Awe & Wonder, Beating Fear with a Stick, Manifestation Retreats

What Will Never Go Up In Smoke.

February 22, 2013

It was hard leaving Maui today but not hard in the way it is to leave a vacation or a beautiful place. Hard in the way falling in love is after you’ve been hurt. The way you want to trust it and say Yes, come on in but you are afraid and that But I am afraid wells up in your throat like a stone and you can’t speak for it. And although you are happy you are also sad because you recognize this feeling of having something and yet not trusting you have it. Not trusting that it’s a thing to be had. It’s a football rushing at you and you’re going I got it! I got it! and then I don’t got it. All at once. If that’s possible.

The stone in your throat is hard, as stones tend to be (especially stones in the throat) which is the place things often get stuck, even if they aren’t stones. Even if they are people.

Stones and words and anger and all the rest. All the things.

Before we ended the retreat this morning, the girls gave me a necklace to say Thank You. One of the most beautiful necklaces I have ever seen and as I held it in my hands I thought how I shouldn’t look up at them because I probably wasn’t reacting in the way they expected of me (Tears? Emotion?) so I kept looking down at the gold chain, at the purple stone, at my ugly hands holding this beautiful gesture. Don’t look up, keep looking down. Don’t ever look up. (No tears? No emotion?)

Well, no. I wasn’t there. I was looking down on it all. A million hours passed and I finally looked up and they all had tears in their eyes and were nodding thank you’s. 

There’s been a mistake. This can’t be for me. I shall float away and keep looking down (no tears, no emotion yet.) But I look up and they are still there nodding their thank you’s in the most knowing way, as if we have known each other our whole lives and this moment was simply a confirmation.

There’s been no mistake. The necklace and the thank you’s were for me so I put it on and touched it repeatedly. Sharp and smooth and tiny enough to fit in my fingers. I pressed hard into it to pull me back into the yoga room there at Lumeria. But still no emotion because I didn’t trust my body was sitting there on that floor or that the floor wouldn’t cave in.

So many things we think are mistakes. So many mistakes we think are things.

When they’re not. They are hallucinations. They are non-existent. Or maybe they are just long gone. Over and done. Maybe they once were things, but they have longed since stopped being things and now are just that happened once or I turned left instead of right.

I turned left instead of right and there I was at Lumeria in Maui leading a retreat with a gorgeous group of women but if I’d turned right I would’ve been __________.

That’s right. Blank space. Who knows. So many blank spaces.

Look right there. There’s one. And there. Another.

Not mistakes. Not things. Just that happened. And then that happened.

It was hard leaving today because I was afraid to leave what we created.

Then, just like that, one of the girls said she had a letter to read. She had written a letter to the group which was moving and brave and lovely. She turned to me and said Jen, your dad would be so proud of you. And just like that: emotion. Magic. Just a few words and the idea of a man long dead in his physical body and bam! I am re-rooted back into the world as if I had always been there.

A double rainbow appeared after we finished our closing circle and we all ran out onto the lawn and pointed and snapped photos and cried a little because it was, again, like falling in love. What if we never see something this beautiful again? How can we make this stay?

I am afraid that was it for me. I am afraid that I will never have that again. I am afraid that. I am afraid of.

I am on the plane, where I do most of my writing, wondering if I turned right instead of left would I have even been to Maui? (Who knows but most likely, no.) Would I be on this plane sitting next to a sweet but loud nut-eating Russian couple? Could I ask the pilot to steer us back, and, if he agrees, would it be the same? Could I stay as safe as I felt this week with all my women during my retreat? (Probably not.)

I feel for my necklace and repeat So many things we think are mistakes. So many mistakes we think are really things and my necklace lays over my heart and doesn’t move or suggest it knows the difference so I decide to make a list. Mistakes and Things.

Mistakes:

~Dropping out of college with one year left after I had won an award for having highest GPA at my school within NYU (Oh, that’s a thing. Things and accolades and this and that which I think makes me me but in reality is just a thing signifying nothing.)

~Filing taxes for the wrong year.

~Saying yes when I meant no.

~Saying no when I meant yes.

~Saying nothing.

~Saying too much.

~Overpacking.

