Learning

Surprisingly, I've been getting through the days without much trouble with fatigue. Every morning the first five minutes are like torture, and I would almost always feel I wouldn't make it, that I would fall into the temptation of a nap. Nope, never did. And at work I never felt I needed a nap. Before I started I imagined I would go to the bathroom, and inside one of the stalls I'd just meditate, which is the best way I've found to overcome fatigue. Of course, not only has that not been necessary, but I realize the bathroom, unless it hasn't been used, is not an ideal place to find your inner peace.

This week I am finishing a project. Probably today I can see its final results. It feels good to accomplish something, even if minor, and this is especially true for someone who is finishing only his second week. The accomplishment of this little tiny project has given me some encouragement for the decision I've made. As I've said before, while I am sure it was a good decision to leave my previous work, I have not been so sure about coming to this one, coming to the world of finance, to live in the opposite of a spectrum where I've been comfortably ensconced on one end. Everything is different, everything requires getting used to. The commute, the work attitudes, the daily schedule, the lack of complications, the lack of spontaneity. And probably most difficult challenge is simply the novelty of this new life. Human beings do not like changes, just that some are more up for it than others.

But against the backdrop of all this uncertainty and the feeling of unease, I felt great having accomplished something. And by working toward the project I also learned a great deal, both on the technical side, which is my background, and also on finance, which is what I want to grow in my garden of knowledge. Of course, what I have learned is a mere drop in what I will need to know to be able to navigate in this new world. I have no illusion of grandeur in the pittance I've learned, but that it's the first sign of a step in the right direction makes me feel happy.

On a more metaphysical level, I am also learning that I can learn. I sometimes look at myself in the mirror, sometimes in the metaphorical mirror of self-contemplation, and I become a little concerned that I'm getting too old to learn new tricks. I know it sounds ridiculous, especially if you are older than me. I suppose it reflects some lack of self-esteem. But more to the point, when you don't really know where you're going, when you feel you're stuck where you are, it is not only old age that would prevent you from learning, but also the fatigue of moving forward. My Dad turned 70 last month. But he had stopped learning a long time ago. Actively learning, I mean. He told me he used to go to different places, often on foot; and when that wasn't possible, he would discover life from the movie screen, in front of which he often used to sit in the comfort of a world all to himself. But he stopped. I think he stopped when he had had enough of the immigrant life. Can't blame him. When your life is so overwhelming, you don't have much mental energy left to figure things out.

Sometimes I'm afraid my energy had been so taxed that I wouldn't have much left for learning. Not much curiosity left to discover the truth about the smallest or the biggest things.

You might wonder where all that taxation went to, if I have spent so much of my life in the past eight and a half years doing very little work compared to now. Complications. Making a lot of complicated things in my life. Some I love, such as tango. Or reconnecting with family. But much of it, I feel, has been fighting loneliness. In the form of trying to establish, establishing, and trying to maintain a hold on relationships that I thought would save me from this dreadful loneliness. That has been very tiring, and to do so for so many years, so many dramas, so much energy released into the void.

Of course, I've learned a lot about life and myself in the process of going through all these dramas, and there's no doubt that I've come a long way in finding that peace, in ambulating on the path of maturity. But one of the reasons for me to have this new life, so busy, so structured, so much simpler, is to get away from the repeat of those dramas. It isn't easy. Dramas are always around the corner, and sometimes I feel they would interfere with my work. Yesterday I couldn't really pay attention sometimes to what the man was explanation to me. My mind was distracted by thoughts, by emotions.

To really grow in this life, I can't simply escape from the dramas. They are born and live in my shadow. I have to continue learning to bring peace in my life, somehow in this new environment where I don't have much free time. Sure, seeking simplicity, as I've often repeated, is a way to find peace. And being in the train and being able to think and write and read helps immensely. So I hope I will continue learning ways to cope with these demons in my shadow. After all, dramas never come to us; they only exist as a consequence of our personality, and they will only recede when we are more in touch with ourselves.

The snow is still here. My last New England winter. On the last few days of my last trip in Buenos Aires I kept thinking about "last" "last" "last". It's funny to say goodbye, and then later you won't really miss much. Last night, still being haunted by the anger I described in the previous day, a friend called. My best friend in New Haven. It was nice to know someone cared when you are ready to call it quits. But more to the point, despite what the snow reminded me, what the city reminded me, despite having concluded that I had no longer anything to wait for in this city, a beam of light shone in my heart and reminded me, not of the contrary, but something completely different, and yet somehow related. She reminded me how good a person I was. How much I have learned. What a long way I have come to being the person she loved so much. And I was comforted by the idea that not all my relations in these eight and a half years were screwed up and unhealthy. I had a friend with whom I never had any drama, and whom I really loved.

That would always be the greatest lesson to learn. To love. To truly love someone is never a mistake, however much suffering you might have to endure, and in this case, I have never suffered because of her. I hope in my new life I will find other relations in the same optimistic light.