Monday 25 March 2013

What or Where is HOME?

Home.  This is something I've been struggling with for quite a while now, as I've been displaced from my house, (which I think of as "home") for some time now.  I spend 99.9% of my time 90 miles (?km) from it, being a caregiver of sorts for my aunt at her house, where I grew up.  Looking out for her isn't the problem.  I love her and she's been good to me, so I'm ok with it.  What's been hard is being away from "home."  Home is generally where my "stuff" is, but even though I've moved all my most important stuff here, I've still been having a real struggle.  There's something about not being in my own surroundings, doing my own thing, with my own stuff, in my own way, that makes me feel kind of trapped, or claustrophobic, or something - I don't know what.  I've thought about selling my house, but my Sweetie Pie (hereafter called SP) of 14 years lives there, too, three or four nights a week when he's working and I don't want to leave him without a place to stay.  But I digress.....HOME is the issue.  What is it.

Yesterday I was reading Effy Wild's blog, which I do every day, and it almost always makes me say OMG!!  She's 44, been working through some really rough shit for years, and has made progress so impressive that it blows my mind, considering all she's been through.  Now she's going through a crisis of the heart, and watching (reading, actually) her deal with it and work through her feelings is inspiring, to say the very least.  She's a wonderful artist and writer extraordinaire.  Once again I digress.   In her blog yesterday, Effy touched on the concept of "home."

Home is where you are at the moment.....Home is not the relationship or the house I'm living in.  Home is right here in my solar plexus.  Home is mindfulness.  Home is being in it.  Home is right here, right now.
                                                                                                                                   Effy Wild
                                                                                                                                           www.effywild.com


That little paragraph jumped right off the screen at me.  It was an AHA moment....it's a concept of home that I used to feel back in my twenties (a long time ago, but from the inside looking out, I feel like the same person, except with more experience behind me).

After reading the blog and ruminating on that quote, I thought again - Where is home?  And Effy's right - it's right here, right now.  But then I also got to thinking.....home is where I live right here and right now....where I really live.  Now in actuality, if we are "spiritual beings having a human experience," which I absolutely believe is the case, then the place where I live, the place I inhabit, is my body.  It's where my spirit, my soul, the very essence of who I am, resides.  So physically speaking, I essentially carry my house around with me, like a turtle or a snail (not really the same thing but you know what I mean).

When you get right down to the nitty gritty, I am ALWAYS HOME.  My home is my essence, and my essence (or "witness") lives right here in this body.  That's kind of a nice feeling.  No matter where I go, I'm home.  Thanks, Effy.