When it's Lost Forever

How to keep moving forward

Humans have a very strange way of learning. As babies, we have to fall before we can walk. As a child, we learn about danger through pain. Until we get our hands on that hot thing, we seem guided by that invisible force to discover it.

I remember my mother, serious look in her eyes, warning me not to touch that sharp thing. But that blade fascinated me. It seemed harmless. It was only after another experience, as painful for my finger as for my ego, that I understood the reason for my mother’s admonition.

I’d earned the endless “I told you.” And understood that pain is a learning tool that teaches us the limits of our kingdom.

In adolescence and adulthood, emotional pain replaces physical pain. 
Pain becomes a teacher. Wisdom, the lessons of this one.

Several types of pain will punctuate our human experience. One of the worst will be loss. Human beings are strangely wired. We realize the importance of certain things only when we’ve lost them. Absence becomes obvious when it’s gone.

Life is a cycle, a beginning and an end. As beings who bond by default, we will experience loss. Without warning. Almost inevitable in the experience of the human condition. To live is to risk suffering. To become attached is to risk separation. Our loves sometimes have great difficulty overcoming these forced separations.

Why is loss so painful?

Because when we lose what’s precious to us, we lose a part of ourselves. Part of our identity. We have to mourn a part of ourselves that will no longer exist. This person, or this thing, was an integral part of our lives. Losing it is frightening. Because we have to reinvent ourselves. Move on. Become something new. And sometimes, we love who we are. We were happy. We don't want to change. But often, life leaves us no choice. We have to find a new meaning, a new identity. Overcoming an imposed situation.

Over the centuries, poets, writers and philosophers have explored these themes.

The poet Lamartine has a line symbolizing this intense emptiness we can feel. 

“Un seul être vous manque et tout est dépeuplé.” 

Only one being is missing, and everything is depopulated.

One person is missing, and despite everything around us, everything is empty. Despite a world full of life, the absence of that one person makes everything bland.

This line comes from a poem entitled “L’isolement” (Isolation), which he wrote after his love, Julie Charles, was struck down by tuberculosis.

It describes a man lost in nostalgia, observing the world around him, gigantic, immense, and yet feeling that 
“Nulle part le bonheur m’attend.”
“Nowhere does happiness await me.”
A tragic line marking his despair.

In the next verse, even the charm of nature has disappeared in his eyes. Everything has become vain. In the next few lines, he is struck by the indifference of the world’s beauty. Then comes emptiness. Then comes the lack of desire. What he desires is no more. Then he can no longer desire.

The poem ends darkly, sharing a man’s suffering and despair.

Its poem reminds me of a Makoto Shinkai movie. The story of a love that is difficult for one of the protagonists to survive. Stuck in the nostalgia of the past. Struggling to build anything.
Set to words in the film’s soundtrack. 
“How much more do i have to lose, before my heart is forgiven?”
Then, the story of a man trapped in his past, searching for the face of his beloved wherever he goes.

I’ve lost. 
Strangely, it’s my losses that have set me on this writing path. Without loss, I probably wouldn’t be writing these lines. Loss is precisely why I encourage the philosophy of the now. 

Not knowing what the threads of fate have in store for us. It’s a necessity to enjoy what we have, to make the most of all the good things this world has to offer. We don’t want to live with the regret of not having done what we should have done.

Loss being almost inevitable.
How can we make peace with ourselves when it’s lost forever? 
How can we dare to become attached again when we know how painful separation is?
How can we avoid getting stuck in the past and allow ourselves to live a future?

I can’t say I’ve found a cure. That would be a lie. But there are a few ideas to explore. 

The first comes from an observation. If life is a succession of cycles, the end of one cycle can be the beginning of a new one. And if the previous ones were a source of joy, the next ones can be too. And why not even greater joys? 

A cycle can begin again, but you have to dare to start it. We could discover new things, new experiences. It won’t erase the past, but it will create a future. Refusing to try, voluntarily remaining in the past, is the assurance of the end. We are creatures who need to evolve to feel alive. Stagnation is a danger for beings like us.

I was talking about identity in the paragraph above, and that’s why a few days ago I mentioned the concept of liquid identity. The more liquid an identity, the more resilient it will be. The more it won’t fear change. It will endure pain, but understand that it needs to adapt to move forward.

The second inspiration comes from a poem by Rudyard Kipling : “If”.
A poem he dedicated to his son. 
Two parts of the poem interest us.

“If you can meet Triumph and Disaster
And treat those two impostors just the same;”

In this first part, the poet highlights the fact that triumph can also be a source of evil. Success often means the end of a cycle for many. Unable to manage success, it’s the moment when many risk too much and lose everything. A new cycle begins. 
Triumph and defeat must be treated in the same way. They are not ends.

A second pair of verses interests us.

If you can make one heap of all your winnings
And risk it on one turn of pitch-and-toss,
And lose, and start again at your beginnings
And never breathe a word about your loss;

4 lines exploring human condition. We’re going to take risks. And there will be some loss. But instead of staying in the past, we can start again. Without saying a word.

The third lead comes from all the great stories. By studying the great stories that have made up our world. Loss is often at the heart of these stories. One of the first tale tells of Gilgamesh losing his friend Enkidu. Faced with the pain of this loss, he embarks on a quest to conquer death. From ancient stories to modern ones, whether true or fictional, loss is the starting point for many stories.

What symbolizes the heroism of these stories? Courage. The hero is not the one who carries on when he has everything. The hero is the one who keeps on fighting when he’s lost everything. He has no reason to go on, he’s broken, but… he goes on. The hero rises again and again. 

Philosophically, his flame of life is always stronger than his loss. His eyes are always on the future, not the past. He turns his pain into hope. Sometimes he doesn’t even know what he’s fighting for, but he knows he has to keep going. He is a manifestation of resilience.

I wanted to conclude with Lamartine. Our man of dark verses. He put his feelings into prose in 1820. He lost Julie Charles in 1817. But although these verses seem hopeless, Lamartine’s story didn’t end there. The end of one cycle became the beginning of another. 

He married Mary Ann Birch in 1820. Became a politician. Became a leading figure in the abolitionist movement against slavery. He himself, who said he had lost his taste for life, lived an intense 52-year supplementary life.
Lamartine is living proof that life doesn’t stop at the end of a cycle. Even if he felt it did.

On these last lines, faced with the difficulties that this earthly experience has to offer us. All that’s left is to try and be the heroes of our own stories.

Have a great Sunday.