Let's Make Soup, Shall We?

Or, the importance of having a practice in preparation for Nov. 5.

It's well established that when a woman is pregnant, people (all kinds of people!) ask her questions (all kinds of questions!) about her body and her plans. It's as true today as it was more than 30 years ago, when I was pregnant with my older daughter.

I didn't mind the questions. As a first-time mom, I felt that being pregnant was pretty much the only thing meaningful going on in the world. Why shouldn't folks be curious?

But there was one question I never saw coming and didn't have an answer for, and it went like this:

"So. What are you planning to do to get in shape for this baby?"

There are a million reasons never to ask a pregnant woman what she's going to do to get in shape for this baby, starting with, "Wait, are you saying I'm not in shape?"

And yet the curious person knew something I didn't: that growing another human can be just like running a marathon, and that optimizing one's body for months of sleep deprivation pays important dividends.

Today, we citizens of the United States are about 33 weeks pregnant with the Being who will becoming the 47th president. If you're feeling a little achy, or having difficulty taking a full breath, that's to be expected. The third trimester can be so uncomfortable.

But even though big change feels imminent, we still have time to get in shape for this baby. In addition to our duty to arm ourselves with information and vote with our entire brains and whole hearts, each of us would do well, in my humble opinion, to have a plan and practice to protect that brain and heart — and especially the soul — in the face of what's to come.

Because some of it is almost guaranteed to be ugly.

Each of us remembers what it has been like when our candidates of choice have won and when our candidates have lost. In recent political history, all of that has come with a good deal of soul-sucking despair. It's easy to become so consumed by the proceedings and outcomes of elections that our own lives can been significantly diminished, our own precious days on the planet wasted.

It pains me to admit that I spent four straight years in a state of fury because I gave hawk-like attention to events over which I'd already deployed my one tiny lever of control. I hadn't bothered getting in shape for the, um, baby. I had put zero self-care practices in place, by which I definitely do not mean bubble baths and Haagen-Dazs.

Real self-care here means erecting a protective barrier around one's soul so that the self is as insulated as it can be from election-related trauma. Self-care means keeping things small and holding them close.

Self-care might mean making soup.

I make soup with chunks of sweet potato, broth, lots of black-eyed peas and diced tomatoes, diced jalapenos and herbs. I make soup on top of my electric stove, the one I bought to replace the gas stove I hated, the one that makes me happy whenever I use it or clean it no matter who is in the White House.

Making soup protects the soul because soup is small and real. I control the ingredients and spiciness, and I nourish anyone I feed with it, including myself. Aware of the big show going on Out There, I draw my focus back to soup in its simplicity.

Never underestimate soup.

I also make work.

I make work with paint and pens and a keyboard, which again are all in here, within my grasp. I make work knowing sometimes I need to set it down and read something distressing or send money or make a phone call in service of the country I love (which so often loves me back, by the way). But when I have done what I can do, I return to work with quiet insistence that I truly leave the Out There out there.

I also meditate.

More. I meditate more now than ever, which isn't saying much, because my meditation practice tends to be more like one of those five-minute oil changes than a full swami-approved devotional. But the practice, however imperfect, helps build a barrier of space and time between the Out There and the In Here.

If you have no plan or practice for the birth of 47, please receive this exhortation to join my virtual club of people who meditate imperfectly but with regularity. There are no dues or meetings. This is an evidence-based antidote to a lot of what ails us, and over time the yield is plentiful.

I tune into how tuning into the news is feeling at a given moment, and am quicker to change the channel when distress sets in. Distress that can be upcycled into meaningful action is good fuel. Distress downcycled into handwringing is corrosive. Again, I wallowed in four years of corrosive handwringing the last time things didn't go as I'd hoped. Been there, done that, burned the T-shirt. Talk about not going back!

There are so many more ways to be intentional about protecting ourselves in this time and the era that follows. Staying one's hand above the keyboard before spraying our frustration across social media is a good one. I am still learning this. While catharsis can be so tempting — I get it! — it's not like there's some great neutralizing-emotions god on Facebook who just happily absorbs it all and leaves us feeling more sane. No. Our frustration comes back exponentially in the form of our friends vehemently agreeing with us or, in some cases, arguing.

We can be so much more resourceful, too, in finding ways to balance the karmic scales. Our brother needs a phone call. Our neighbor needs her lawn mown. Our dog needs an hour in the woods. A friend could use a little pick-me-up gift for no reason — or perhaps soup. Perhaps our friend needs a bowl of soup.

Understand, I am not arguing for civic disengagement. I am just making the case for recognizing that we are not, as individuals, our country's broken system. Each of us must heed our sense of duty as good citizens while we protect and maintain the most precious resources we have: our senses of joy, agency, connection and care for ourselves and others.

So now to you.

How are you planning to get in shape for this baby?

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Thumbs up for Sebastian Junger's newish book

Thanks to bookseller and philosopher Ryan Holiday's book recommendation newsletter¹, I recently read Sebastian Junger's In My Time of Dying.² The best-selling author of The Perfect Storm and many other titles, Junger here reveals his experience of nearly dying from an aneurysm in a blood vessel near his pancreas. An adventurous, fit and pain-denying guy like Junger was wholly unprepared for dealing with the condition that almost took his life. He shares in vivid detail the wild medical ride he took while doctors tried to save him and the humbling aftermath of the trauma.

Junger is an exceptional writer and thinker. Even in a memoir, he is the ultimate journalist who infuses his personal experience with expansive information about medicine, near-death experiences and the human problem of enjoying life alongside the inevitability of death.

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About the art

This pretty-in-pink celebration of soup making was stirred up just for this post. The original can be purchased here, if you're interested.

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Notes

1. Sign up to receive Ryan Holiday's book-recommendation newsletter here.

2. Sebastian Junger's In My Time of Dying.