Any good solutions while learning to trust the gut.

Written in response to: Write a story about a problem with no good solutions.... view prompt

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Adventure Coming of Age Crime

Boxes.

Eventually, we all will or have received one of these. Some of us may choose to take our eternal rest in this container six feet under in the ground. Until the final ceremonial Goodbye. Some may choose a smaller, quaint box for the final ceremonial Goodbye.

Boxes come in all shapes and sizes. Same as problems. Boxes have many meanings. Same as boxes.

There are boxers both human and worn on humans’ bodies.

Box it up is a phrase used when gathering things together. Boxes are used to protect and secure. Boxed out is a term often used to exclude. To take out.

Some carry important items to our doorstep. Some take important items and store them. Some boxes are taken away. With so called trash in them. Some are collected. Some cannot be parted with until forced.

Sometimes they hold precious memories. Sometimes they hold unpleasant memories for “storage” until retrieval is required or requested. Sometimes. We are encouraged to “put it in a box” as if to say, put it away. For later. For forever. . Depends on the problem.

In the spirit of the holidays, there is a festivity called Boxing Day. A big shopping holiday. In the spirit of animals, dogs to be specific, there is a big dog called, yes, a Boxer.

Much like life, boxes bring problems to and away from us.

Feeling boxed in is a gut feeling similar to be “cornered”. No escape. No solution. Just many little bugs trying to get in or get out. No bona fide solution as to how to navigate the bumps and boulders along the way. There is often a definite plan to collapse the box lurking around the a corner. Hmmmm, just a square box, and its solutions going round and round and round and round. Where it stops, no body knows. Kinda like a roulette wheel. Although, numerology the practice and being of a fixed mindset can help us navigate engaging in and playing this kind of wheel. Numbers are security. Numbers are fixed. On the one hand, numbers and their security and precise-ness are a remedy. On the other hand, they can be a human’s undoing.

Have you ever heard the phrase putting a square peg in a round hole. The solution may actually lie somewhere in the middle. Figuratively and Viscerally. Knowing when and how to trust in it is a whole ‘nother ballgame. A whole ‘nother ball of wax. Who knows best?

Like the guaranteeing feeling of numbers, science claims there is a concrete connection that exists. Of 1+1=2. There. It is. Fact. Conclusion. Right? No see to saw here. No roller coaster to have to ride.

Not necessarily so. The answer may lie in the troubled middle. Just consider for a moment. Scientifically speaking there is an actual physical connection of personal language spoken from the head, through and around the heart to the abdomen. Seriously. When one feels a stomach flip, or butterflies in their stomach, that is speaking to them. Speaking to themselves. People are often wary of people who talk to themselves out loud. Talking to myself, so to speak. Considered odd or weird.

The experience is so intimately felt, that describing it to another is like speaking a foreign language. When someone sees someone they care about, their stomach may flip. Nerves can cause a stomach to be tied “in knots”. Butterflies in my stomach feels unsettling. The core holds all this information.

Overdoing anything or overwhelming anything can cause our middle to reject the contents and throw them up and out.

One would surmise that the safest place to be is inside. Internal. Inside. Internal. To feel good internal is to feel good and be eternal. Unfortunately, there is no one good solution. One way or another, unless cared for and exercised properly, the muscles may weaken, the strength is lost and then, well, all can become lost.

Like a roller coaster, the heart is along for this visceral ride of life too. It too needs to be exercised both emotionally and physically. Or it may be unable to carry its weight of trials and tribulations. It needs to be pumping along in synchronicity with the head and stomach. If there is a dis connect, if the flow is not not paying attention to each other or exposing our outsides, an untimely attack can occur. Which can lead us right to our turn and time to head six feet under into our box into the ground. Before we were “ready”. Before we know what hit us.

Boxes can excite. Boxes bring remedies. Boxes bring much anticipated joy. Boxes are stacked. Boxes are snacked. Boxes are lined. Boxes hold precious contents. After opening they are broken down for space. The mystery and adventure of unboxing is often in the opening. Sometimes knowing what is inside. Sometimes not knowing what is inside. Having a guess. What it is inside. Probing and questions to consider.

Humans can excite. The mystery lies in how they contain them selves. Some are strong and some are weak. The mystery and adventure of exploring to discover what is inside. Or not knowing what is inside. Some persons keep their contents so tightly wound, their contents so protected and hidden that to pry it out of them is no small task. They may never be able to put their “stuff” in a box. They may not have the talent of trusting their gut, their intuition. They may be so used to keeping a lid on their box, that it risks exploding inward, outward, upward. Somewhere. On someone else. Left to clean up the mess.

When the internal box becomes so tight, and you cannot breathe it makes your heart work harder. If the heart is working too hard and unable to/not connecting the head to the middle as the conduit, as the connector it becomes a dangerous and vicious life cycle.

If you make a fist, it makes your heart work harder.

Depending on how one takes on this “fact”. Can be both good and bad. Right? If you make a fist and you are a boxer, fighting for someone or something bigger. Maybe fighting for your life. Working on your heart is an ongoing battle. If a person is running, making a fist will indeed make their heart work harder. And result in work against themselves. Working too hard. The answer must lie somewhere in the middle. Somewhere in the gut. In the core.Somehow, someway in trusting your gut. Release the grip and grasp. Easier said than done.

The boxer who punches, punches for some reason. Some higher, loftier goal. To get punched in the face takes an especially strong person. To take it over and over and over. Can the heart withstand the beatings? The core will know when to tell the boxer to stop. The boxer intuits when to stop. The punches and being punched.

The runner who runs, runs for some reason too. Some higher, loftier goal. To run over and over and over too takes an especially strong person. It does not really matter what they are running to or from. The secret lies in their core. The core will know when and tell the runner to stop. The runner intuits when to stop. The running and being run over.

Above the core and below the head, lies the connector cable capable of keeping it all moving, all moving forward. In the right direction. Takes an immense amount of trust. To trust the gut.

The heart. No other part can adequately function best without this one part beating. Beating for itself and beating for others.

Once it stops. It stops. All the breathing, boxing, running, jumping, riding, seeing, sawing, rolling, coasting, counting, spending, singing, ringing, slicing and dicing, goes along with it. Because there is little joy in going it alone.

December 31, 2021 23:17

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