Dealing with Disintegration
For some, the New Year may not exactly feel like a fresh start. Over the holiday break I spent time thinking about the people in my life who hope that 2024 is better for them than 2023 was, for mostly personal reasons. So if you're like them and you're in the thick of it right now, but you hope a new leaf does get turned this year eventually, consider these ideas.
Existence is an ongoing cycle of integration and disintegration. Of putting things together and watching them fall apart. Of inflation and deflation. Yet, when we personally experience a cycle of disintegration, our tendency can be to fight against it.
Our capitalism-based society has conditioned us to think that everything should always be growing and improving and getting bigger and better. That’s not realistic, or sustainable. A common reaction is to beat ourselves up and try harder when things just aren’t working. That’s the last thing you should do.
Here are some symptoms that indicate may be in a period of disintegration:
You feel like you know nothing.
You don’t have creative energy.
You don’t feel like doing anything.
Everything feels harder than it should be.
Nothing is falling into place like you wanted it to.
If you can, learn to use the phases of disintegration that you experience for just what they are meant to be: messengers telling you to pause, recoup, reflect, let things settle, and rest. This may feel like “doing nothing” or “no progress.” Don’t be fooled.
Things can’t come together in a new way if they don’t first fall apart. If you’re dealing with disintegration, here are three guidelines to get through it.
Recognize, Acknowledge, and Honor It.
We tend to want to deny that we’re in this phase. Have you thought to yourself that if you just worked harder and pushed harder you could force your way through it? Instead, surrender to what is. Sit back and let things disintegrate. The way to begin doing this is to simply recognize it. The first time you notice it, you can think to yourself “Oh, THIS is what Liz was talking about!” and then over time as you recognize the pattern, you can say to yourself, “Oh yeah, I’ve been here before. I know it will pass and let me use this time to honor what is true.”
Do Something Else. (Including nothing!!)
Once when I was in a period of disintegration, I went to the coffee shop almost every afternoon and read. During one disintegration phase when I lived in California I regularly relaxed in the sun in my backyard. To honor the disintegration is to surrender to it. Disintegration is a sign of change, and to fight it is to fight your own growth. But change can be scary. Even though you may know you’re in a disintegration phase, you don’t know what the integration to follow will look like. You will know soon enough. For now, just trust the process. Use the time to do something you’ve been wanting to do more of.!
Lean on your Rituals.
Fear of the unknown is often why we fight the process and pretend that things aren’t really unraveling. During this time when it feels like the floor is falling out from underneath you, rituals can provide temporary scaffolding to bridge you from one reality to another. A ritual is a habit to which you assign meaning. It could simply be your morning shower. It could be dinner with family or friends, or journaling. As you go through the motions, remind yourself that this act has a deeper meaning for you right now. This ritual is “holding you” in your period of disintegration.
Embrace your feelings of disintegration as a natural part of growth. Disintegration happens in service of new integration. Trust the process and good will come of it.
