What Does Dragonfly Magic Teach Us Late at Night?
Other than goosebumps and guttural sounds
Late one night this week while I watched a West Coast Swing dancing video on YouTube on the couch, I heard a flittering on the wall behind me. I had the front door open for the fresh cool breeze to enter after a warm day, which was an invitation for a ginormous dragonfly to enter for a visit. The flittering of her wings hitting the wall repeatedly sent goosebumps popping down the back of my neck. She was in such a panic to get out of this dire situation and I knew I was her only hope.
I grabbed the broom and swept it gently, coaxing it to leave through the door from which it came. All the while, I’m letting out guttural sounds of panic and fear emitting from my body, which I’ve never heard before. Sadly, it flew behind the immovable credenza and I gave up, turned off the lights, closed the front door, and then the bedroom door, and went to bed. Either it would meet its demise or I would meet her in the morning.
I looked up the spiritual meaning of the dragonfly and found that in almost every part of the world, this flying insect symbolizes change. Change in the perspective of self-realization; and the kind of change that has its source in mental and emotional maturity and the understanding of the deeper meaning of life.
We have the opportunity to change the past as it lives alongside us every day whether we realize it or not. The past responds to our lives as we are confronted with challenges, a conversation or even watching a movie. We are constantly assessing the files in our brain to see how we can relate to the present moment, if we are safe if our bodies kick into adrenaline mode, and if we need to fight or flee from the situation.
The past often visits me in the middle of the night when I wake in a panic asking myself, “Was I a good mother when they were young? Did I rush through their childhood? Did I have fun or was I only focused on the schedule, being in control, making my kids do things they didn’t want to do?” I desperately recall the memories of my children’s voices, when we would laugh, when I might have been too cranky, or when my husband and I fought too much.
Don’t feed the fears they say. This is especially difficult when the fear lurks at night. Yeah, it’s fun to torture myself in the middle of the night. Sometimes, reading helps me relax and go back to sleep except for when I read about boys and how we are failing them. Being a boy mom has had its challenges particularly when the communication divide between us has been deepening over the years. It’s not enough to say, that boys don’t communicate as well as girls do, in my scenario, it has been eroding over the years.
For the general public, there are two things at play; the erosion of language due to the technical age of shortcuts in syntax communication along with the commercialization of self-absorption of youth culture at every turn. Yes, social media. According to the patriarchy and American society at large, the expectations for boys to be strong and independent, not show weakness, grief, fear, or ask for help directly contribute to the loneliness crisis.
I recall when I first became a boy, I wondered, what do I do with a boy? We had a great time when he was little, listening to music, baking cookies, and painting a Menorah together for Hanukkah which we still use today. As he got older, it was more about exposing him to sports, which he was great at like Kung Fu and swimming. When we’d urge him to try soccer or Little League, it didn’t go so well due to a lack of desire and the agro-parents who fought with the coaches wanting to win at all costs or placing their son in the star position.
I remember conversations with my girlfriend, also a boy's mom, who I could be real with. We saw parents judging one another, the consistent drinking at every baseball game to just get through it, the Solo cups filled with alcohol as they took their kids trick-or-treating, and at times felt there was no authenticity. No one wanted to talk about how difficult it was to work full-time and raise a family without help unless you paid someone. The divide between working out-of-the-home moms and house manager moms was clear. Frankly, I think we were jealous of one another thinking it was better on the other side when in reality, they are both difficult realities.
In middle school, we had a sweet time working on my son’s Mitzvah project for his Bar Mitzvah, baking cookies for literacy for a local elementary school that needed books to help English language learners. I can still see his beaming face at the table in the park selling them with pride.
And then my son had his psychotic break at age 14.
The dynamic of our relationship began to change as I became his protector, his guide in a way I never expected. This is not to say his father didn’t play these roles, I am reflecting on my experience as a mother. My life became more isolating as I worked full-time as a recruiter in Silicon Valley corporations and worked to balance the rage and fear within my body. When my last full-time role, which I foolishly put my heart and soul into for a year, ended after the Park City Utah company-wide offsite with a 7-minute phone call in my backyard I walked on the cool grass in my bare feet with disbelief.
And then I woke every morning crying for about three months thinking it was about the rejection of yet another job when it was really about the grief and loss of my son who was living in his private hell.
Was this a moment of life happening for me not to me?
Fast forward eight years later, and my son is stable, working part-time at a local hotel, driving, and learning how to care for himself while living at home with us. However, he’s isolated behind his closed door playing video games, electric drums with headphones (thankfully), and his guitar. Conversations lasting more than five minutes are few and far between as I don’t know how to draw him out without being a taskmaster or talking about his mental health. I struggle with his aloneness when he’s probably used to it. I still want more for him. I know he would like a friend or two.
Again, waking in the middle of the night to read these statistics has not been helpful when I long for his next level of recovery to include better communication and a friend or two.
A Survey Center on American Life found that 28% of men under 30 have no close social connections.
27% of men reported having at least six close friends.
15% of boys said they have no close friends at all, a fivefold increase from 1990 when 55% of men reported having at least six close friends.
Many young men ages 18 to 23 feel that “nobody really knows me.”
High school counselors report that students routinely ask them to check in on friends they’re worried about but rarely come in concerned about another boy.
What am I supposed to do with this information? How can I change anything at this stage?
I have to try something new even if I have to learn a video game. Believe me, I ask him every week to watch a show or movie with me.
In the darkness of night, I remembered the motivational interviewing technique I poorly tried years ago. I’m ready to try again. Essentially, it’s using open-ended questions, affirmations, reflections, and summaries or OARS as targeted by the founders of this technique, William Miller and Stephen Rollnick. It’s a way of having a conversation about change which I will dive into practice again after some needed rest.
The next morning while making coffee in the stillness of the wee hour, I heard the panicked flitting of the dragonfly against the window. She had made it out from behind the heavy immovable credenza! The white light of morning shone through the window as she tried to reach it unsuccessfully making the same mistake over and over. “I have to save her,” I calmly thought.
If I could open the window next to the closed window, widely enough, maybe I could sweep her out. I took the broom and again gently motioned it to the outside space. Between yelps and working to stay calm, my inner voice calmly spoke to me, “Come on, you can do it. The window is open, go, be free!”
My beautiful dragonfly friend soared to freedom!
She taught me that we dart around in life sometimes not being able to see the depth of the messages, we have to let ourselves off the hook and start where we are right now. We may feel trapped like the dragonfly from time to time but if we can shift our perspective and see the opening we can be free from doing the same thing again and again and expecting different results.
I know my son will find his way, he will show me and I will be right there alongside him.
Resources:
Next Gen Men - “A small but mighty nonprofit working towards the future where boys and men feel less pain and cause less harm.”
UP NEXT ON THE SPICY SOUL MAMA PODCAST:
Alex Momcilovic from BecomingNobody.org
From age 13 to 20 I struggled with violence, drug dealing and heavy drug/alcohol addiction. In 2016 I had an intense spiritual awakening and began studying various philosophies, spiritual traditions and methods from around the world.
Alex and I will be diving into what it’s like to be a young man today in America and how he got himself on the path of bhakti love.
