How to Survive an Existential Crisis

When you wake up at 3 AM and remember you're human

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REAL QUICK

You guys. SO MANY OF YOU became paid subscribers last week that I’m now on a first-name basis with Peter, the clerk at the post office [great guy, btw]. I had so much fun sending out “Poetry is for Rebels” sweatshirts and have even seen pictures of some of you wearing them and looking fabulous. Thank you for supporting The Second Cup.

Actual footage of my kitchen table, prepping sweatshirt packages. Note Theo’s “shopping list” and the black-eyed Susans the kids beheaded earlier that morning 🤣

And guess what? It’s still August. And we’re still celebrating The Second Cup turning 1 here on Substack this month. And I ordered MORE SWEATSHIRTS to make sure that everyone who upgrades their membership this month can have one. So what are you waiting for? Whether you choose the $5/month or $50/year option, I’ll send you one, too!

[P.s. Do you know someone else who would love The Second Cup? Gift a paid subscription to them, and get a sweatshirt for yourself! That’s what I call a win-win!]

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HOW TO SURVIVE AN EXISTENTIAL CRISIS

We joke about it:

After a long night of vegetating on the couch, Ethan and I both stand with some degree of difficulty, holding onto our backs and our knees and bellies (me) and limping off the age we feel creeping into our joints.

There is no doubt about it—we are in our thirties and the invincibility of our twenties has left us for good.

And while we laugh at each other’s aches and groans, and the song “Much Too Young to Feel This Damn Old” resonates on a whole new level, I sometimes wake in the middle of the night and feel so suddenly human that I can hardly breathe.

I feel the opposite of invincible.

I feel vulnerable.

I’ve had the title HOW TO SURVIVE AN EXISTENTIAL CRISIS in my mind for weeks now. I sat down a couple of times to write this poem; on my first stab, the opening line was simply, “Ultimately—you don’t.” Not finding that very encouraging, I scrapped it.

But it wouldn’t leave me alone. Maybe because I, too, want to know how to survive an existential crisis. How to deal with waking up at 3:00 AM and remembering that this body is wearing out—and that there is nothing I can do to stop it.

I wrote this poem for me; I wrote this poem for you. I wrote this for all of us who wake up in the middle of the night and feel bare and exposed and who desperately want to believe that at the end of it all, there will be a benevolent landing for whatever remains of us.

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HOW TO SURVIVE AN EXISTENTIAL CRISIS

I get these hints of fragility
more and more these days

often in the night I feel
a pang that shoots into 
the round parts of my belly 
to remind me that I
may have insurance and
a hospital bag 
but those are only structures
to make me feel safe;
they will not for a moment
protect me from what I am most afraid:

being human.

my body knows 
better than I do
that it has limits and 
it will 

      eventually

            break. 

and I—I am utterly exposed
to the nature of things:
far more powerful than
the systems we put in place
to manage being alive
in a world that feels, 
often,
uninhabitable. 

In the startling realization
of our frailty
how can we stand? 

There is nothing to be done
but to free fall
into 
the 
mystery

and to pray
all the while
that at the bottom
there will be one
who stands there to catch us.

I wish I could say
that we can be less human
that our plans and
preparations
will
protect us 
from that we fear most

but to rely
on the provision
of a greater One:

that is our lot in life

and it is everything
and enough
— and terrifying —
to surrender 
our systems

and point our noses onward
allowing our whole,
bare selves
to be swallowed 
by the depths
of what we cannot see

we pray for a benevolent landing
but those who claim
to know it all
know very little indeed

still I say:
take this bent body
that is soft and ripe
for pain
and envelop me in Love
[I have seen enough to trust it —
to throw all my chips at its mercy]

for if I must break
I at least want my spillage
to be 
a fragrant 
offering

to soothe a world of people 
who can't escape

being human

either.

-Deidre Braley