Enough?

I’ve been journaling a lot lately. And that’s been nice. But today I felt I needed to sit at my computer and click clack my thoughts and feelings away. I felt like I needed to step into the vulnerability that comes with the possibility that someone might actually read this, as well as the hope that maybe someone might relate. 

I’m in Kilifi, Kenya, sitting at one of my favorite restaurants that hangs above the sea and sports the most beautiful sunsets in town. The sun hasn’t started to set yet so it’s still warmly shining on me as I type. But the 5:30pm kind of shine, the soft one. Not the hot 12:30pm kind of shine that makes me want to run indoors. It’s inviting. I feel invited by the sun. As the sea gently ripples beneath me I feel invited. I feel invited by the sea. I feel invited to let her do what I seem to be unable to do right now: tear up. Cry. Let tears come out of my eyes. So I guess rippling ocean will do. 

Now, this place is swanky. It’s not a place that someone on my limited income can afford to come to on a random Thursday night. In addition to sitting and writing, I have ordered myself a glass of wine. A rose. It’s delicious. The perfect amount of fruity while still being seductively dry. I’ll probably even order another. When my heart and my hands come to a place of contentment with writing, I will close my computer and order my favorite thing on this menu: the oysters. I’ve had a bad run with seafood lately. It’s felt way too meaty and fleshy for me as a person who eats a largely vegan diet. But I ordered them because I used to love them. They bring up such fond memories of pleasure and relaxation and I need that. I need that right now. I need to love them, so I will.

I’ve been contemplating the word “enough” lately. “Enough” is so elusive to me. It’s so desirable yet unattainable. I don’t quite understand it. So I have been dancing with it, getting a little closer to it with each move. My world over the past several years has largely been very dual, very binary: Too much, or not enough. 

I haven’t arrived at the beautiful middle. 

First there is too much. 

My mental illness is too much. I have waaaayyyyyy too many children to take care of. The things I need cost too much. I have spent too much time away from family. I’ve said too much. I’ve eaten too much. I’ve overcommitted.

And then there are the people who encourage me to desire and attempt to attract what feels like “too much” in my context. The say attract a perfect mansion of a home, a huge salary, the nicest car.

Then there is not enough. 

Oh, not enough. 

That’s a big one for me. The kids and families I love don’t have enough to eat. Two different people asked me to take on their children today, but I don’t have enough. I don’t have enough emotional bandwidth. I don’t have enough space in my house. I don’t have enough money.

Where does enough lie in between the binaries?

Where is not having an extravagant mansion, but also being able to pay my rent in the home I do have? Why do I always have one or the other? Why can’t I get to enough? The middle.

Where is not being crippled by depression and anxiety, but also not needing to be constantly unsustainably high on life?

Where is having children and caring for them, but not having too many or caring too much? And why can I never get there?

I attended a Dharma of Money workshop the other day and the teacher did a meditation on enough. Thinking about, meditating on, and visualizing enough felt so deeply healing and satisfying for me. It feels like a place I so desperately need to be. But I just don’t yet know how to get there.

I started keeping track of my spending lately. I made a budget of how much money I intend to spend on each area of my life. One of the areas I am struggling to stay within budget of is my habits like this. Like feeling completely overwhelmed and coming to drown my stress in oysters and wine. 

Yesterday it was potato chips.

The day before it was fries.

Today its oysters and wine.

 I have budgeted $40 per month for my eating out and drinking and snacking, but I am consistently going way over that. I am spending almost $100 per month on these indulgences. I don’t make much money at all so that’s a lot. That’s “too much”. But when I was a 21 year old bartender living in Philadelphia I would easily spend $100 on a weekend of partying. So. was that too much? Or do I now just not have enough to sustain my (sometimes unhealthy) coping practices? What is enough? Where is it? What does it taste like? Will it ever find me?

I don’t know the answers to these questions but all I know is right now I am still stuck in the binaries. I don’t have enough money to pay for this wine and oysters, but I feel like I need it after today because today was too much. I know that a two bedroom house is sufficient for me and my family. We have been squeezing into two bedrooms for months now… but I want more. I want three bedrooms. I want to have a sea view again. I want to have enough space to entertain friends. Is that too much or have I just been living on not enough?

Growing up in America, but living in Kenya has made the whole notion of enough very confusing.

Today was a day of too much and not enough. 

I had too much responsibility, but not enough time. 

I had not enough money, but too many financial responsibilities. 

I had no more emotional capacity left, but a daughter that needed me to be strong for her.

I had too many emotions and not enough tools.

I had too many oysters and too much wine…. Or was it just enough?