The Good, The Bad and The Fugly

Well now.

It’s been an unusual past week or so. I’ve been in something of a fog – or fug as some might call it. Although it hasn't been quite that smoky or stale.

This is really unusual for me as usually I am clear as a bell, so when I have times like this it feels “bad”.

However, I am grateful that I am at a stage in my journey where I no longer think anything is “bad” – it just is what it is - it may not feel "good" but that doesn't mean it's bad!

My job now is not to lament about how “bad” something looks or feels but to ask, “What is the purpose of this? How does it serve my higher evolution and journey ahead?” – and this is the question I feel that really needs to be asked. It feels much more like the Truth.

While on a call with my life coach this week it came to me why I was in this fog. I am in transition. I am between two worlds. One boat I have stepped off of and the new one I have not yet boarded. In fact, in many respects I am still choosing what boat to get on to! This would be why. I am neither “here” nor “there”. Yes. It is fugly!

This time however I am as at peace with the fog as I am with any boat past, present or future. It is just another place. Just because it doesn’t feel as solid it doesn’t make it any more or less real. It’s as “real” as anyplace in this Universe, I often think that everything is just a mirage anyway.

Perhaps you also often question the nature of reality. Sometimes it feels solid as rock and other times as flimsy as a cobweb, as if it could be swept away at any moment and look as if "it" never happened. Like leaving a job or home town or anything, really. Once you've moved away it can all seem as if it was just a dream. No longer real. Was it ever??? I have come to the conclusion that both are true and both are false. (- It makes sense to me anyway!!)

So in this foggy place, I am probably as awake as at any other time even though it feels as if I am asleep. The fog times are intertwined with moments of stark simplicity and clarity. I think this is going to be my new "normal". I seem to be big on keeping things as simple as they can possibly be. Not a bad thing I’m sure, but I’m a complex kind of gal – or so I thought. Maybe I am just so simple I’m profound! Hehe

Anyway:
It was not my intention to go into a stream of consciousness today but more to share where I am at and my recent feelings on this label called “bad”. We are so good and so well versed in labelling in this way, especially with events that happen in our life (and with food), but I have come to see every event as for my higher good, even if it looks ugly on the surface.

In fact I don’t think I can think of a single time when something “bad” happened where something better didn’t come out of it. I would like to think that we could all start to replace the word "bad" with “different”, because that’s what it is – a contrast to what we perceive as good. But as I am venturing here, I don't think "bad" is bad after all.

And let me also add that even “good” is edging its way out of my inner vocabulary as well. Everything is perception after all, and what I may see as “good” may not be good at all - or you may not agree that it's good. Who is to say? What makes one person right or another person wrong? Who can ultimately be the judge? I am quite enjoying sitting in this space where everything “just is”. Because as I change everything around me changes. And perhaps that is the issue. One minute it’s good, one minute it’s not good depending on my inner frame of reference. It can be quite exhausting, not to mention inaccurate! So now, it just is - and "just is" is fine. I can keep all my emotional energy in tact and whole for doing what I love the most – serving people from the purest place I can dive into at the time.

Make of that what you will ~ Is it good, bad or just plain fugly? ; )

Comments

[Sarah Newton]

Fugly! I love it and spend a lot of time in Fugly....and no it has a word I may spend more time there....I know you are a Gill Edwards Fan and when I am in Fugly I get Gill to make me a flower essense which normally helps....

I use to call Fugly "contrast" as out of contrast always came a bigger and better Sarah...some taking much longet to emerge :-)

Here's to Green Smoothies, Juice (my new fave thing) and Fugly may we all love her and sail in her.

You are awesome

Sarah

[Elizabeth A.]

Karen,

I love your insights here. Navigating life's transitions can be so hard - I am working more in my yoga practice to focus on the transitions between poses than the poses themselves - hoping the grace on the mat will transfer into the real world.

Herminia Ibarra in her book Working Identity talks about this phenomenon of "becoming an ex" - leaving one life behind, embracing another. She uses the metaphor of the crucible to describe life's transitions; I prefer the more gentle image of the cocoon. But whatever metaphor you choose, Ibarra's advice - that we short circuit these phases at our peril - is good. Whatever is happening in these "fugs" needs to happen. If you try to prod the caterpillar out of it's cocoon before its time, what emerges will be lifeless.

There's nothing "bad" or "good" about the caterpillar, or the butterfly, or the in-between. Each phase is what it is.

[Judy]

Thanks for posting this. I understand what you're saying, because I'm in the same position (or was, I'm transitioning to the new boat/land as we speak), and actually it felt like falling apart and not knowing who I was anymore... Or like that caterpillar you wrote about in your ezine, which goes all mushy before turning into a butterfly... And becoming mushy dóes feel fugly...! However, I feel the butterfly part happening and feel much more happy now. I know the 'dark ages' are always necessary, though not necessarily nice... Again, thanks for sharing!