In recent years, through bad health, betrayal and a myriad of other unfortunate circumstances I have increasingly found myself in a joyless, depressed, anxious place with rising panic in response to the rolling catastrophe of my day-to-day life, unable to do anything to redirect it to more pleasant pastures.
Depression and anxiety have been lifelong companions although I had found that meditation offered an alchemic method of rediscovering joy within this wasteland. Health problems have severely challenged this, subverting my efforts with struggle and so amplified a sense of panic of losing my principal means of digestion.
Last night's edition of ‘Feasts’, based in Mexico, however, offered me a fresh approach. It related how their celebration of El Día de los Muertos (Day of the Dead) was based on the ancient Aztec view that death was our true state of being whilst life was merely a fleeting, aberrant interlude. Whilst this might initially appear macabre and nihilistic, I found it (like the locals apparently do) strangely uplifting.
I found that embracing this view, relieved my life of the burden of unfulfilled promise, the claustrophobic struggle to repair what is falling apart and profound feeling of shame of my failure to achieve anything in that regard. At least, momentarily, this have given me a sense of joy and appreciation of the the things life is offering right now, freed from some of my expectations, however reasonable those might appear.
I should add, this is not entirely new to me as it seems consistent with the buddhist view of emptiness and that the nature of our minds is unborn and that, if we ease off clinging to the imagined permanence of things and denial of death we become more free to celebrate life for what it is rather than what we wish it were. However, within life’s turmoil, it has been easy to lose this perspective, amidst the pain, and this fresh view has renewed a heart connection and brought me some lightness of being to be a dead man talking.
[ Photo: A gogo gone dancer by Terry Jones http://twitpic.com/33sjm ]
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