elect Biden used early this evening when he and Vice President-elect Harris, along with their spouses, paid tribute to the over 400,000 people who’ve lost their lives to Covid-19 over the past year. We must remember to heal. The crux of his speech was that healing cannot take place without embracing our memories and allowing ourselves to feel. We must remember in order to heal.

When we sustain the loss of someone we love and cherish, it can feel like we’ve been burned. We shy away from the flame. We don’t want to go there again. It hurts too much.

But the truth of life and love is that we cannot separate our emotions. It’s impossible to parse out only the so-called ‘good’ feelings and emotions and simultaneously refuse the existence of the harder, more painful ones. You simply cannot have one without the other. They truly are two sides of the same coin.

Yet We Try

Just because the pain comes with the joy, the delight comes with the sorrow, doesn’t mean we won’t try to separate them. Of course we will – at least, most of us will try. As humans, that seems to be our default nature.

And that’s pretty much been our national reaction to this pandemic up to this point. There’s been a denial by many of the devastating loss. The deaths – so many, so staggeringly predictable, yet callously rejected as true. And the utter loneliness in which so many were forced to endure these losses.

Now, We Remember

This evening we were finally given permission to acknowledge the losses many of us, and so very many of our brothers and sisters, have sustained – and are enduring at this very moment. We remember. We know. We acknowledge the truth of our love, our relationships, our heartbreak, our loss.

Now, we start to heal.

(T-311)