I am lovable when I am good. I am detestable when I am bad.
My badness has to be choked out of existence. There is no room for the ugliness of who I am to be seen. The ragged underbelly of my personality is not for public display. But my failings seem to fly into view at the drop of a hat. Charged with the responsibility of keeping them under wraps and stopping mayhem, I manage myself, or else I am the mad woman marching relentlessly to the beat of my own drum. But I grind to a stop at the edge of the abyss. Toes touching the cragged overhang that falls into the void. Will I jump?
The edge calls to me. Oblivion screeches my name. But there is no quietly slipping off into the dark night. There is clamoring, scratching and flailing -- clinging and holding on. Pleading and begging to exist.
The hospital room fills with people. Angus is pushed out the door.
Bells and buzzers are going off. Even though it is the middle of the afternoon with plenty of daylight the overhead surgical lights are turned up scorching my eyeballs. I’m on a cold hard table. And the room is freezing or I’m just cold from blood loss. Doctors and nurses are rushing round dressed in their blue scrubs. I wear a flimsy green hospital gown. There is a clock on the wall and the ticking has been drowned out by the hum of people talking. There is an off white pulse oximeter on my left index finger with the inner light growing red.
Now I’m moving. The doctor has arrived. We are heading to surgery to stop the hemorrhage.
Understandably after giving birth that the desire to live is volcanic force. There was no surrendering or feeling drawn to the white light. There was the gnashing of teeth and grasping to hold on for existence. It was a visceral response to live that I did not control.
And while that fight was happening deeper realizations were unfolding. Who am I? This body on the table or something else? My awareness is not localized in my form. What does that mean?
And even though I escaped death at that time, I realize now there was no way to escape the edge. There is but a thin layer of illusion covering the cracks of what is.
This experience shattered my reality and pierced my innocent delusions of what was important and true. Fragments of untruth split apart at the seams revealing them for the lies they were all along.
Spinning in vertigo. Screaming in silence. Battling for control.
There is no goodness large enough to turn what is fake into reality. There is no effort strong enough to create truth out of fiction. There is no suffering deep enough to erase the brutal fact of death and oblivion.
Brandishing optimism like a sword cannot cut to the quick of life if there is nothing there. It is simple to conclude there is no point, but the point is just not mine. I do not decide the point. I can’t control the point. I am not the creator of the point.
And what if there is no point? Is it really so painful to live without meaning or is it freedom?
If you would like to listen to the Rewilding Love Podcast, it comes out in serial format. Start with Episode 1 for context. Click here to listen. And, if you would like to dive deeper into the understanding I share along with additional support please check out the Rewilding Community.
Rohini Ross is co-founder of “The Rewilders.” Listen to her podcast, with her partner Angus Ross, Rewilding Love. They believe too many good relationships fall apart because couples give up thinking their relationship problems can’t be solved. In this season of the Rewilding Love Podcast, Rohini and Angus help a couple on the brink of divorce due to conflict. Angus and Rohini also co-facilitate private couples' intensives that rewild relationships back to their natural state of love. Rohini is also the author of the ebook Marriage, and she and Angus are co-founders of The 29-Day Rewilding Experience and The Rewilding Community. You can follow Rohini on Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram. To learn more about her work and subscribe to her blog visit: TheRewilders.org.