A short thought: I blew out my lantern to hide from myself

“I am out with lanterns, looking for myself” is a line that I will forever associate with my beautiful friend, Lauren. It was written by American poet, Emily Dickinson, and has nestled in my brain, along with a stream of other quotes. And, although I associate it with specific times of my life, and the light my friend brings me, I’ve realised this quote doesn’t apply to myself (my Nobody, as Emily might say…)

Instead, I have blown out my lantern to hide from myself.

I’m someone who believes in constant reconstruction and reincarnation of oneself. Not in the sense that we die and come back as something different, but I believe we have the opportunity to die a few small deaths every single day and be reborn as someone new tomorrow (not to be confused with petite mort in French, although both good for the soul in my opinion).

In this daily rebirth, I think we can forgive our past selves, we can grow from them and we have a new opportunity to be the person we want to be – but recently, I think I’ve lost sight of this.

I have, instead, been reincarnating and running from a past self that not only is someone I am not proud of but of someone that no longer exists. And how do you outrun an echo? How do you outrun a past, which is not tangible, touchable, or visible?

The answer to this is you can’t. And this is terrifying. Because, if I have no past self to run from, I am constantly running from the person I am. An ever-changing beast that knows my vulnerabilities more than anything or anyone.

The picture I see when I think of this is:

I am sat in the centre of a large, dark room, like a mun mtshams (a dark retreat). I’m cross-legged, but my eyes are open. And you know the feeling of staring into complete and utter darkness? That is the feeling. Except instead of feeling a void, my pulse is racing, because at any second a tealight might be lit, and I have to race over to blow it out before whatever lingers in the darkness (Self? Others? Who knows) can see me.

This is how I feel more often than not. A reincarnated being, running from the shadows in darkness – which is completely impossible.

I’m reluctant to share this thought openly. Not because I worry about other's opinions of me, but I worry that the people that matter will worry. I am fine. I am recycles of my past and a collage of what might happen in the future, but I am tired of using my breath to blow out lanterns.

Time to learn to breathe gently. Time to learn to play with fire, I guess. And whether its an explosion, or a light unlike anything I’ve ever seen, I’ll know I tried.

And tried.

And tried.