“When I find myself in times of trouble, Mother Mary comes to me
Speaking words of wisdom, let it be
And in my hour of darkness she is standing right in front of me
Speaking words of wisdom, let it be
Let it be, let it be, let it be, let it be
Whisper words of wisdom, let it be”
Let it Be by John Lennon and Sir Paul McCartney
I sleep a lot.
It’s always made me feel ashamed, how much I like to sleep. How much I need sleep. Busy people, successful people (at least the ones I know) do not take marathon naps like I do.
It dawned on me lately why I require so much. Why I get so tired.
I work hard.
“Yea, yea, we all work hard,” I can hear you saying as you read this.
I work hard in a different way.
Hearing what someone is saying is hard work for me.
I have to struggle to hear and keep up and make sense of what’s going on. All the time.
I am not fully deaf. My hearing is distorted, and I have major tinnitus (constant ringing in my ears). I hear sound but cannot make out what that sound is for the life of me.
Imagine talking underwater. Imagine someone talking with a sock over her mouth. Imagine people laughing and not ever knowing what they are laughing about, so you just laugh along anyway so as not to look bad.
I cannot watch tv without subtitles. I cannot hear what you say unless I look at your lips.
It gets old. It gets boring. I get very tired of having to tell people about my hearing loss.
I get scared that it will get worse. Then, I try not to get scared that it will get worse.
So I go to sleep.
It is exhausting putting forth so much energy simply to hear someone tell you his name.
I remember when I heard my teacher Wayne Dyer speak a couple years ago. He brought up this notion of simply letting it be.
It gave me goose bumps.
Up until that point, I generally had a hard time letting things be. I just thought it was a song by The Beatles. At that moment, I realized why I had a hard time with that concept.
I lacked trust.
Trust is the bridge between all things, between asking and receiving.
So, I sit here and watch The Bourne Identity with the sound turned down because I actually find it soothing, and, like good company, it doesn’t have to say a lot. Just knowing it’s here is enough.
More than anything, it frustrates me. I want to hear; I work hard to hear, but, frankly, whether I work hard or not, it doesn’t make a difference. It just makes me exhausted and kind of sad.
So, I am going to work less.
I accept that I cannot hear perfectly, and if I miss a thing or two, well, then I miss a thing or two.
The energy I exert to be part of the world is taking its toll on me, and whether my ears can hear it or not, I am, in fact, very much part of the world.
It’s taken me quite some time to understand my fatigue.
Why can my friends can go and go and teach four yoga classes and keep going, and I need to crawl in bed and pass out? What stuff am I made of? Yikes! How am I going to be a mother if I have to rest so often? This is my current fear.
Well, the fact of the matter is I will have to work less in the irony of all ironies.
Practice radical acceptance that the things I am meant to hear will be revealed to me even if someone has to pass me a note like we are in eighth grade. I have to stop pretending that I can hear and then spend five minutes replaying the sounds in my brain so I can make sense of them.
And if I need to sleep a little more to be the best teacher I can be, then so be it. I sleep a little more.
The reality is that my life, much like these films I can watch and enjoy on silent mode, can be enjoyed without so much noise. I can probably sit back and relax a little more because, whether I admit or not, I probably know what is going on. I have to trust a little more and maybe just get a really good translator.
My own “born identity” is that of a healer.
The older I get and the longer I have had to deal with this hearing loss, the closer I get to fulfilling my destiny. I am an empath. I am a healer.
I do believe this is largely due to my struggles with hearing. It has allowed me to fine tune my other senses and become highly aware of what it means to be human.
Does it suck sometimes? Yes.
Do I feel really tired a lot because I spend ninety percent of the time trying to figure out what the heck you just said? Yes.
Do I miss jokes? Yes.
Do I miss what the yoga teacher says? Yes.
Am I happy? Yes.
Am I grateful? Yes.
Am I love? Yes.
That’s what it is. I trade a bit of fatigue and some struggle and some deafness for a pretty awesome life and a heightened sense of compassion.
I’ll deal with it.
Just please don’t whisper or talk to me while upside down or from another room.
In turn, I will give up the fight and realize that when I really need to hear you, I will.
I will find a way to hear and the things I don’t, well, my guess is that they weren’t meant for me anyway.
Today’s challenge: Where in your own life can you stop working so hard?
Where can you stop fighting what is?
Where can you cease fighting with your own body?
Where can you simply let it be?
Where can you stop worrying or trying so hard?
In other words, where can you trust more? Where can you own your knowing and abandon your doubt?
Write it down in the comment section below. If you need a prompter, finish this sentence: “In my own life, I can let it be when it comes to ______.”
There will be an answer, let it be
Let it be, let it be, let it be, yeah, let it be
Whisper words of wisdom, let it be.
Go ahead. Whisper them below.
Jennifer Pastiloff was recently featured on Good Morning America. She is a yoga teacher, writer, and advocate for children with special needs based in L.A. She is also the creator of Manifestation Yoga® and leads retreats and workshops all over the world. Jennifer is currently writing a book and has a popular daily blog called Manifestation Station. Find her on Facebook and Twitter.
Jen will be leading a Manifestation Yoga® weekend retreat at Kripalu Center for Yoga and Health in the Berkshires, Massachusetts Feb 1-3, 2013.
*Photo by soonerpa.
