Life is Like a Treadmill, You Never Know What You’re Gonna Get

You know those times in life when there is just way too much going on and you begin to question if you’re able to handle anything at all? I don’t mean externally; too many people to see, too many things to do. I mean internally; too many emotions to process, too much weight on your body coming from somewhere you can’t see or pinpoint directly, if even at all. Those moments when you find yourself gasping for air or praying for something to give. For just an inch of space to open so that you might be able to breathe, to steady yourself and get a grip on things. 

I always imagine these times are like when I was little and thought that playing on my parent’s treadmill was fun. It occupied my mind and it was an interesting machine to use. I remember loving how I could control the speed and change it whenever I wanted. When I increased the speed, I had to move faster. When I slowed it down, I could stop. It was all in my control. 

There were times on that treadmill that I would pump the speed up to an amount that excited me. Would I be able to keep up? Who knows! Up one notch and then another, I would feel my adrenaline pumping and I knew that my favorite part was coming up. The part where my legs were moving far too fast, almost machine-like, just before I pulled the safety plug out and stopped the mechanism entirely. I would push myself to a place where I knew it either had to stop or an explosion of chaos would occur. In the moment just before I would lose control and fly off, I would shut it down. Just like that. From speed to silence in only a moment. 

Sometimes life feels like that treadmill, only I’m no longer in control. It feels like the speed goes up without warning. Faster and faster, I begin to panic. Can I handle it? It’s much less exciting and a lot scarier when you’re not the one with the safety cord brushing against your fingertips. It’s much more uncomfortable and overwhelming when you can’t control the speed but you still have to run because you can’t get off. Not without falling. Not without hurting yourself. 

My life has been an out of control treadmill recently. I found a brief pocket of peace last winter and rode it as far as it would take me. I was safe, comfortable, and stable. My life was easy and predictable, quiet and void of any deep emotions or connection. I was numb but I told myself I was healing. Maybe I was. Maybe I needed the numbness, the quiet and the space to find equilibrium once more. But when I was ready to step out of that bubble, life hit me like a freight train. 

At first it was exciting! Spring was here and I was reborn. I was finally vaccinated against Covid-19 and for the first time in over a year, I felt freedom and I felt alive. Little did I know that embracing the spring I felt blooming within my body meant stepping into an extremely dark and harrowing journey. It meant hopping on a treadmill that I did not have one ounce of control over. Because I had no idea what I was entering into, I began to run. 

At first the pace was easy. A brisk walk, my lungs were expanding and my heart was beating loudly once more. It felt like how I imagine it must feel for a big grizzly bear to leave its hibernation and run in an open field for the first time since the beginning of winter. It felt refreshing and it felt good. 

Then the speed picked up. I felt excited and raw, like I was free falling into a cloud! My business was booming and my dreams were finally showing up. My social calendar was jam packed and I began to greet the world in a very confident, energetic way. Sometimes I feel like I became a brief extrovert and to be honest, it was kind of nice to expand out into the world in a way I never have before. It felt powerful and that power called for more speed. 

My legs were moving fast. Too fast for me to question if I could do it, so I just kept moving. I let my muscles take over and I cruised. At first it felt good but then it began to take too much. Too much breath, too many heartbeats, too much movement. I was ready for the speed to drop but it never did, so I kept running. Only now, there were cramps. Aches. Trouble breathing. The freedom I felt was slowly turning to fear. The confidence I had in my grasp was floating away, just out of reach.

I began to doubt if I could take it. I doubted my legs, my feet, my muscles. I doubted my belief in self and the more I doubted myself, the more my feet began to trip. At first it was just a fumble but the fumble gave way to falling. The handles on the sides of the machine allowed me to keep up and get my feet back on the ground. But eventually those handles began to disintegrate. 

I suddenly found myself reaching for something that was no longer there. Without those handles, I was sure to go down and it wasn’t going to be pretty. I’ve never wanted anything as badly as I wanted that emergency plug to be pulled. For the machine to come to a standstill and for my legs to just get a break. Even if it was only for 5 seconds, I needed that break. I was constantly praying for that break but it never came. 

So I ran and I stumbled and I ran and I stumbled. At first I tried to make it look like I was stumbling on purpose. In my mind there was an audience and this audience was full of harsh critics sitting in their comfortable seats. The fear of their shameful judgements fueled me for a bit, keeping me going. I was surely going down but maybe if I ran hard enough before falling, no one would hold it against me. 

My mind was convinced that I could keep going but my legs were ready to admit that I couldn’t do it anymore. Since I wouldn’t allow myself to fall, my body fell for me. It crashed to the ground and was thrown off of the moving floor in a violent, painful way. Bones cracked and muscles strained as the hard ground caught my weak and tender body. I had finally found stillness. I had finally pulled my own emergency cord. 

Of course, this is only a metaphor. There was no single moment where my body gave out and crashed, but rather weeks and weeks of my body crashing and my mind chastising it for not being able to keep up. There were many days -and nights- spent lifeless on the couch. Hours of mindless tv and social media scrolling. Days on end of isolation and solitude. A harsh sentence for such an inevitable crime. I was punishing myself for falling.

