Life Is Goodbye, Life Is Hello

Have you ever sat and cried– disturbed and lonely — in a strange place in a strange city, longing for your family, your dog, your own bed? Did you ever have to leave home for good to earn a living, but it didn’t feel good at all? Have you ever watched a house you used to live in get torn down? Or painted an ugly color by the new owners? Have you ever moved into a brand new office much better than your old one and felt out of place and uneasy? Have you moved the furniture in your living room and felt confused for days not knowing why, because you really like the new arrangement much better than it was before. Have you finally taken the trip to Las Vegas, Europe or Asia, delighted with everything you see but counting days until you can look at your own front door again?

People are so mobile for their own reasons: adventure, education, better living, exploration and so many more. I, myself did it to escape the life that I didn’t like. To find myself where I belong and be more comfortable. But being here for all these years, I must say that I’m not really there yet. There are things in this life that I am still searching. Where?… I don’t know. I still feel that sometimes I don’t belong here and longing to be back to where I came from. Or be in a place that I feel a real HOME. *Places are important. Place is how you define your sense of space - of what is your space. You know how you feel in your own space.* Life is secure. Your own responses are predictable. I lost the space that I thought I have. I am suffocated in my own space… No ventilation…Vanishing sign of life like a fog disappearing as the clearance of a day. Lose a space that means “home” to you and your whole psychological system may be askew, sometimes much to your surprise or shame. Is this something to be ashamed of? No… I am like every other creature of nature. I like to know my own territory, proclaim my own boundaries - if not to the world, at least to myself that I am independent.

A lot of moving around can upset the system. Your body might let you know how little you like physical changes, even intellectually you pride yourself on being easy-going and persuasive. Think of all the little secret griefs that accompany every exciting move or trip. Subtle griefs, not ones that you would call out loud by name. You might think of them as stresses or difficulties in adjustment. But something quietly important to you has been left behind. If it’s true that you are feeling some unspecific and illogical sadness, find out what it is about the old place that holds meaning for you.

Recognition makes letting go much easier. The new places, after all, might be better, in their own ways, given a chance - given new meaning. Things change. No one stays the same. You were once young, grown-up and in a spur of a moment, aged. Life moves. We move with it or die. But there are natural resistances within us; even organisms born to change - fight it. From the safety of sameness, we confront the possibility of change, with fear, tension, then yielding—–letting be. We grieve for change, yet we grow through change.

Author: Precy Pilorin