The Light Keeper

If I’ve heard it once, I’ve heard it a dozen times (just this past week!): 

“I’m so sick and tired of
being sick and tired!”

It’s a comment I hear everywhere; at work, among my friends, on my favorite talk show radio. I’ve now coined a title for this response: “Classic Covid Fatigue.” 

I just got off the phone with Jules. She’s in the hospital recovering from back surgery following a fall she took last September. She’s been in tremendous pain for months, but now she finally has some relief. 

She’ll spend a few more days in the hospital and then she’ll be transferred over to a rehab hospital where she’ll slowly regain her stabilization and independence.

“How are you doing?” I ask.

“I’m great!” She responds with a slight slur. Apparently the pain medication is working.

Jules is not experiencing Classic Covid Fatigue, she’s feeling euphoria! 

“They are taking such good care of me,” She continued. “The nurses are so nice and the surgeon is very un-surgeon-like. He spent 45 minutes talking with me. He answered all of my questions following my marathon surgery. He showed general concern towards me. I feel very lucky.” She ended this statement with a completely satisfied tone.

Jules is in the hospital recovering from surgery on her birthday, and the last thing she said to me was, “I’m so lucky.” 

Classic Jules. 

So, I have to ask, how do I get a slice of that lucky feeling? 

While my intention was to check on Jules and offer her some sunshine, when we got off the phone I realized I actually needed the injection of light that she, yet again, offered me.  

Jules has always been an example of resiliency, a lighthouse to my soul. She learned early how to carry sunshine inside her and she lives a life of almost-defiant shining. Jules knows how to lead with gratitude no matter the circumstances—even more especially when she has justifiable reasons to complain. 

I’m elbow deep in the stormy waters of this ongoing pandemic. Maybe I’m not drowning, but I’ve been taken under by a crashing wave or two and I’m spitting out mouthfuls of salt. 

As a teacher, my colleagues and I are faced daily with impossible choices. Do we keep students in school as the Omicron variant surges, or do we return to the hellscape of online learning? How do we keep children motivated to wear masks when they’re angry that the world is upside down, no end in sight? How do I create a sense of safety for these children when I sometimes, to be frank, don’t feel safe? 

As the wife of a firefighter, I have a front row seat to the ongoing emergencies. An 85-year-old in respiratory failure and no room at the ER. The difficulty of finding a hospital bed in time. This is one of many, many stories. 

These are the details I’m witness to. This is how I’m oriented to this pandemic. But this is not how everyone is oriented. 

The world news, local talk shows, my grocery store— all show evidence of this Classic Covid Fatigue. We all want this thing to be over. I’m seeing people use their force of will to imagine that the pandemic has ended, even when the data shows something very different. Even my healing communities, places I visit to help ease my aches and pains affiliated with the aging process, have resigned to Classic Covid Fatigue. After receiving treatment from one of my beloved healers, I overheard someone say, “I’ve already had Covid, so I’m good! I’ve got the antibodies!” and then they went on to describe the fun time they had at a party over the weekend. No more masks, no shots, no social distancing, no nothin’. “I’m done!” No cares of potential spreading, no more conversation. 

When you aren’t aware that all ICUs in the valley are full, it’s easy to stop seeing the emergency. It’s easy to imagine that the invisible virus was something that magically dropped into our lives and can be magically brushed away. 

As much as I’m uneasy about the fatigue I’m witnessing in others, I’m worn out from the insensitivities surrounding me. I’m also experiencing my own version of Classic Covid Fatigue. I’m tired of pretending like wearing a mask all day doesn’t bother me. It does bother me, but wearing one allows me to practice the principle beliefs I hold about caring for others. 

In yoga, I practice Ahimsa, a Sanskrit word meaning, “noninjury.”  It is an ethical principle of not causing harm to self and to other living things. I just want people to start thinking about others …. 

In the meantime, my Fatigue lingers. When will this storm end?

A Lighthouse is an allegory of both
permanence and transience

It is Light Energy that pulls us through the storm. It is a beam of light that shows us where the treacherous rocks are and where safe passage lies. 

A lighthouse is an incredibly enduring, strong building that gets pounded, pounded, and pounded by storms. It’s built to hold the light. It is solid so that travelers can safely journey around it. 

We’re strong people, but we’re being asked to go through the storm of the century. This pandemic has necessarily shifted all of our lives. And when Jules says she feels lucky after all she’s been through, she reminds me that I, too, know how to let my gratitude win out over my fatigue. 

I know how to be a Light Keeper. To be a Light Keeper, you have to be willing to see the benefits that come from the painful thing. 

Becoming a Light Keeper doesn’t happen automatically. I’ve learned that I have to be willing to fill myself with light to have enough to shine out and share. 

Here’s an example of finding the light: List of 15 lessons Covid has taught us

To have the strength needed to maintain our role as Light Keepers, SELF CARE is essential! 

I know, I know, you’ve heard this a million times by now. But, instead of preaching further about this, I’m going to give you one trick to access self care at any point during the day. 

I’ve found that my one trick to quickly access my Light Keeper Superpowers is accessing deep presence by simply witnessing the outside. 

“Uh … what?”

The outside. It can be nature. It can be a busy downtown street. It can be my own back or front yard. This is when I turn on the 5 senses. 

I ask myself, “What am I feeling, hearing, smelling, tasting, touching, and seeing?

I give myself time to notice. Nothing more, nothing less. 

Just a breath, just my body, just my gentle witnessing. 

Filling up with light can be easeful. 

And that ease can become peace. 

Jules commented that her own endurance, drawn out from injury, is an “experience important enough to not avoid or surrender to it, you simply cannot.” She continues, “Wisdom emerges from the experience of suffering; just as a muscle, in order to build up, must endure some pain, so our emotions must endure pain in order to strengthen.” It’s not a permanent state of suffering, it’s just a necessary state.

Laughter is still a necessary expression of emotion

For my own birthday, we visited this lighthouse. We witnessed wildlife far out in the distance swimming and playing in the ocean. A meditative moment demonstrated playfully as whales breached the water’s surface only to slam their bodies against it again. Akin to children stomping water puddles, I became enamored with the scenery and all our weariness disappeared for that moment in time.

I leave you this week with this song, completely outside of my genre of chosen music; and yet, perfect for today:  LIVING IN CHAOS, by the Offspring (a Pop Punk genre band) is a song with lyrics: 

“The world is hard to fight, hitting you once, hit it again” 

“I see hate and greed, swear it’s a messed up town.” 

“Embrace the pain and see, by taking it back, you turn it around.”