The rest I can’t write here because the Russians might read over my shoulder and that makes me nervous.

Things.

My necklace the girls gave me this morning.

The airplane I am sitting on.

The book in my lap.

The glasses on my face.

There are too many things in the world to list them all.

I feel for my necklace and think if it could grant me one wish it would be to hear perfectly. Then I think I would like to change that wish to I would like to be here perfectly.

If I am here perfectly I can see that dropping out of college wasn’t a mistake but it was my left turn and if I hadn’t turned left I would be _______.

And the filing taxes bit, eh. The IRS will figure that one out.

The rest, the yeses and no’s and the overpacking aren’t so much mistakes as they are ignoring my gut in the way I used to ignore my hunger. I hear you and I don’t care. 

It was hard leaving today because I am not yet perfectly here.

I worry. I send vessels and ships into an imaginary future stockpiled with fears and toilet paper and anxiety. I worry that I will never have this again. This being what I had there on that island. That it was a fluke. That there wasn’t a group of women who flew from all over the world connecting in the way everyone dreams of connecting or maybe there was but it was a blink and it will never be back as things we love sometimes choose to do.  I am happy. This is working out. You are alive. I love you.

Then Poof! Up in smoke. That’s what the things we love sometimes do as unfair and shitty as it seems (and as it is.) That’s what the life we love sometimes does. It just goes.

And yet and still, I am happy they gave me a necklace with such texture because I can press it into my thumb and have it bring me back on the same ship I sent off into the future with toilet paper and regret. The necklace can send me sailing back into my seat on an airplane with the smell of nuts in the air.

I keep looking at the letters everyone wrote me this morning. I had everyone write down the 5 most beautiful things they saw in each person so each woman left today with a pile of letters.

The one thing in every one of my letters, the common thread of beauty that all the ladies saw in me was, one word: Inspire.

I can’t go anywhere on this airplane. I can’t float away because I am already floating up here in the sky and I am trapped next to the Russians in my window seat so I must sit with that word. Inspire, inspire, inspire.

What does it mean? I ask my necklace like a crazy person.

I actually didn’t think I was crazy until the necklace answered back. It said it means keep speaking your truth and you don’t need a degree from NYU to inspire. 

Now, did the necklace say that? I don’t know. Maui is a sacred and magical place and they bought it there, so maybe it did? Maybe I need to suspend my disbelief for moments at a time so I can get over the I can’t believe they mean me. I can’t believe this will last. I can’t believe in my own happiness. I can’t believe this is my life.

Maybe I need to suspend my disbelief and let my necklace remind me of its heritage. How it traveled through the hands of some gorgeous women who love me as I love them. How it hung in a store and when it caught their eyes it spoke to them. (So they told me.) It literally spoke to us, Jen. 

Maybe my necklace isn’t a thing at all. Maybe it’s a reminder that happiness is possible for me and those I love fiercely. And maybe, when the necklace is gone, however necklaces go, the reminder will remain: That I deserve to be happy. That I don’t have to be afraid. That one day, some incredible women who I led through a life-changing journey, walked into a store in Wailea and wiped the sand of their feet so they could find something to thank me. A thing, something, they said knowing they would never find that thing, so they wrapped up their love in a purple stone on a gold chain and we all understood that it would never go up in smoke.

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17 Comments

  • Reply Barbara Potter February 22, 2013 at 11:49 pm

    This was so profound it brought tears to my eyes. By the way, in case you forgot, Neil Diamond went to NYU to study pre-med and
    Very close to his graduation he dropped out to take a chance on a music career earning a few dollars a week. In 1995, thirty-five years later, he received an honorary degree from NYU Hmm. Food for thought there. The path we take is always the right one as long as it is our path we are walking on.

  • Reply rachyrachp February 23, 2013 at 9:10 am

    I have sat with that question throughout my adult life. What if I made a right and not a left? What if I went down that back road and not the highway? What if. I love this essay. I resonates with probably everybody who will read it today. Beautiful.

