Dedicated to those suffering from the mass shooting in Highland Park, IL on July 4th, 2022.
Written on July 4, 2022.
Hold up the universe, good girl. Hold up
the tent that is the sky of your world at which
you are the narrow center pole, good girl. Rup-
ture is the enemy. Keep all whole. The itch
to be yourself, plump and bending, below a sky
unending, held up by God forever
is denied by you as Central Control. Sever
yourself, poor false Atlas, poor “Atlesse,” lie
recumbent below the sky. Nothing falls down,
except you, luscious and limited on the ground.
Holding everything up, always on your own,
creates a loneliness so profound
you are nothing but a column, good girl,
a temple ruin against a sky held up
by forces beyond you. Let yourself curl
up: a fleshy foetal figure cupped
about its own vibrant soul. You are
the universe about its pole. God’s not far.
~Molly Peacock, Good Girl
29 years into life and this poem remains my favorite. When the world gets heavy—and it’s gotten heavier the last few years—I find myself coming back to this phrase, “Hold up the universe, good girl.” It flashes through my mind from time to time. A gentle but persistent visitor.
By recognizing this autonomic cognitive response, I’ve learned that this former “advice” no longer is. Within this phrase lives a curiosity as to where this ancient, paradigmatic programming came from. When, how, and why did it show up in my life?
But of course it would. As a micro expression of the macro, there is no separation. And even in the throes of chronic depression, anxiety, an eating disorder, and self-harm all those years, I vowed to myself: never show anyone the depths of your suffering.
Most days I couldn’t lift my eyes from the ground. My head dragged like an anvil. When I did lift them, I made it a point to smile at everyone I passed. That way, even if they saw through the smile, I didn’t know they knew. I couldn’t be witnessed. That was the goal.
Today, I caught myself making eye contact with someone on my walk. Per usual, I smiled. I’ve become more aware of these forced, inauthentic gestures. This time, however, was different.
After our exchange, I turned around to make sure they continued in the opposite direction. That I wasn’t being followed. Another automatic, learned response. This is not surprising behavior for women on this planet.
Some hours prior, I learned that my hometown suffered from a mass shooting at the Highland Park Fourth of July parade, taking seven lives and injuring 47. I struggled through tasks and to-do’s amidst constant text messages, updates, check-ins with old friends, heartbreak, devastation, and streaming tears. Images of my streets, stores, and once-happy town are now flooded with blood, horror, and shelters-in-place.
I grew up in a Deerfield home stationed on the cusp of Highland Park. My family and I went to the Deerfield Fourth of July parade every year from pre-K all the way to our teens, and even on our summer breaks from college. Today, that parade along with many others were canceled.
We frequented Highland Park often for nightlife, friend hangouts, DQ runs, pancake house brunches, college shopping, and more. HP was an integral part of our experience growing up in the northern Chicago suburbs.
Prior to July 4th, 2022, both Deerfield and Highland Park were considered notably safe and ideal locations to raise and educate children. Today, that exact beloved and historic pancake house was used as a rooftop rifle range.
My family and I lived less than five minutes from the shooting. Highland Park and Deerfield residents alike—along with hundreds of other towns and their residents—have suffered, are suffering, from sheer cruelty, shock, death, grief, and indescribable pain.
The collective trauma—whether it be from guns, pandemics, or human rights violations—lives in all of our bodies. Yes, particular moments affect people in different ways. Still, the multi-layered, incessant incidents can be—and have been—relentless.
Today and onward, my heart breaks for and with my hometown, as well as with all those who know this experience. Today the phrase, hits too close to home was brought to an entirely new level.
Today, something inside me shattered. Questions of safety and security loomed to the surface. A new reality involuntarily inserted itself into my life. Am I surprised? Unsurprised? Which is worse?
Today, I didn’t want to smile at strangers, but I did anyway. And in doing so, I recognized the magnitude of my own conditioned programs. In my life, smiling meant survival. Smiling was strength. I needed to win the game of tolerance. I needed to obey the orders of the world. Of myself. To be a good girl.
Today, I no longer live a life of boundarylessness, inauthenticity, hiding, or shame. This world can make it feel like happiness is a revolution. Maybe it is.
As author lain Thomas says, “Be soft. Do not let the world make you hard. Do not let the pain make you hate. Do not let the bitterness steal your sweetness. Take pride that even though the rest of the world may disagree, you still believe it to be a beautiful place.”
Easier said than done, eh? A nice sentiment, you might think. You don’t have to believe it right now. It might feel impossible. My wish is that you do, eventually. Maybe not now, but soon.
