Waking Up in Winter

Poet Andres Fernandez has written, “Do not just slay your demons, dissect them, and find what they have been feeding on.”

This is the work of therapy. Although you could attempt it on your own as well.

The best therapists are insightful listeners. They help us talk about what is bothering us, what may be haunting or disturbing or frightening us that we have been unable to either admit or face.

Within the protection of the therapist’s office, we are able to confidently say what we might not otherwise be able to say to anyone else. There is enormous freedom in that if we are indeed able to experience it, to open up and say what we feel.

“I hate my parents but I pretend I love them.” “I’m having an affair.” “I drink too much.” “I am terrified that someone at work will see how incompetent I really am.” “I can’t stand my husband/wife.” “My kids have completely disappointed me.” “I was sexually abused as a child.” “I am afraid I will be abandoned by those who love me.”

These kinds of statements, and others, are things we normally don’t want anyone to know about us. They are dark, scary secrets held in the privacy of our souls. They are memories we fight to forget.

But whether it is with a trained therapist, a friend we trust, or just on our own, if we can confront our “demons,” which I consider to be our emotional and psychological dysfunctions, not some evil spirit, then we can begin the journey to healing and growth.

I am convinced that we are born good, that we each one has the innate potential to be a responsible, loving and caring human being. What changes us is disease; abuse that is physical, sexual, or emotional; poor parenting; emotional neglect; rejection; overly strict religious demands in the home; perfectionism expected from us; and so on.

Most of the time we are not even aware of the causes of our distress until we enter adulthood. Sometimes not even until later in life when our relationships fail, our work suffers, our health breaks down because we have abused our bodies with addictions to food, alcohol, or drugs.  

In her book, “Waking Up in Winter: What Really Matters at Midlife,” life coach and author, Cheryl Richardson, has written, “At some point, we’re all invited to take the hero’s journey—to leave familiar territory, face our demons, travel through the darkness, and find our way to a better life, one more aligned with who we’ve become.”

Many of us, for one reason or another, never take this journey. Some, perhaps, don’t need it. But most of us reach some point in life when we do. We find ourselves in an existential crisis, something that causes us to question our existence, who we really are, and what we are doing with our life.

The Hindu religion, boiled down to its basics, is not about struggles and attempts to believe certain dogmas and doctrines to make us behave. It is essentially about getting us to a place of realizing, not believing. It emphasizes being and becoming, not staying stuck in ideas or beliefs that don’t work.

Whether you care to follow that religion or not, and I’m not especially advocating for it, it still offers an enormously healthy approach to life. When we get to a point where we feel out of place, phony, lost, alienated from our true self and from others, how helpful then to simply face the facts. Open our self to honesty and reality.  To realize and see what we need to change.

That is the hardest part of the process, getting to that place of beginning. But once there, whether in therapy or just on our own, amazing freedom can happen.

It’s really not about slaying our demons. It’s about discovering who we have become and who we want to be.

© 2018 Timothy Moody