  • Reply Jennifer Hoddevik February 23, 2013 at 1:59 pm

    totally shared… 🙂

    Yoga Your Holiday (+1) 562.335.8000 http://www.TheTravelYogi.com

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  • Reply jamesvincentknowles February 23, 2013 at 3:06 pm

    When you do this, the way you do, letting your soul float so vulnerably & true, your heart sits right there upon your chest, glowing brightly & beating your uniquely kind rhythm, where astonishment has nowhere to go, where your love is. Where your love is no linger invisible. Where there is nothing but beautiful about you.

  • Reply Amy Esacove February 23, 2013 at 3:21 pm

    One thing I have learned on my own journey (as clumsy and heartbreaking and amazing as it has been at times) is that everything is perfect. Because it can’t be any other way. Witnessing your journey has made me feel very honored. It has been amazing to watch. Keep moving forward, love.

  • Reply Follow Me Films February 23, 2013 at 7:57 pm

    Reblogged this on Follow Me Films.

  • Reply Amanda February 23, 2013 at 8:45 pm

    Jennifer, what an experience! I am in awe of what you are Manifesting! I really love what you said about things and mistakes:

    “So many things we think are mistakes. So many mistakes we think are things.

    When they’re not. They are hallucinations. They are non-existent. Or maybe they are just long gone. Over and done. Maybe they once were things, but they have longed since stopped being things and now are just that happened once or I turned left instead of right.”

    Next time you are doing a retreat in NYC, I’m there! Re-blogging on mysignature.tv.

  • Reply Amanda February 23, 2013 at 8:47 pm

    Reblogged this on mysignature.tv | in the making and commented:
    “The will to grow, must outweigh the need to feel safe.” Jennifer Pastiloff. Here is a fabulous blog from Jennifer.

  • Reply Helen February 24, 2013 at 8:34 am

    You are a beautiful writer. I could feel the emotion in this piece. I am facing a big transition in my life right now. This perspective helps me realize there are no right or wrong turns, it’s just the road I’m on.

  • Reply 4th grade writer | 3wordsfor365 February 24, 2013 at 2:21 pm

    […] reading my sister’s latest essay about the turns we take in life, the left turns and right turns, I thought about my life. Who would […]

  • Reply Listen: This Is Your LIfe. | The Manifest-Station February 24, 2013 at 2:39 pm

    […] wasn’t really a newsletter but rather my essay I had written on the plane Friday night called What Will Never Go Up In Smoke. It went viral on Facebook and I thought I would share with my mailing list. I got some heartfelt […]

  • Reply authenticalive February 25, 2013 at 2:14 pm

    morning Jen… remember the wooden hair stick my husband made for you?? well, you could use it for kindling and it would go up in smoke… but, the Love We Feel For You will always be there..

  • Reply yinyangmother March 3, 2013 at 2:56 am

    If you stay in the here nothing can go up in smoke. Smoke is for the past, for regrets, the burning away of what no longer serves you. The magic puff will always remain while ever you remember it and the necklace will always bring it back. You will relive the feeling in Maui, on other retreats, anywhere and everywhere you choose to feel that way again. I so want to do one of your retreats if this is the magic they create (unfortunately Australia is a rather long way away)….kathy

  • Reply Listen. This Is Your Life. « Positively Positive March 9, 2013 at 3:14 am

    […] wasn’t really a newsletter but rather my essay I had written on the plane Friday night called “What Will Never Go up in Smoke.” It went viral on Facebook, and I thought I would share it with my mailing list. I got some […]

  • Reply Lauren Giammarco Silveira March 9, 2013 at 5:00 am

    Amazing, inspiring…thank you. Those words will never go up in smoke 🙂

  • Reply reocochran March 28, 2013 at 7:41 pm

    This is a wonderful post with so much content!I think the quotes are amazing and the words and meanings more than one reading is needed to digest it all! Dream big, believe in yourself…all kinds of messages resonated with me.

  • Reply Went To A School February 17, 2018 at 6:01 pm

    Why do we NYU alumna always mention it? I’m stopping here because your article did it. Between myself, and you, and Lady Gaga, we’re insufferable. We’re the BMW of student bodies and it needs to stop. Here. Now. Our school attracts narcissists, and it’s not as sexy in print as I or you think it does. Let’s all please stop it now.

    I’m doing it.

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