Last July my father died, it was sudden, shocking and brought into play a myriad of raw emotions inside of my body. My relationship with my father was multi-layered due to the fact that he developed the disease of alcoholism.
When I was young, especially prior to beginning school, the memories I have of my father were healthy, tender, playful and connected. As far as I can recall, he was a loving man, who although caught in the rhythm of intense work and responsibility was still able to enjoy himself and engage with me. He was smart, funny, creative and had a passionate love for nature.
I spent my primary years living in the woods with my father, mother and two younger brothers. I have strong visceral memories of this time in my life and the ponds, forests, animals, swamps, rivers and lakes that were part of my daily existence. It was a joyful world, this raw, natural wilderness, and from my best accessible memories it seemed a good life for my parents as well.
When I entered school at the age of six, everything shifted and we slowly began an integration process back into the social norms of North America.
This shift was extremely challenging for myself and for my family, everything changed. We infiltrated the cultural rituals of television, packaged food, school and consumerism into our family. The deepest and most confusing ripple of this transition was the fact that my father began to spend his none working hours drinking in the pub, away from the family. The corrosive affect of his behaviour caused a multitude of difficulties that progressively worsened as the years went by.
When I was young, especially prior to beginning school, the memories I have of my father were healthy, tender, playful and connected. As far as I can recall, he was a loving man, who although caught in the rhythm of intense work and responsibility was still able to enjoy himself and engage with me. He was smart, funny, creative and had a passionate love for nature.
I spent my primary years living in the woods with my father, mother and two younger brothers. I have strong visceral memories of this time in my life and the ponds, forests, animals, swamps, rivers and lakes that were part of my daily existence. It was a joyful world, this raw, natural wilderness, and from my best accessible memories it seemed a good life for my parents as well.
When I entered school at the age of six, everything shifted and we slowly began an integration process back into the social norms of North America.
This shift was extremely challenging for myself and for my family, everything changed. We infiltrated the cultural rituals of television, packaged food, school and consumerism into our family. The deepest and most confusing ripple of this transition was the fact that my father began to spend his none working hours drinking in the pub, away from the family. The corrosive affect of his behaviour caused a multitude of difficulties that progressively worsened as the years went by.
Hence, by the time of my father’s death, he was entrenched in the thick milieu of alcoholism, but I had already taken the opportunity years earlier to talk with him and had laid to rest any unfinished relational obscurities between us. I felt clear and at peace. When I spoke with him his ability to be accountable and loving eased my heart completely.
This story of my father’s death is a strange bridge to my experience as an Internet “dater”. Shortly before hearing of my dad’s death I decided that perhaps I needed to be more pro-active if I wanted to develop a loving, intimate relationship with a potential partner. I knew several people who had met their mates on-line; I had tried it myself a few years ago, but gave up quickly. This time I wanted to actually meet people and to spend some time and energy looking for a kindred soul who might be traveling a path similar to my own.
I set up as honest a profile as I could, I did my best to represent myself with clarity and intention. I felt ready. Then my father died. When this happened I decided I needed to spend some time integrating his passing. I went off line, and preceded to cry, pray, do a lot of walking in the forest, and allowed the memories and sensations to move through me. It was a fertile time, abundant with a plethora of feelings and thoughts.
About three months later I felt even more ready to embark on a relationship. It was as if my father’s death had freed a part of my heart that had been somewhat nebulous in it’s willingness to open to love. Perhaps I had still been fettered in the confines of the lonely, forgotten daughter who found trees and animals more easeful to relate to and trust then a lover.
Nonetheless I reposted my witty, joyful profile on the dating site and the birds started to fly home to roost. I began to go on small dates, for tea, a walk, to see a film; these dates were novice, as I really have not dated much. There was a quality of enjoyment and a small quiver of excitement with each meeting. There was also a slightly melancholy tremor to the dating; it is not that the people I met were unkind or distasteful. Truth be told they were generally very sweet, good hearted, hopeful and interesting. Yet, for me, what I yearned for was perhaps an illusion. My heart swelled like a small boat in the ocean. I ached to meet someone who had also stretched their body across the grass when they were a child, had felt the grass reach into their skin, had loved the sky with it’s palette of blue and pink and orange and had known what it was to break with the wonder of it all. This world, with it’s chaotic dancing cattails, eagles and rushing water, pulling me in every direction as I drink in the beauty around me; rushing my innocent body into the grass, collapsing with delight and reverence. The world was holy; bringing me to tears and lifting my heart into endless tailspins of wonder.
