How Are You?
During a recent time in my life being asked this question caused me to pause for a very long time before answering. A thousand answers would swirl through my mind. I would be dumbfounded that anyone would ask such a complex question in casual conversation. I had gone through, as paraphrased from Brené Brown, either a breakdown or a spiritual awakening. It was brought on by heartbreak and exile from a spiritual community (and God only knows what other karmic seeds ripening). It felt like psychic disintegration. I peered often into the abyss and three times touched utter madness. This was in stark contrast to most of the rest of my life, in which I was very easy to love, and loved easily. The entire horrible attic of personal shadows had been exposed very publicly and the unsurprising result was to find myself an outcast. It was shocking and horrible. I couldn’t believe no one would come and save me, but when they tried, I pushed them away with violent intensity in a misguided attempt to punish someone, anyone, for the painful experience I was going through. And so I found myself alone, which is how some journeys must happen.
Q: How are you?
A: Good.
A: Stressed out by you asking that question, because I don’t know which level of answer you want.
A: I am awoken by a sense of loss and failure almost every morning. Sometimes several times throughout the night
A: Really scared. Of rejection, abandonment, being called out as a fraud.
A: A perfectionist part is whipping me into such shame that I don’t know how I am enough to even answer such a simple question as this.
A: I am going through some experience of being an exile, an outcast.
A: Fine.
A: Wanting to share myself authentically, to expose the actual feeling that I feel, to give an authentic answer, and I don’t know what that answer is.
A: Trying to not give up.
A: Sort of angry at you for asking that question with no qualifiers- Do you mean how am I in my body? in my work? In my connection with God? how is my love life, my spiritual practice, how am I feeling about topic x or situation y
A: Embarrassed.
A. I can’t tell if I’m in acceptance, or if I’m giving up. I don’t know how to be grateful, how to forgive.
A: Cut off, shut down, grasping, grabbing, not trusting.
A: Disconnected from God and in mourning
A: Twisted up in a prison of unexpressed emotions. Like a house that has not been cleaned in a long time. Its hard to know where to start.
A: I want to tell you everything about my life in answer to that question, but it will take at least 4 hours.
A: I am embarrassed by my behavior over the last year within my community. I now find myself with no one wanting to spend time with me. I have burnt people out and it is exactly the opposite of what I wanted.
A: Confused into silence, cut off from my own intuition so much that I can’t answer that question
Q: How are you?
A: Complicated.
A: Shunned. In a negative heavy dark frequency that repels others, in horrible contrast to most of my life as a popular and sunny person.
A: Longing to belong
A: Trying to forgive and love myself, all of it, even these dark shadowy sides.
A: Full of shame, I’ve acted terribly, I’ve realized things about myself that I’m not proud of, I’m faced with so many dark aspects of my personality and want someone to tell me what to do with them. Someone to say, oh I see all of that, no problem, that’s all welcome too.
A: I’m insecure, I don’t know how to fit in anymore.
A: Extremely mean to myself.
A: I don’t know what to say. I want to give an answer that will create more connection, that might make you laugh, or think I’m wise, or make you feel good about yourself
A: Uncertain.
A: Madly searching for the perfect answer to that question.
A: Do you mean in the God sense? well I’m a bit of divinity in form, so I’m perfect and great because how could I be anything but? But I don’t really feel that way right now.
A: Feeling really really separate.
A: Feeling totally unskilled at knowing myself, feeling myself, expressing myself and connecting with others.
A: Longing for connection and love
A: Full of anger and disappointment and a sense of betrayal, but don’t know how to manage those feelings- expressing them as they are will only push people away, keeping them in will turn toxic and push people away.
A: Feeling stuck.
A: An arrogant failure
A: Very selfish. How does one stop being selfish?
A: A self obsessed jerk who doesn’t actually see other people as real. Is this changeable?
A: Unable to make even small connections with people without making a mess of it.
A: Desperately wanting to be open again, to open my heart, to feel magic, to see the good.
Q: How are you?
A: Claustrophobic
A: Certain I’ve made the wrong choices.
