Out of the Frying Pan

"Do your best to fulfill the needs of your body."
-Don Ruiz in The Four Agreements

I apologize for the length on this one, but I promise it's good stuff. From now on entries will be short and sweet.

It was 8AM, and the sound of my alarm made me want to ring someone’s neck. What kind of world did I live in that would force me to leave such a comfortable assembly of cotton sheets? Lying in the darkness of that morning’s gloom, I almost convinced myself to cancel life for a day. Then a flood of thoughts cascaded violently through my lethargy. A most unwelcome collection of unfinished business inundated my mind, forcing me to leave my bed and head straight for the coffee machine. I frantically began to plan my day and pack up my life in a bag that wasn’t fit to hold it while I simultaneously completed a mental checklist of everything I had most likely forgotten to do already. My beloved peanut butter waffle sandwich tasted delicious but there was no time to savor it. The tornado of my morning preparations had left my room a mess but there was no time to clean it. I feared that my fish might suffocate and drown in the filth contaminating their tank but there was no time to change their water. After I exited the apartment and bolted down three sets of stairs, I realized that I had forgotten my wallet. The fish held their breath in anxiety as I dashed into the room, reunited with my wallet, and dashed back out again. The day had begun.

It was during this murky phase of my life that I had let my perception of living “fully” determine how I should live; I was both the subject and the artist behind the portrait of a life that I thought would be meaningful. Mortality became a reality all of the sudden and I was under the impression that I needed to do more with my life. I wanted to live life intensely — but life was intensely beating the crap out of me. My mind oscillated between the desire to suck all the essence out of life and the struggle to love all the essence that I was sucking. A sinister thirst for learning, for doing, for seeing and feeling possessed me with intoxicating force as I entered my sophomore semester at Penn State University. I wanted to meet and experience and involve and work hard and play hard and exercise and… never sleep. Then there was the egg pan.

The dreary day that followed the morning I have described proceeded to echo the chaos of that morning’s activity. After sitting through five classes, writing an article for the newspaper, tutoring at a writing center, tutoring at Panera (while feasting on delicious pastries), and draining myself at a two-hour swim practice where I nearly drowned because someone kicked me in the face, I went to make myself an omelet. There had always been a separate pan that I used specifically for cooking eggs in because when I cook them, my impatience causes me to burn the eggs, leaving a permanent crust on the bottom of the pan.

I whipped out my trusty egg pan, but then turned on the lights to suddenly stop and search the inside of the frying pan for a reflection of myself that I had somehow lost. Crusty egg residue blotted out my face. Normally, I would have overlooked the egg pan. I would have cooked/burnt my omelet and devoured it in less than a minute. As I peered through the egg residue at my distorted face in that moment, however, I was thunderstruck.

Two days later I quit two of the major activities that I was involved in at Penn State and I got rid of my egg pan, upgrading to a new and improved system of egg-scrambling. Starring into that egg pan was like looking into the eye of a hurricane; it was a brief moment of sublime inactivity. Suddenly I realized that in all my attempts to live fully, I had stopped living entirely. My health had been deteriorating and I was sick more often than I was healthy. My body was demanding that I slow down. I was doing all the activities that I loved to do, but I left myself no time to love doing them. Thinking of it now, I am reminded of Lady Gaga — the global pop superstar who passes out at concerts because she tries to take on more than she can handle. It became clear to me that I was letting external pressures control my life and that I needed to drastically alter my situation to correct that. I was a struggling dog, and all the outside forces that I had arranged for myself were holding the leash that walked me. I needed to hold the leash.

To put it simply, the egg pan somehow taught me the power of simplicity. In taking a moment to analyze the absurdity of the fact that I even owned a pan designated to burn my eggs on because I never allowed myself time to fully cook them, I discovered that I had lost myself in a demanding whirlpool of productivity. I realized that living fully is not about how much you do, it’s about how much of yourself you invest in every single action that you take. Cutting back on my activities illuminated the idea that to do everything at my own pace would be a much better way to live. It’s like riding a bike: you can’t be overambitious and choose to charge up a hill in a tough gear, or you might end up rolling backwards.

I learned that when you overdo, you deplete your body and go against yourself, and it will only take you longer to accomplish your goals. My fear was of missing out if I slowed down. The reality is that once I slowed down, I gained irreplaceable vigor and missed out on nothing. Soon after, my lifestyle changed permanently. I was no longer concerned with daily output, but rather with daily input. I began to appreciate the little things and magnify each experience and each relationship that I made to get the most out of them without trying to tackle too many at once.

I now cook my omelets slowly and diligently on a pan that I cook the rest of my food in. The meal tastes better than ever. I have lost my health only once in the past year, and I have learned to designate time in each day to reflect and to channel my attention toward taking excellent care of my body and mind.

I surfaced from the frying pan and switched gears to appreciate the light in each day.

Invigorating life means living at your own pace.

Simply.