Unmanaged stress and the high levels of Cortisol it produced compromised my neurology. I could feel the emotion-regulating volume of my brain withering away literally. Indeed, the sensation of an amygdala shrinking and wrinkling is a particular one, yet a very real phenomenon that’s not too hard to imagine. Picture a soaked sponge being squeezed ever-slowly and its contents dissipating into thin air. It would be egregiously misleading to suggest the analogy of a grape transforming into a raisin. There was nothing sweet or desirable about what I was going through. Although I conveyed what I was experiencing to my doctors and a few friends, nobody explained how or why this could be happening to me. Insights into brain and neurological science came years later after I learned how to put my psychological tumult to rest. At the heart of this liberation was my discovery of Vipassana meditation. However, the renewed hope and fresh insights it infused had me further develop in unlikely ways afterward. For example, becoming an English teacher in Paris after my divorce from Sandrine had much to do with my rehabilitation. No, I can’t use that word! It gives the impression Eric was restored like a classic automobile. I couldn’t straighten, solder, and buff the rusted and broken parts of my identity. How could I have when the universal framework and dynamics of impermanent nature were, unbeknownst to my consciousness, off my inner radar? Instead, for all of my life, it had been scanning for and detecting other types of treasure — ephemeral. Just as on January 1st, 2011, when the treads of my tires began to swerve violently left and right on black ice, my self-image had also lost traction, launching me into a crocodile-like thrashing, whipping, merciless struggle.
Photo: "Black Ice"
Eric Baronsky
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