What I yearned for was not a date, but rather, I wanted a grown up to worship with. Someone to smell the moss with, to roll in the grass and then build a fire and roast potatoes. I wanted to live the wilderness inside of me with a mate I adored.
I did not understand, this was a very tall order for a dating site, yet I persevered. I stayed open; I kept up with the dating and the answering of emails. I did not give up even when I felt discouraged. I was a real trooper.
Then a miracle happened, I was simply minding my own business, doing my meditation, breathing in, breathing out. Focusing on the Tonglen practice, welcoming the feelings of loneliness into my body, allowing them to permeate me like thick smoke and then breathing out loving kindness and sending it back into the world with a soft heart. During this meditation it struck to me like a light going off inside my chest, I did not need to search for a mate. I did not need to feel alone or that I would not be loved. I did not need to be on a dating site.
Love lived in my body, always had, always will. Love is not something to “make happen”, to conjure up. Love is simply love. Loving is wonderful, but I had become preoccupied and even somewhat exhausted by grasping, trying so studiously to find my beloved. If there is a mate for me, we will find one another, in this life, or perhaps some other. We will walk into each other’s lives with ease, just like the breath. I do not need to “work” to make this happen, the way I felt I had to work to attempt to have my father love me when his drinking began to alter his heart and take his attention away from myself and our family.
My Tonglen meditation gifted me with such insight, making it utterly clear that I could let go of the responsibility of being on the dating site. My intention is to keep my heart as vast as possible to the grace of life, to the opulent lushness of my existence and let love wash through me like it had when I was a girl. I did not crave or grasp for a “lover” to join me when I was in my child like wonder. I simply danced in that place of open heartedness, danced like a wee dervish afire for life.
When I wrestled with the mechanism of the dating site, finally figuring out how to delete my account, I felt a wave of relief, faith and delight rushing through me. I was free! I was free of the confines and the restrictions of my own romanticized delusions. Love was in me and all around me, all I had to do was open the gateway of my sturdy, joyous heart and breathe.
I did not understand, this was a very tall order for a dating site, yet I persevered. I stayed open; I kept up with the dating and the answering of emails. I did not give up even when I felt discouraged. I was a real trooper.
Then a miracle happened, I was simply minding my own business, doing my meditation, breathing in, breathing out. Focusing on the Tonglen practice, welcoming the feelings of loneliness into my body, allowing them to permeate me like thick smoke and then breathing out loving kindness and sending it back into the world with a soft heart. During this meditation it struck to me like a light going off inside my chest, I did not need to search for a mate. I did not need to feel alone or that I would not be loved. I did not need to be on a dating site.
Love lived in my body, always had, always will. Love is not something to “make happen”, to conjure up. Love is simply love. Loving is wonderful, but I had become preoccupied and even somewhat exhausted by grasping, trying so studiously to find my beloved. If there is a mate for me, we will find one another, in this life, or perhaps some other. We will walk into each other’s lives with ease, just like the breath. I do not need to “work” to make this happen, the way I felt I had to work to attempt to have my father love me when his drinking began to alter his heart and take his attention away from myself and our family.
My Tonglen meditation gifted me with such insight, making it utterly clear that I could let go of the responsibility of being on the dating site. My intention is to keep my heart as vast as possible to the grace of life, to the opulent lushness of my existence and let love wash through me like it had when I was a girl. I did not crave or grasp for a “lover” to join me when I was in my child like wonder. I simply danced in that place of open heartedness, danced like a wee dervish afire for life.
When I wrestled with the mechanism of the dating site, finally figuring out how to delete my account, I felt a wave of relief, faith and delight rushing through me. I was free! I was free of the confines and the restrictions of my own romanticized delusions. Love was in me and all around me, all I had to do was open the gateway of my sturdy, joyous heart and breathe.
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