Jumping off a train…

The other day while discussing some health issues, I blurted out… “It’s just like jumping off a moving train…” It truly is. For when you jump off a moving train, you don’t leap off lightly to land perfectly upright on your feet. No, you need to keep running with the train and in the direction of the train at least a short distance.

Okay okay, I’m not talking about jumping off a high speed Shinkasen or TGV and there are no dramatic bridges or burning trains involved. I’m simply referring to jumping off a clunky slow moving train onto a platform. And yes, you would have to have lived or travelled to certain parts of the world to have seen this or done this.

For when you jump off a train onto the platform, you cannot bring yourself to a screeching stop. Once your feet find the platform, you have to keep running with the train at least a short while. While physicists will explain better via laws of momentum and speed, I think it is an apt analogy for life and change.

Oftentimes, it is hard to break free of the previous situation with surgical precision and we may have to continue awhile with the energy of prior circumstances. And I find this ever so true. I lived with a chronic illness for many years. And just because I am trying to jump off that train, the pace and drudgery of that big clunky train is yet very much a part of me.

It has not been possible for me to suddenly stop or start running in a different direction. My feet may be off the train and may have touched the platform but I have to still keep running with the momentum of my previous life and that includes the illness. For that is the speed and energy my body understands and is accustomed to and it cannot change its course overnight. And that is true of healing as well. Although remedial procedures and steps have been taken, my body seems to have a long way to go. It still needs to run with the pace of the train before it knows to be on its own, without the grind, grief or ghost of the train.

I have no idea how long that is going to be. At times it feels as if I’m going to run with the heavy clunky train forever. And each time I feel so, maybe I can remind myself that I have indeed leapt of the train - even if I need to run a little while longer with it. And recognizing that speed and energy will allow me to transition to the platform better. And perhaps in due course I may take a new train even.

But for now, I can try and keep all this in perspective, even when my feet and heart hurt at the idea of having to run with my clunky train.