The Mystery Continues

How frequently are you a mystery to yourself?

I'm pretty sure most people who know me well don't think of me as mysterious. My needs are simple, my passions obvious, and though I try not to be unkind, I'm not shy about expressing opinions. And I don't often surprise myself. "What you see is what you get" is arguably a good way to describe the way I show up in the world, at least most of the time. 

It's possible that my innate predictability is the biggest reason why my outsized emotional reactions to random events can sometimes render me a mystery to myself. There I am - composed, rolling along, laughing. Then, in a flash, I'm a puddle. The things that can trigger profuse tears are often numbingly mundane. I've been this way as long as I can remember. I still don't get it. Neither of my parents were particularly emotional and my three siblings reside on what I would call a normative continuum with respect to how frequently they emote.  

In the woods of Maine last week, I tried to unravel this mystery to my partner in the de-brief following a simple exercise we'd done, an exercise that had unleashed another inexplicable torrent. The unraveling was unsuccessful. As I began weeping uncontrollably - again - the only word that made sense to me as I spoke with my partner was mystery.