My hustle became very intense this year. With school, two jobs, and an internship, my hustle became my story and it was a way I could validate being so tired and checked out of social engagements, and unable to travel home as much as I wanted to.
I handled my hustle mightily this year, and my body's ability to move me through all of my responsibilities felt like the stuff of greatness.
However, my super power in 2011 is decidedly not my hustle.
How droll.
As I became grounded in the emotional components of my internship and what it was calling forth in me, I became aware of something powerful in me very quickly.
The first time it happened was when I was sitting with a woman named Shirley. She was bed ridden, unable to speak, and in an indeterminable amount of constant pain.
I was intimidated by not having a traditional feedback loop with her. I could not depend on the cues I was used to through language and body movement. All she could do was look at me.
As I sat there, I felt all of my anxiety and uncertainty and fear, and willed it all to fade away. The moment was not only about me. It was able being there with her, being present with her.
It was a physical sensation. As my apprehension melted away, I looked at Shirley and she looked at me. And I felt myself drop into a purely feeling place. This place exists just below the level of tactile experience, and I discovered that getting there was easy for me.
In this place, I could feel Shirley. I could feel her thoughts and emotions, and I could transmit information. She was agitated by her pain, and as I sat there in this place with her, I let her know I understood. I acknowledged her great amount of pain, and let her know that in the moment we shared, we could be calm and peaceful, no matter how fleeting.
I felt her shift with me, and I began to get to know this fascinating person.
All without words.
My super power is this deep reservoir of calm and feeling that I learned to access willingly. In this place, I am able to communicate through feeling, and I learned how to understand the information that is transmitted between others in this other state of awareness.
I am learning what it means and how it feels to be fully present with other person and it is absolutely the most super powerful thing I experienced in 2011.
[this is good.]
And this is why we asked you to be our Day Of person on our most important day.
Posted by: Jason Toney | December 28, 2011 at 03:48 PM