You see, I was always going to fall. That’s what happens when life controls the speed AND the emergency cord. Falling becomes our only way out. Hitting our breaking point becomes our only way to hit the ground and bounce back. But I didn’t bounce back. I sunk into a deep depression where some days, taking out the garbage or making food for myself was impossible. I began to rely on take out and my safe spot on my couch to keep me alive. 

The treadmill was still moving full speed but I was lying on the ground next to it, motionless. Lifeless. Breathless. My body was still yet the world of weight spinning on top of me was beginning to crush me. I had fallen and I could not get back up. 

I’m not here to tell you some brave story about how I got back up despite how difficult it was. I didn’t. I still haven’t. I am still lying on that cold floor next to the manic movements of that machine. But for the first time in my entire life, I gave myself permission to break. This life is not easy or simple. In no reality will I get to control the speed or the emergency stopping of my journey. But I can thrust my body to the side and fall to the ground. I can choose to stop running and I can give myself a break. I can give myself room to breathe, even if those critics in the stands glare at me and scribble on their notepads with their own egotistical amusement. 

Not everyone can stop. Not everyone has the support, the resources, or the room to stop. For some, stopping means dying. It means losing their safety and their lives. I am grateful that I was able to throw myself off of that treadmill and just stop for a while. I am grateful that I have friends and family who came and laid next to me on that floor. They combed my hair, they fed me, and they dusted me off so that I could continue laying there for however long I needed. 

Now because of all that, I have the option to stand once more. Although my body is still recovering and will need more time before I can fully stand, let alone run again, I have the option. I have the chance. I have a choice to make. I can lie here and let my body waste away, letting people care for it and feel sorry over it. Or I can fight. I can fight every inch of my being that begs me to stay down and motionless. I can fight all of the doubts and fears that whisper “all hope is lost”. I can fight the urges I have to slip away into a permanent peaceful slumber and reject my responsibility to my own life force. I can fight for my life, so I will. 

Empath Pie

What does it mean to be an empath? Giving an objective definition for something that is entirely subjective by nature reveals that it probably means something different to us all. Yet somehow we can each relate to one another's unique meanings, giving us a pretty ironic look into how empathy serves its purpose in this world. Connecting the undefinable. 

Surrendering to our empathy gives us a secret power as both humans and spiritual beings in a physical world. It allows us to find common ground and understanding with others in an otherwise rigid and logical world while gifting us a break from the zoomed-in view of our own life and personally-focused points of view. It is our healing elixir for when the ego and life become too large of a presence, casting shadows over our true nature. Not only does our understanding expand when we connect through empathy, but so does our ability to connect to others. It gives us the space to back up and experience life from a much more important place: our spirits.

When it comes to defining what it means to be an empath, we must first look at what it means to experience empathy. Empathy is the capacity to understand what the other is feeling on a vulnerable, emotional level. It is the ability to connect to and share an emotional feeling or experience with another, something that the ego might often make difficult for us to do comfortably. Empathy is to internally bear witness to the rawness of another living being's emotional experience, presence, and existence without judgment and with a truckload of understanding. 

Empathy, to me, is one of the most beautiful and extraordinary phenomenons to experience naturally in this world and in life. Empathy means we are not alone. Not even the ugliest or most painful of experiences can isolate us from the living because it is those very deep and shredding emotions we feel that bonds us to every other living being and what it means to be alive. Somewhere in this life, there is another who has felt the same sensations and frustrations that once moved through your systems or left you hanging on by a thread. There is somebody that has been through a very similar emotional state. There is somebody that understands. 

While empathy gives us the support we need as beings of love to move forward when life gets hard, it also gives us the gift of sharing the bright, big, and wonderful things with others as well! It links our experiences with one another; the good, the bad, and the entire in-between. Empathy connects us. It connects us to other humans, other beings, and to our very own soul. It transports us closer to our home frequency of love and connection by giving us the experience of both our own emotions and the emotions of others. It shows us how to relate, how to understand, and how to love. Through connection. Deep, authentic emotional connection. 

The term "Empath" is tossed around quite a bit, out in the world but more specifically in the metaphysical/spiritual communities. I have pondered what it means to be an empath for quite some time now and through my practices with mediumship and energy reading, I have discovered many different perspectives of what it means to be an empath. There are many subjective meanings and a whole lot of different ideas attached, so here I will share with you my own personal understanding thus far. Feel free to take what fits and leave what doesn't, as we all have unique and personal experiences/beliefs and every single one is true and valid!

I have learned that you cannot experience real, honest, pure love without empathy. Whether it's love you have for your dog, for a stranger, for your mom, or for your partner, empathy is the main ingredient. Without empathy, your love is not coming from a place of common understanding, from connection and relation, it is coming from a wound or from a conditioned belief. Empathy is how you experience Big Love (the term I coined to describe divine love which is the nature of the existence of the universe). Big Love is the feeling that you are one with the universe. It is the connection to all that is and the balance that surrounds us, somehow connecting all the right dots and doing it all in our highest good. Big Love is the purpose for which we experience hardship and growth, it is the understanding that we are beautiful, meaningful beings in whatever state we vibrate in and that healing can occur if we welcome it. It is also the promise that lives in the light and beckons us through our own healing journeys. The promise that if we seek to heal ourselves through love, we will endlessly multiply it in all the moments we have ahead.

