It Feels Like Nothing Until It Feels Like Everything
Whenever I have a crisis to manage or a speech to write, I go to a massage parlor for a full body massage. The body keeps the score, and I am a symphony. I am at my most malleable, and the cracks of my bones finally ignite the concise truths I’ve been ruminating on. Notes app novels are culled into single sentence mantras. I have had standing ovations come as a result of these sessions, but the most notable line was a literal and serendipitous saying that came to mind, quietly: “It feels like nothing, until it feels like everything.” A slight nudge can suddenly press you and forget you, like a flower in a book. You’ll defend your ignorance as simplicity, until you’re forced to watch it eclipse your purpose. Your life may change overnight, without even knowing you’ve been willing it all this time through the tightrope of action and inaction. Your unsent messages. Your attendance. Your chores. Your lies. Life is an endless debate of standing up and deciding to revive, relive, or reevaluate. You’ll never know when it’s too late, if you don’t know yourself. Half a decade ago I knew this, while slippery and silent on a massage table in Soho. It felt too soon. But better to know and feel it now, in the moment, than to never have felt at all.