What Do I REALLY Believe?...

Earworms...sometimes they can be deadly. Like when the theme to "Gilligan's Island" plays over and over in my head...or some tasteless commercial jingle clings to my last, good brain cell.


An "earworm" is a made up word describing any song, jingle, or medley that sticks like glue inside the ears, destined to repeat its tune or lyrics over and over in the mind, regardless of desire to ban it or keep it there...sigh...I get at LEAST one of these stuck in my head every day.


Yesterday’s earworm was a nice, little song by The Gabe Dixon Band, called “All Will Be Well”. I found myself humming the song and doing a thing I call "mumble sync"...something sort of like Milli Vanilli's lip sync debacle in the 80's only my "mumble sync" is more hit or miss. As the song plays over and over in my pea brain, I find there are certain parts of it I will "mumble sync" out loud...certain phrases or stanzas...sometimes only blurting out one or two words of the chorus, like a bad Tourette’s. Hence the name, "mumble sync"."


All Will Be Well" is a catchy piano-esque song with a smooth, speedy chorus. The main chorus words are:

All will be well.
Even after all the promises you've broken to yourself.
All will be well.
You can ask me how, but only time will tell.


I have no idea why this song was floating in and out of the radio waves in my head yesterday, but it seemed significant...of course, every little brain fart of my LIFE seems significant to me! Because ALL of my thoughts are highly important...LOL

But as the song repeated itself like a broken record throughout the day, I realized I was also recalling an old poem credited to Dame Julian of Norwich and connecting some kind of unspoken mental dots. The poem I was reciting in my head (there sure "seems" to be a lot going on in my noggin, but it's a false sense of hope that ANYTHING significant is happening in there!) goes something like this:


"All shall be well, and all shall be well. And all manner of things shall be well."


For those of you not in the "know" about Dame Julian (if that really WAS her name...history is not certain), she was born in the 1300's. And, while in her early 30's, she fell gravely ill. Last Rite's were performed, yet she miraculously survived. But during her hours of dying then recovery, Dame Julian of Norwich had mystical visions, which she later documented. She wrote about the Divine and the Trinity in female terms, which was unheard of and punishable by death in her time (What am I talking about? This still IS punishable by death in 2008, isn't it?!? Blasphemy!) But, because of her standing in the Church, she was left alone to humbly serve. Her statement repeated three times of "all shall be well" in the above poem is indicative of her theology and belief of a Father-Mother-God.


Whew! I sure digress when it comes to the history books! Back to the EARWORM and the title of this post (Wait! Hey look! A chicken...LOL) Soooo, I'm earwormin' away yesterday with this upbeat, positive message groovin' in my head, and I suddenly stopped dead in my tracks. “What am I thinking?” I thought to myself…which is a confusing thing to ask one’s thoughts.

"All will be well"...nice message, optimistic, great spring-time quote."All will be well"...and then it hit me. Is this what I REALLY believe? Wow! Talk about being blind-sided by my own Super Ego, AKA, that little “Voice” within.

"All will be well"...yeah, right. I'm in the throws of an MS relapse with airport runway lights illuminating the night sky of my noggin.

"All will be well"...sure, it will be. It just ISN'T today.

"All will be well"...it WOULD be well if I were independently wealthy and didn't have to worry about health insurance, etc.

"All will be well"...if only I were well.

"All will be well"...I can't effing walk without a cane! What is my life coming to?

"All will be well"...

And so it went.

I have always tried to hold myself in the light of being a fairly upbeat person...one of those, "the glass is half full" kind of rose-colored glasses type people. And, for the most part, I DO maintain a healthy sense of humor and delight in the world. But there is also a side of me that harbors pessimistic optimism...you know the kind..."All will be well, MAYBE". LOL I hold that “maybe” card in my hand as a GET OUT OF JAIL FREE pass for this little Monopoly game called LIFE…just in case. Just in case all will NOT be well. I keep one eye forward on the board rolling the dice while clenching my JAIL PASS tightly in my sweaty hands. After all, “all might NOT be well”…pessimistic optimism.

As I sat yesterday and contemplated my “pessimistic optimism” regarding the current state of my MS and life, it dawned on me perhaps I, too, was having some sort of mystic vision just like Dame Julian of Norwich? OK, maybe not a “mystic vision”, but perhaps I was being given opportunity on this Easter Sunday to exam something greater than myself? Maybe…just maybe…my “pessimistic optimism” was doing me more harm than good at this juncture in my life? Maybe I have been wasting valuable energy clenching my GET OUT OF JAIL FREE CARD (just in case I need it!) and not really enjoying the game?

Sometimes I hate it when my Super Ego, AKA, that little “Voice” within, talks to me because it is always right. It is that Voice inside my head that “knows”…it is that Voice inside my head of reason, calm, understanding, fearlessness, and divine wisdom that guides me through my Monopoly game of LIFE with ease. It is that Voice, should I heed its message, that tries over and over again (like a GOOD earworm) to grab my attention within the chaotic thoughts I call my cognition.

I have NOT been enjoying the game of late…I’ve been too busy and frantic trying to control the uncontrollable…trying to “predict” which way my MS might land on the board and at what cost. After all, MS is a very difficult opponent to play against in the Monopoly game called LIFE. It doesn’t follow the standard rules of play and, even with a dripping-in-sweat GET OUT OF JAIL FREE card in my hot, little hands, there’s no guarantee I will get to USE the card. It doesn’t allow me to stock pile my fake money…it doesn’t allow me even to choose which GAME PIECE I want to represent me on the board (I always preferred the Top Hat myself).

What came to me in my “mystic vision” yesterday is this: “All will be well” is STILL a line of pessimistic optimism for me…because I am still predicting my future by saying it. It implies all is not necessarily “well” in the moment…but it WILL be…just wait and see.

Today, I am purposefully placing a made up ditty/earworm in my head called, “All IS well”…I am making a conscious choice to override the other “voices” in my thoughts wanting to play it safe…wanting to keep something back just in case I need it. I’m tearing up my GET OUT OF JAIL FREE card because I’m not afraid to go there. And, I’m rewriting Dame Julian of Norwich’s poem:

All IS well, and all IS well. And all manner of things remain well.”