A Melodramatic
A: Extreme, but not extreme enough
A: Really fucking worried. Have I broken my life? Will I ever be able to sense myself and other again?
A: Grateful that the world is really quite gentle with me.
A: Alone, really sad about not being in a relationship and not having a child.
A: Closed down, young, unskilled.
A: Damaged. Physically not fit, fat and lazy and self indulgent.
A: Damaged intuition- made awful choices, will never get back to being a being of light.
A: Seriously self obsessed.
A: Too much, childish, too intense, I burn people out. If you’ve read this far, you’re probably feeling done with me.
A: Not clear. Not able to say the thing without lots of extra words
A: Really stuck in my mind. Performer, controller, critic all running the show.
A: Not disciplined, spiritually unevolved.
A: A big talker- one eyed giant in the land of the blind
A: Desperate for help.
A: Sort of exhausted, no juice, no mojo
A Lost.
A: In need of good parenting.
A: Flattered that you asked, but uncertain if you actually want an answer
Q: How are you?
A: Clinging to a cliff edge.
A: Unsure of our connection.
A: Very insecure and needy.
A: Perpetually unhappy- in search of what is better- grass greener.
A: Addicted to sadness, wanting to stay in the state where people help me, on the verge of a breakthrough, but not actually breaking through.
A: Bland. Boring, nothing. Fat, tamasic, stagnant. No juice, no life force, dormant consumed by the shadow side.
A: Totally unsure of what to do next.
A: Disconnected and wanting connection.
A: Unsure of how to behave in the world, of how to interact with others.
A: Belligerent, judgemental, arrogant, punishy, not authentic, want to tear others down, angry and sullen.
A: Feeling a tension in my neck and jaw and jowels that is thick and tense- it communicates unhappiness and dissatisfaction with my life to the outside world.
A: Courageous. Still looking, still seeking.
A: Insecure around certain types of men
A: Seeking reassurance. More or less constantly.
A: Easily traumatized.
A: Learning to speak for parts instead of from them.
A: Occasionally hopeful
A: Paralyzed by the question you just asked me.
A: Unsure of who is going to take over the wheel at any moment.
A: A collection of people inhabiting one body.
Q: How are you?
A: I need to fill you in on two years (at least) of back story to begin to answer that question
A: Overthinking this
A: Feeling disconnected and grabby and insecure and not in trust
A: Not good, not bad
A: Depressed
A: Lazy
A: Unable to summon life force.
A: Held down, held back, by myself
A: Heavy.
A: Disappointed with myself.
A: Weirdly arrogant.
A: Angry petulant childish narcissistic
A: Unsure of who I am and afraid of everything
A: Really worried what you are thinking at this point
A: Broken
A: Unable to actually shoulder the burden that life has placed on me
A: Negative dark and heavy and a drag to have around
A: Cruel to my father
A: Disappointed with my life
A: Enraged a lot of the time
A: Furious that people don’t do what I want them to do
A: Cruel to myself
A: Getting old and freaked out about it
A: Actually pleased with my physical appearance.
A: A good front, but nothing underneath
A: Shaken, shakey
A: Uncertain what to do next.
A: At my core a disgusting, mean and unformed person
A: Someone who opened pandora’s box.
A: Full of regrets. So full of regrets that they may drown me.
A: Doing great- expressing myself honestly- sometimes late, but always better to take the risk.
Q: How are you?
Today? How am I doing today? Fairly at peace. It’s just another day, the only way forward is gratitude for everything that appears. I promise that if we ever meet, and I ask how you are, I will welcome any answer at all. I leave you with this poem from Rumi
The Guest House
This being human is a guest house.
Every morning a new arrival.
A joy, a depression, a meanness,
some momentary awareness comes
as an unexpected visitor.
Welcome and entertain them all!
Even if they are a crowd of sorrows,
who violently sweep your house
empty of its furniture,
still, treat each guest honorably.
He may be clearing you out
for some new delight.
The dark thought, the shame, the malice.
meet them at the door laughing and invite them in.
Be grateful for whatever comes.
because each has been sent
as a guide from beyond.
translation by Coleman Barks
All photographs from the author’s collection and life.