Empathy holds space for love to exist in its purest and most authentic form. The kind that makes your entire body vibrate with warmth and softness, that lifts you up and leaves you tap-dancing lightly on air, the kind that holds your hand and says, "I am here. You are safe". Empathy is the room that births the most beautiful array of creations that life has to offer. Empathy is important stuff when it comes to our interactions, connections, and relationships with others. It connects us to our truest, most vulnerable self, and it is also the key to getting in touch with our spiritual nature and abilities (the metaphysical and energetic senses that come naturally to humans the higher we vibrate energetically). 

The metaphysical/spiritual communities often use the word "Empath" to describe one who has particular sensitivities related to experiencing the thoughts, emotions, and states of others. While I am certainly someone who uses it in that form, I am beginning to realize that that is just a short way of explaining it. An empath is someone who experiences deep and sometimes powerful psychic empathy BECAUSE they are sensitive to energy or a specific vibration of energy (emotions, thoughts, physical sensations, etc.). Because their heart is open to empathy and connection. All of us have the capacity to be empathic, just as all of us have the ability to experience empathy. All of us also have the capacity to be sensitive to the energies that exist within us, around us, and throughout the entire infinite universe. Some of our souls may have chosen to be unconscious of these sensitivities, some of us subconsciously or actively choose to block them or suppress them. Some of us (like psychics, mediums, and intuitives) have chosen to live fully sensitive and aware of the energies that surround and/or affect them. Whether we choose to practice this ability as a career is also up to us. The world needs sensitive, empathic ones in every position and corner, not just as practicing metaphysical messengers. At any point in your life you can certainly become aware of or turn off your abilities, as a spiritual being in a physical body/world, to sense the energy within and around you. The energy that makes up your world, reality and the universe around you is constantly there, detectable to those of us that choose (on a conscious or subconscious level) to sense and experience it. 

Those who are sensitive to the world of energy will be sensitive to the emotions of others. Those who are sensitive to the emotions of others are already open to sensing the world of energy. Read that one more time! We are all capable of being "empaths" if you roll with the theme of empathy and connection to others on emotional levels. When you consider the connotations of "empath" that comes with the spiritual/metaphysical version of things, you would be talking about those who are currently energetically sensitive. Some may only be open (again, on a conscious or subconscious level) to experience energy grounded in humans, such as in the form of the thoughts and emotions of others ( I call this psychic). Compare this to people like mediums who are open to experiencing and sensing the energy that surrounds them in all forms (thoughts, emotions, memories, experiences, spirits, spiritual beings, the energy that exists outside of our bodies, etc). 

There are many different levels and forms of experiencing and sensing energy in this physical world and considering yourself an Empath means that you are aware of and accepting of the fact that you are sensitive to perceiving that which is not physically tangible (energy, i.e. emotions). That in itself requires a certain degree of faith that some may struggle to discover within themselves. We are all on our own, unique journeys moving at a pace and intensity that we designed for ourselves and continue to create. 

No matter what you are sensitive to, be it nothing, the thoughts and emotions of others or spirits and the energies of the universe, you can turn it up or turn it down! You can grow it or shrink it if you wish. You can choose to stop it at the psychic level (experiencing other human's experiences) or kick it up a notch and sense the universe at large and all it contains. You can also choose to experience none of it, although, I highly recommend being connected in some form to anything larger than the physical experience. It gives life meaning beyond comprehension and sometimes that is what carries me through the tough days. 

To conclude this long and informative piece, I offer you a nugget of wisdom: it all starts with empathy. If you are lost or feeling overwhelmed, unsure of how to define what being an empath means for you personally, start with your ability to feel empathy for others as a human. Start with the emotions and the vulnerability, with the trust and the presentness. There you will discover your own unique definition of what it means to consider yourself an empath, and from there you can discover what it is you are curious to learn more about. I can promise you this, being empathic, being sensitive in whichever degree and form you are, is at its root an incredibly beautiful and honest experience. The key to balancing your empathic nature and your physical experience -and the topic for my next piece- is to understand the world of energy and the ways in which you are sensitive to it and experience it. This also includes how you can step into your power and become in charge of your energy and energetic experience! 

There is a whole invisible world that we live in but sometimes all we think to see is the physical world that lies before us. Solid and dependable. Until it's not! Learning how to navigate and understand our energetic nature puts us in control of the experience we work to create and sets us free. So, tune in next week for a Ponderer's take on THE GREAT WORLD OF ENERGY! Until then my loves, I offer you a slice of Empath Pie. May you treat yourself to the same sweetness that you bake out in the world, tirelessly! You are loved and supported through each and every moment. Stay beautiful! XOXO