After a brief hiatus to chart a course, I’m continuing my COVID supplement to The Book of Waking Up. If you’d like to support this project, signup for my Substack. Special thanks today to Susanjen who signed up as a yearly $65 subscriber!

10. A Way Through the Chaos

The howl of pandemic pain—you’ve no doubt felt it, too. The loss of a job, of short-term sanity, of a family member or acquaintance. The potential scarcity of income. The abuse of spouse, a live-in parent, a socially-distanced but awfully-connected boss. And even if it’s not any of these acute forms of pain, there’s still an existential chaos in the air. We are a people inhaling the toxic off-gassing of Nature’s anger.

Gabor Mate put it best: “The question is not why the addiction, but why the pain.” And with this much pain in the air, is it any wonder we’re turning to the objects of our addiction, to entertainment, booze, boobs, baked goods, and Cadbury Eggs? Is it any wonder that some of our old vices have come like Walter White?

via GIPHY

Some of us answer that knocking more often than not. We invite anything that might distract us from the pain. (Or, as the spiritual writers say, we “attach” to things other than the Divine Love that heals every pain.) And though you’re no priest, here’s my confession: I’m prone to create those attachments, too.

In The Book of Waking Up, I spilled a great deal of ink on the notion of attaching to all the wrong things in an effort to mute the pain. I released that book approximately one month before the first wave of COVID-19 cases hit the United States, and to say that message was timely is an understatement. Who knew we’d enter a season of so much collective uncertainty, chaos, and grief? Who knew so many of our addictive tendencies would be exposed? And who knew I’d have such an opportunity to practice what I preach about ordering everything (including habits, coping mechanisms, and addictions) under the Divine Love that reorders a life?

I’m no clairvoyant.

So this week, I’m turning back into the practices I’ve outlined in The Book of Waking Up, practices that provide a foothold for resisting bad habits, coping mechanisms, and addictions. I might expand on them a little, too. I’ll show you how there’s no escape from the pain and chaos of the present moment, but there is a way to make it through. There is a way to filter the toxic air of the moment. There is a way to come out of this pandemic more stable than we entered it.

To be continued…

Join me tomorrow (and for the foreseeable future) as I continue my Pandemic Supplement to The Book of Waking Up. And if you haven’t grabbed a copy of The Book of Waking Up: Experiencing the Divine Love that Reorders a Life, grab a copy. And yes, Amazon has slowed down book shipments, so considering purchasing it from Bookish, Fort Smith or grabbing a digital copy for Kindle or Nook.