The Art of Wallowing | Healthy Aging Series: S12 E12
Camp Bullis, Texas, 1975
It felt like a death march. As part of our Airbase Defense Training, the Air Force required us to march 10 miles, which included other necessary skills like orienteering, weapons fire, and combat tactics.
Today, I don’t think twice about a 10-mile hike. There’s a system of trails in the Jefferson Memorial Forest that has very little elevation change (it’s flat) and totals 13 miles, and I do that course once or twice a year, especially when I’m training for a challenging hike in Colorado, Utah, or Arizona.
Back at Camp Bullis.
On the weekend prior to the 10-mile march, a couple Airmen and I drove down to Corpus Christi, and then to Padre Island to fish and swim. Keep in mind, I burn easily.
Things did not go well, as it was late spring in southern Texas and SPF was not widespread in 1975. It was only approved by the FDA in 1978, and the first lotions were only SPF 2. Did I mention, as the blue-eyed boy, I burn easily. And being the 18-year-old young man that I was, I did not think to buy and use that previously mentioned SPF 2 lotion. At the end of the day I was toasted. So much so, that the next day I couldn’t get out of bed.
Maybe heat stroke?
That was Sunday. The 10-mile march was Monday. So, bright and early on Monday morning, I dragged myself out of my bunk, out of the Quonset-Hut Hotel that the USAF provided free of charge, into the latrine, into a cold shower, and then, I joined the formation.
BTW: I would describe the latrine as an old building, like you see in youth camps with a long open Bay. There were 20 commodes, or what civilians called toilets, lined up against one wall with no stalls. When you did your business, you had to do it in front of God and every Airman at Camp Bullis. Yeah, I know.
Now to the March
Things did not go well. I floundered. The Sergeants did a pretty good job keeping an eye on things. Eventually they called for a rest, pulled me aside and made me drink lots of water and eat salt tablets, and then decided that I was out. They called for a truck to take me back to the “hotel.”
The next thing that happened could be described as a divine intervention, but honestly, I cannot imagine what kind of God would make it rain to spare one Airman, out of a total of 350,000 enlisted Airmen in the USAF, from being a little embarrassed because he was being pulled from a 10-mile march.
And it wasn’t just a rain shower. It was a gully washer, with an outrageous lightning show. All for me, maybe, but probably not.
And, although I was overjoyed, the rest of the squadron was pissed. No rain gear. Stranded in the pouring rain for at least an hour, probably more. We were all drenched to the bone as we bitched and moaned. You might say we wallowed in our misery. I seem to recall there was a lot of that in the military service. Not all the time, but we all agreed it was our God-given right to complain about everything. It’s probably the first place I heard the phrase, “Misery loves company.” It was a bonding experience, wallowing in our misery.
There is an art to wallowing and some people have perfected it.
I’m not talking about people wallowing in a lavished lifestyle. How hard can that be? The real challenge would be to, if they have a lot of money, not wallow in it, to live a more austere lifestyle, and commit to using said money to make the world a better place.
The Art of Wallowing
When I speak about the Art of Wallowing, I use “wallow” to describe someone indulging in negative emotions, like self-pity, anger, sorrow, depression, and other negative feelings and for excessive or prolonged periods.
The Art of Wallowing is the skill we develop for perseverating about our perceived misfortunes.
Maybe this is akin to having, what some people call, a “pity party.”
But before I launch into the Art of Wallowing, I want to share two things: First, there is a time for sympathizing and, second, there’s a time for challenging people who are wallowing. People need to wallow. People need to have a time of turning inward, a time of reflecting on their misfortune. We all experience misfortune, and I think there’s something healthy about wallowing when we experience it. I don’t want to be insensitive to our need to wallow, because sometimes we are hurting and wallowing is the appropriate response to that pain.
But there is a time that we need to get up out of that wallow, much like the Buffalo and Bison, and get on with living. The challenging part is to get up and dust yourself off, and if you can’t do that, find a therapist that will help you through that process. A lifetime of wallowing is a lifetime that is being wasted.
What are some things that we wallow about??
What’s Life all About?
We wallow about our lot in life. It’s a kind of existential wallowing. What’s the point of life, where do we fit in, why is this happening to me, and is that all there is?
I remember that scene in, “City Slickers,” where Curley is explaining to the Billy Crystal character, Mitch Robbins, about “that one thing that he needs to learn about life, to make life meaningful for him,” and Curley enlightens him by saying, “That’s what you need to figure out.”
Mitch was wallowing in his feelings that life didn’t matter, he didn’t matter. He had to create meaning for himself. Maybe that’s what you need to do. Get up. Dust yourself off and find meaning in life. Do what’s important to you. Make your life meaningful.
Regretting the Past
Some people wallow in their past. They wallow in their mistakes. They wallow in their regrets. They wallow by wondering how things could have been different, they wallow in their perceived bad decisions and wonder what things could have been like.
There is a beautiful passage in the Alcoholics Anonymous literature that is referred to the 9th Step Promise. I’ll paraphrase it for you here:
If we approach this stage of our growth with care and dedication, we’ll be surprised by the changes we experience before we’re even halfway through. We’ll discover a new sense of freedom and happiness. We’ll stop regretting our past or wishing we could erase it. We’ll truly understand what serenity means and find real peace. Regardless of how low we’ve felt, we’ll see how our journey can help others. Feelings of worthlessness and self-pity will fade away. Our focus on ourselves will diminish as we become more interested in those around us. The drive to put ourselves first will gradually disappear. Our entire perspective and attitude toward life will shift. We’ll stop fearing people or worrying about financial insecurity. We’ll start to instinctively handle situations that once confused us. Suddenly, we’ll realize that a higher power is accomplishing for us what we couldn’t achieve on our own.
Again, get up and dust yourself off, or find someone that will help you do that, by helping you let go of the past.
Wallowing in Your Fears
Wallowing in your fear is another way of saying that you are living a fear-based life. We fear what others think about us. That’s a big one! We fear death and dying. Another big one. We fear failing, or we fear looking small in other people’s eyes. We fear losing our sense of importance in other people’s lives. We fear what the future holds. And of course, the result of living a fear-based life is being paralyzed by that fear. We don’t dream.
These are just a few of the things that we wallow in.
What are you wallowing in today? If the Buffalo are any kind of example for us, wallowing is good, and it helps us rid ourselves of the pests that we carry around with us from day-to-day.
I would suggest setting up a wallow-time periodically and just allow yourself to wallow. Wallow in your fears, wallow in your insecurities, wallow in your existential struggles, and wallow in your fears about the future, and about your own mortality.
Find a quiet place and enter a state of grounded breathing. Focus on the air entering and leaving your nose, so that you can feel that cool air through your nostrils. And then conjure up your fears, conjure up your regrets, conjure up your lack of meaning and purpose in your life. Use that time to step into your fears, step into your insecurities, and step into your grief.
And then get busy living.
You may need some help with this. You may need some help stepping into the fear. So, find a good therapist, or go to your therapist and tell them that you’re tired of wallowing, and you want to get busy living.
Sometimes it’s that simple.
