The Unbearable Heaviness of Being

On returning from overseas a few months back, I had Covid for the first time despite being vaccinated. I’d wishfully believed I couldn’t get it, that maybe I had some kind of rare immunity, since for years everyone around me had gone down with it, but not moi.

However, in Switzerland, up beautiful Mt Pilatus, or more likely in the bustling, hermetically-sealed coffee shop on said mountain, I caught it. After, when the acute symptoms had passed, came heart palpitations and a creeping heaviness of being that I couldn’t otherwise fully explain.

After some tests I was given beta-blockers to settle my palpitations, and they’ve largely worked, for which I’m grateful. However, there remained this low hum of heaviness that wasn’t there before, a fatigue, a lack of motivation for tackling challenges, for getting excited about…anything.

I’m joking.

And I am actually very OK. Worry not. I’m not sick.

I’m just not quite the way I was, and of course, I’ve searched for the Why.

Is it the pills - I’ve never taken any regular medication before?

Is it the menopause - that’s been one of the most excruciating experiences I’ve been through? I resent it, and all it steals, especially changes to my energy and clarity.

Is it long Covid? Who really knows where the diagnostic boundaries of that monster begin and end?

Being unable to pin my heavy inner fog on a specific crisis or cause, I’ve been paying very close attention to when I feel the heaviest, the brain-foggiest, the most lethargic and flattened, and to what helps.

I have some findings, that might be useful to you too, if you can relate.

These are the things that I believe are making me heavy, tired and flat:

The dearth of journalism that is real, ethical and skilful. We have learned to trust so little of what we see or read, it’s barely worth reading any so-called news. The skepticism and suspicion around News, something we once largely trusted, is exhausting and depressing.

We are saturated in commercialism and we’re over being told we ‘need the thneed’. Fighting it on multiple fronts daily is exhausting.

Governments. Do you trust them? And do you feel very empowered to do much about that? I guess just now, having witnessed recent world events, I don’t.

These things are exhausting, flattening and depleting.

The only answers I have, remain the perennial healers. The joys, the authentic experiences, the glimmers of light, the connections made with other souls, to nature, and to small details that bring sparks of pleasure and beauty, hour by hour.

The wool art that adorns the local street shopping strip, knitted and displayed by talented local craftspeople, for the enjoyment of the community.

Finding frames for a selection of my grandmother’s old photos, 100 years old or more.

Listening to audio books to learn from the style of other authors and escape into story, while doing mundane tasks.

Contacting friends I haven’t seen for a long time and inviting them to meet at a café for a coffee and ‘hello’.

Researching a place I’d like to travel next year, in detail, and dreaming of it.

Writing, writing, writing even when I don’t think I’m writing well, I’m still flowing, and from that, something good could happen. Whereas if I do nothing….nothing happens.

Not watching the news.

Bites of simple language learning, for a brain stretch.

Only using the internet in specific, targeted ways. No scrolling dumbass feeds.

Walking with dogs. Playing with dogs.

Reaching out to people and asking questions, trying to learn something new, and show them care.

Going to a very old style pub, not necessarily drinking, but immersing in the history, and eating good, plain pub food.

What do you do?

What else can we try?

I wish you a peaceful holiday season, with copious instances of light, authenticity, beauty and pleasure.

Love to you,