Mourning – Detachment

If This Card Chooses You – In your dreams you hurt. You feel such shuddering emptiness and loss it’s a physical relief to wake up and find your dream wasn’t real. Lots of people fear such sadness is some kind of prophecy. It’s enough to make a person fear going to sleep.

The Detachment Card – says you are too “involved.” Check out life’s professional warriors like cops, firemen, paramedics – all will tell you you have to “forget’ the personal to get the job done. Focus on the crisis you can heal – even though the suffering human reminds you a lot of all your Special People.

People Die. People Lose Their Personalities – Better to think your worldview through BEFORE the crisis happens. Is death the end? Then you will fear it. But remember, what a caterpillar calls “the end”, Nature calls ”a butterfly.”

We All Need to Mourn – Warriors mourn, too. Warriors’ forward drive sometimes fools them into thinking that moving backward in the dance is a sign of weakness, when ebb and flow are laws of life.

Sadness is not allowed in a society where perfect strangers feel comfortable demanding you “smile.” Look at all these Instagram feeds with everybody grinning away because they’re having so much FUN and their lives are so PERFECT they never wake up shuddering with sadness. Except they are human too, so we know that they DO.

They’re just better at covering it up than we seem to be. (And some people, admittedly are just plain shallower.) This inevitably means we all have lots of legitimate, necessary mourning to catch up on. If you missed “bargaining” and “acceptance” all that’s left is denial and depression. Sometimes, the “causes” of your lost mourning seem inconsequential to our “adult” selves. “So your pet died when you were five,” everybody says. “Your parents got a divorce. You moved five times. Get over it, already!” But we say, Now is always the perfect time to accept the power and significance of your own feelings.

Warriors Feel Compassion for Others – So begin with yourself. Why feel these things now, right before you set off on your next great, consequential adventure? Sometimes it is joy that brings to the surface those past unhealed hurts. That’s necessary, part of the ebb and flow. We are strong enough to feel it now.

Warriors Are the Heroes of the Collective Unconscious – Warriors do battle for and honor centuries of collective suffering. It’s OK to think about that sadness, especially if it makes us feel closer to other people. Everyone has these lost, wrecked treasures submerged in their lives.

Warriors Feel Deeply – Your power frees the greatness of your emotion even as it protects them – your feelings and other people’s. Celebrate the fact that you are able to feel so deeply in a world where others feel forced to punish themselves, taking risks and drugs in order to “feel something.”

The Art of Detachment allows warriors to rise above the fray, strategize, plan,. Enjoy their lives even on the eve of battle. Let go – finally – of the toxic elements in your life. Time to go “no-contact” on the toxic people who are wasting your energy. Read up on sadism, the better to understand the people out there who are enjoying your suffering. Buddhists recommend surveying your thoughts and feelings from a distance, as in hypnotherapy, then setting them free.

Detachment is Not Dissociation – Dissociation is more like floating through life with all our systems repressed, feeling numb. Dissociation is not good. You can use that quivering pool of tears to respond more intensely to life, to art, to music, and to each other.

Resilience is the Warrior’s Most Powerful Survival Trait. This means that even after blight, we can flourish more strongly, just the way pruned plants will. It’s not necessary to explore all the caverns of your being, but it will make you stronger. Once again, choose a buddy and a guide. Think about the “hero’s journey” story you respond to most deeply. How would you explain your hero’s journey to someone else? Feel free to use metaphors, after all, when we were children we did feel our world to be populated by monsters and the supernatural.

Models & Mentors – “Detachment is power. Release all things that no longer work for you” – Shane Steele

“To be detached means to dive so fully into the experience you dropout the other side… with full understanding you can say, “Now that I know, I can let go” – Teal Swan

“In detachment lies the wisdom of uncertainty…freedom from our prison of past conditioning…willingness to step into the unknown surrenders us to the creative mind that orchestrates the dance of the universe…” – Deepak Chopra

“I release the subjective thoughts, energy and emotions I am holding about people, places and things that kept me trapped in dis-ease…I can step back and allow the feelings & thoughts & energy to dissipate…I am then free to act with compassion, love & acceptance” – Angela James

“Attachment is the fabricator of illusions – reality can be attained only by one who is detached”

– Simone Weil

“Detachment is having your life be about you, not about other people” – Karen Casey

#Haiku: Detachment

last phase of grief
blesses wrestling angel –
flourishes scar tissue wings