Back in the day, I spent a couple weeks on Kauai with a girlfriend, the same year when Bobby McFerrin’s song spilled onto the airwaves. His title “Don’t Worry, Be Happy” resonated so well with sitting on the beach sipping beer after beer, enjoying the sun and alcohol’s warmth. Inevitably, though, the night would turn cold as I would fight with my girlfriend. Excessive drinking nearly always brings drama.
In my life right now, I do not have one ounce of drama. And I genuinely don’t expect to again. But I am wide open vulnerable and cry or laugh a few times a day, but that feels pretty normal now–expressing real feeling instead of pretend feeling, which is simply alcohol infused melodrama. I think of the big theatrics in Richard Albee’s play “Whose Afraid of Virginia Wolf,” where Elizabeth Taylor and Richard Burton grandstand around the living room imagining that their pouting hysterics are real. I am so happy I do not have to witness or experience moments like these again.
Enjoying peace of mind is the jingly feeling you enjoy while listening to a bouncy song like “Don’t Worry, Be Happy.” Sure, life stresses are around and yet at core I am free. One funny element in my response to life is that I’m unusually soft around other people’s suffering. Perhaps as I truly alleviate some of my own hurts, I’m a touch fearful of watching pain in others. Not quite sure if that is at all clear, but what seems at play is that as I heal on a deep level, I can finally admit how painful some life events have really been, which opens me up and makes me prickly to others. Huh? I didn’t always promise clarity on this blog, right? Maybe a healer needs to heal first? We’ll see. I am not worried just happy–even if I miss out on my hoped for dream date on Valentine’s.
I would stay and write more convoluted self-insights, but a special song beckons me–has a light reggae beat and a pancake syrup quality sounding voice. Ever heard it?
