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I have been putting off writing for a few weeks now. It is funny how procrastination masks itself as accidental (“I’m just so busy!”)  or standalone, a product in and of itself. It seems innocent (“I just don’t like doing things that are unpleasant.”) and harmless (“It’ll get done eventually.”)

In reality, procrastination can be used as a tool to uncover our deepest fears and unconscious weaknesses. This has been something I’ve been working on lately – Shadow work. More to come on this topic, but the catalyst was a conversation I had with a friend a few months ago. I was describing my latest exploits in South America, what I had discovered, what I was still seeking, all the ways in which I was trying to grow and improve. My friend responded, “You always seem to be trying to change yourself and get better. Have you ever tried just accepting who you are?”

No, I hadn’t. And I wasn’t ready to. I could accept the parts of me that I liked and that others deemed agreeable. But all the parts that I didn’t like about myself, I would reject and hide until I successfully changed them. And once I was perfect, I could present myself to the world and I would accept myself.

This thread of conversation has been repeated in many ways since then. I was discussing my plans for the future with some friends, how I was going to Boulder to refine my meditation practice and save up for India, where I would really dive deep and figure it all out. I think I said something along the lines of “I’m not coming back until I know for certain what I’m doing.” My friend responded, “Well, what do you think you’ll find?” I didn’t know.

Upon further reflection, I realized that what I was looking for was the same thing that I was looking for by travelling South America. The same thing I was looking for when I shaved my head, when I drank ayahuasca and smoked DMT. Everything that I thought would uncover the truth & that would show me how it all is was short-lived. An illusion. These were all desperate attempts to know the truth, to be certain, to be sure. I don’t know if we can ever know the truth. At least the “I” who wants to know the truth (the ego) will never know it. Ouspensky wrote, “The one who knows doesn’t know he knows.”

Herein lies the problem with the aforementioned dead-end approaches. While the purest part of me, my soul, longs to be reunited with it’s Source, my ego compromises this yearning by pursuing the truth for the purposes of power, control, and self-righteousness. My ego wants to go to Colombia and drink ayahuasca and meet God and then come back home and tell everyone how it is. How amazing and glorious it all is and oh, you wouldn’t get it, it’s for me alone. It wants to hoard the truth because it is afraid and insecure. This is no way to approach the Truth. One can only do so with complete humility.

Humility is maybe the antithesis to the ego, who is certain of it’s own separateness and importance. And, baby, is this ego strong. It is a cunning shapeshifter. It is convinced of it’s righteousness, confident in its omnipotence. It is stubborn and persistent. While I acknowledge it as natural and necessary, I do not need the ego to run my life. In doing Shadow work, I hope to learn more about my ego and, consequentially, detach myself from it, until I can watch its games with amused awareness and loving kindness.

The reason I’ve procrastinated writing is that I’m scared. The vision I have for this blog is vast, murky, and unclear. I don’t know what I want it to look like or sound like. I don’t know what my voice is as a writer – I haven’t written in years! What is the purpose of my blog – am I simply displaying my thoughts & feelings for others to see? Am I trying to persuade others? Is there a call to action or an underlying thread? Why am I doing this?

These questions and uncertainties are indicative to larger feelings I have about myself. What am I doing with my life? Who am I? I am afraid and I am unsure, as I’m sure many of us are even though we pretend not to be. The masks we’ve been told to wear – I’m confident, I know what’s going on, I have agency and control over my life – are fragile and ill-fitting. As we get older, we realize that this role of “knowing” is one we are increasingly meant to occupy, lest we make others uncomfortable and force them to question their own realities.

My mask has never fit right. I remember when I was five and I thought the 10-year olds were huge and they knew what it was all about. Then I was 10 and I was like, omg, but imagine being in 8th grade. Once in 8th grade, highschoolers seemed like adults. In high school, college was the real deal. Now, I’m 25 and I still feel like a kid. “The more that I see, the more that I know / I don’t know anything, at all.” 

But no. You are 25, so act like you have it figured out. Grow up. Ideas of who I should be & how I should act interfere with who I actually am. Maybe strength = honesty = vulnerability? Maybe strength is the ability to look each other in the eyes and say, “I don’t know who I am or what I’m doing. Don’t hate me or hurt me for it. Instead, allow me to be whoever I am, however I show up in this moment. Accept me for who I am, not who I am supposed to be.”

It seems apparent that only through honesty and vulnerability can we discover the Truth. And in all honesty, I am still very much a work in progress. Some days, I’ll come on here and be like “I FIGURED IT ALL OUT! LIFE IS JUST ABOUT LOVE!!” and other days I’ll be deep in the I-give-up trench. Some days, I’ll be jokey mcjoker pants and other days, I’ll be depresso-mode. I’m learning to accept all these parts of myself and not force myself to be a finished, presentable product, easy to categorize and digest. It just doesn’t work that way.