Missing
Last weekend I went on my favorite trail for a hike. A 2 mile climb with an elevation of 1500 ft. The view was perfect with the remaining colors of fall. I used to climb this hill every Saturday until the pandemic struck. The virus followed by the fierce forest fires, bad air quality and the resurge in the number of people affected by the virus, everything kept me away from my solo weekend pilgrimage to the hill which is so close to my home and my heart.
During this long stay away from the entire experience, I strangely thought I was not missing it. I always told myself that it was okay to not be able to go there . I always told myself I was not missing it. I did not realize until I stepped foot on that trail that I was playing a mind trick to protect myself from the feeling of missing something so special to me.
Have you experienced something like this lately? A situation when you think you do not miss something until you do it again and then realize how much you have actually missed it.
I am not talking about missing things that I never had or never existed. That is a different topic altogether.
This experience taught me 2 things :
- A lot of times we don’t realise how much we miss something until we do it again.
- Our mind tries to play tricks to keep us from getting hurt from the feeling of missing something.
One way to recognize such a thing is to check if we try to brush aside any memory of it. For instance , whenever I tried to check if I miss working in a corporate environment, I brush it aside. I prefer not thinking about it and then I tell myself that I don’t miss it. I save myself the disappointment that comes with accepting that I miss it.
Another way to recognize such a thing is to do the activity and check how it feels. For example I thought I did not miss going to the farmer’s market. I was getting my produce from a nearby store and I was okay with it. I visited the farmer’s market after my hike last weekend and then I realized how much I missed buying produce from the farmers market. I wasn’t sure if I missed doing a certain exercise routine. I tried the routine yesterday and did not particularly enjoy it. So I know I was not missing that exercise routine.
Among other things, 2020 has also taught me that it is okay to miss something and acknowledge it. I miss hanging out with friends . I miss meeting family . I miss going on vacation. I miss going to the movies. I miss the freedom of going anywhere at any time. I miss everything that was taken for granted prior to the pandemic.
And it is okay to miss it. Until I am able to do all of it again, i will miss it.
Image by Engin Akyurt from Pixabay
Comments
Totally agree! Pandemic has made people value smaller things which we took it for granted. We started seeing happiness in small things around us.
Totally agree with you👍, so many activities that I thought I won’t miss and one in particular which I want to write about is , my gardening activity, especially growing indoor plants and spending hours with these small green babies was such a pleasure and I gave up after I shifted my residence, it’s been a year and when I got a Tulasi plant for my new home , I was so excited and no words to express the energy that plant started to give me back , very happy indeed 😊
I miss all of those things too! I think we try to convince ourselves that we don’t, because we think that makes the situation easier to accept. But personally, I think it’s easier to acknowledge how much we miss and to simply own it. We’ll do al those things again, thank goodness, but until then, we do miss it.