My wish is that the pain and bitterness and harshness of life lead you to know the beauty, softness, and awe. We must know one to know the other. Contrast can work in your favor. And whether we know it or not, it always does.
That said, when we’re hijacked into fear, trauma, and confusion, paralysis occurs. We live life with blinders. We can’t see the whole picture. It feels impossible to know any other way. Our physiology changes to match our perception. No one can blame anyone for this. And no one can take away or talk you out of your experience. Don’t let them.
So if you’re open to it, I offer this: you don’t have to be anywhere other than where you are. And you don’t have to hold up the universe right now. Or ever. I resisted this concept of holding both/and, the wabi sabi of life, for many years. It wasn’t helpful.
Holding the yin and yang of life is a practice. Time heals the acuteness of now. Support, community, love, and connection heal. It’s okay not to initiate a smile if you can’t smile. It’s okay to have boundaries. It’s okay to ask for help. It’s okay to take your time. It’s okay to not be okay right now. Really. There is space for it all.
What happens when we say no? When we set it all down for a moment? What if we don’t “keep all whole?” As Molly Peacock says, “Let yourself curl / up: a fleshy foetal figure cupped / about its own vibrant soul.”
Your soul doesn’t have to access vibrance right now. Let’s curl up, remain fetal for a while until we can once more remember that ever-present color.
Let’s aim towards healing together. As spiritual master Abraham Hicks says, “One who is connected to the Energy Stream is more powerful than a million who are not. And two who are harmoniously focused and connected to the Energy Stream brings about a co-creative endeavor that cannot be matched by anything else in all of the Universe.”
This “Energy Stream”—whether you call it God, Source, Spirit, Creator, the Universe, or anything else—is the Light. If you forget your power, there are others holding it for you now. You don’t have to remember this moment. You have permission to rest. Take your time.
And while the Light may seem so far from darkness, it never is. It’s always right around the corner, working to balance the scales, towards equilibrium and harmony always. Can you feel it in a deep breath? One conscious thought, one conscious inhale, exhale, can change one’s entire trajectory.
To all those affected—I am deeply sorry. All hearts around the world feel this loss—even those who don’t know, even those who don’t have words. Where you hurt, the world hurts. You are always capable of accessing the infinity of sympathetic hearts beating with you now.
As James Joyce said, “In the particular is contained the universal.” The particularity of violence, however, should not be a universal experience. Alas, here we are.
Today, I have run the gamut of emotions, which merely gave me the smallest idea of how those directly impacted must be feeling. Amid my day of emotion-hopping, hate showed its face. I worked not to shame or judge it. It came for a reason. It’s a protective, active, wise, and passionate messenger. I listened. I needed to feel it to return to the Light.
Like Rumi’s famous poem, The Guest House states, we must treat each guest like a visitor, “every morning a new arrival.” The full poem reads:
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’re 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 whoever comes,
because each has been sent
as a guide from beyond.
This poem, like wabi-sabi, speaks to impermanence, the ever-changing nature of life. And still, for something as permanent as a family death, this lesson can be one of the hardest to maintain. Forgetting is part of being human, after all.
When hate showed itself—an infrequent visitor—I was reminded of the well-known quote by Martin Luther King Jr: “Darkness cannot drive out darkness; only light can do that. Hate cannot drive out hate; only love can do that.” These polarized, contrasting experiences are, too, part of our humanness. For better and for worse. The wabi-sabi of it all.
It’s okay to fluctuate, oscillate, meet both ends. And while we’re emotive beings with the gift of sentience, that doesn’t make life easy, fun, or pleasant all the time. Tragedy may not make sense now or ever. You don’t have to see straight now. You don’t need to speak. Or do. Scream, even. No need for band-aids or cover-ups. It is okay to be raw. The soul needs to be raw, sometimes.
No words can ease the unforgiving, visceral sharpness of pain. But I like to try. And keep trying. And try some more. For those who don’t have words and want them, feel free to borrow some for now.
Your pain echoes through the collective’s frequency chamber. It ripples, winds, bends. Still, the world needs you even when you’re struggling. And you can need us too, those fighting on behalf of the Light.
While the body finds its way back to base, while the shock finds peace, while the deepest of the dark finds light, reach out. Seek open hearts and hands. They are, and will always be, aplenty.
In honor of this past July Fourth, all those hoping to celebrate with their families, expecting to be safe at home, this one’s for you. My deepest condolences to you and yours. And I wish for you to remember—when you can—“God’s not far.”