When Everything is F*#ked

Just this moment.

This is a new column called “Hey Jeff”, where I create a customized meditation in response to someone’s unique situation or challenge or curiosity.

In this month’s installment, I respond to Karen, who has cancer. Below is her note, shared with permission. I turned part of my reply into a guided meditation. If it speaks to you, save it for a hard day. Or explore it now. It’s meant to help the only way I know how: one moment at a time. 

Thank you Karen for your words – wishing you courage and equanimity and a full recovery.  

Jeff

Karen’s Note: Surgery after surgery, followed by chemo and now radiation have put my body through the wringer after my colorectal cancer diagnosis eight months ago. Working as a psychotherapist to support others on their healing path has kept me both well-distracted and well-worn. I’ve had to keep it moving and I’ve been afraid to slow down.

I’m profoundly tired, sad and scared. I feel powerless, which often leads to rage and reactivity.

I don’t want to be with myself, my loneliness, my shame, my terror or my physical pain. I often disassociate so as not to feel. But of course this only leads to more disconnection, loneliness, shame, rage and pain. I crave connection, most certainly with myself as well as with others.

How do I maintain a connected relationship with my body through this traumatic time? How do I safely access a daily meditation practice when I'm very often at the intersection of freak out, burn out, and some version of fight, flight, freeze or fawn?

Thanks xx

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Hi Karen, it’s Jeff. 

What an awful situation. Exhaustion, physical and emotional pain, worry about health and the future, all while needing to keep up some kind of professional momentum. It’s a crushing load. I’m sorry you’re carrying it, friend.

I’ve never had cancer so I can’t say anything about that. But I’ve had a lot of physical pain and I’ve dealt with hopelessness and suicidal despair in my life. Moments when I can’t imagine enduring one more second. 

At these times, different strategies work for different people. 

Here’s what helps me:

First, I move my physical body to a new space. Another room, an empty church, somewhere in nature. A different setting for a different set. I make it a pilgrimage. I complain the whole time I’m going, because I think it’s bogus and it won’t do anything.

Once I arrive, I sit and ask for help. I don’t know who I’m asking: life, God, leprechauns? I don’t care. The point is to get humble. To get on my knees, and know my own powerlessness. To make space for life to find me.

I put my hands on my chest or my belly and I breathe out. I feel the contact with my hands. I try to let that small intimacy settle my nervous system a bit.

I say ‘I’m sorry for what you’re going through.’ I say ‘I love you.’ Something genuine – how would you actually talk to a friend? How would you want someone to talk to you? 

And then I say, ‘just this moment.’

I do my best to shrink-wrap my attention out of the past and the future and into my senses, into the exact right now. That’s key.

If my body is in a lot of pain, I find someplace else to pay attention – maybe the tip of my fingers, or the palms of my hands. Or I focus on sound: a background hum, the swish of passing tires on wet pavement, the wind in the trees.

I say, ‘just this moment.’

That’s all I have to get through. One moment at a time.

I need a break from thinking I need to fix my body, or my problems, or the world’s problems. A break from the fear and overwhelm and heavy sense of responsibility.

So I surrender. I give up control. And I try to zoom my attention into the smallest neutral thing.

Just this tingly sensation in my body as it emerges, this little bit of it. Or just that sound, dipping my attention in like a hummingbird.

This immediate thing, and nothing else. Nothing further out, nothing up in the head, nothing out in the future. Connecting to right here.

When I drift, or get hijacked by despair or urgency or doubt, I come back to some immediate neutral sensation. I come back a hundred times.

I move my attention into and through and under a sensation until I find what feels like the tiniest piece of sacredness. So tiny. A piece of the world that has nothing to do with me. Or a piece of my body that has nothing to do with my controlling mind.

Something happening all on its own.

I can’t explain it, but doing this can feel like a relief. It can feel like connection with myself.

I tell myself everything is bearable one moment at a time. I tell myself it’s OK.

I tell myself, 'just this moment.'

I imagine my pain and helplessness draining out through my feet into the ground.

I ask for help.

I give up.

I don’t expend any energy doing this, because I don’t have any energy to expend. It’s more a letting go of bound-up energy, of resistance and useless wheel-spinning. I don’t even have to summon up some kind of special self-compassion, because what I’m doing is already the essence of self-compassion.

Giving myself rest and acceptance.

I find that after doing the above for a few minutes – or longer, if possible – I feel cleared out. Less alone.

And then I text or call a friend. Because you’re right, the habit of disconnection and shame and isolation makes everything worse. I force myself to connect out to another nervous system. I personally can’t do this when I’m in that brutal contracted pain space, but I can do it after I’ve surrendered the way I’ve just described.

Hope that helps my friend, and that you get the healing you need. 

Warmly,

Jeff

PS -   My friend

Sebene Selassie

– a terrific meditation teacher and human – has written quite a bit about her long journey with cancer, and created meditations on Ten Percent Happier for chronic pain and anxiety. Sebene also has a beautiful Substack:

Ancestors to Elements

. We speak with Sebene in the next episode of

The Mind Bod Adventure Pod

, where she guides a practice on how to cultivate intuition.

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Have a meditation request for Jeff?

Great – please fill out the form linked here. Just a (short!) bit of context about you and your situation, including what’s helped in the past, or where your curiosity comes from. I hope to make a custom meditation about once a month. Obviously I won’t be able to respond to all requests, but I do want to say that there’s still value in asking. The act of simply and clearly stating a situation – and naming what’s already been supportive – can be helpful. I hope this is the case for you.

In the future, this column will be for paid subscribers only. Consider upgrading your subscription if you’re able. Thank you!

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Attention, brave souls… 

Home Base is on the hunt for two volunteers. First, we need someone with a basic Garage Band know-how, to help wrangle our audio files. Expect 1-2 hours a week of slicing, dicing, and auditory smoothing.

We're also on the lookout for someone to help craft our visual identity. Maybe 1-2 hours each week. I love a particular kind of comic book aesthetic, and right now AI is great for this. One day I’d love to hire a proper illustrator!

If you're game for any of this – and you have some experience – please drop us a note at info@jeffwarren.org, with “Volunteering” in the subject line. Thank you!

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