Chapter 9
Since Eden had first mentioned it, the subject of bottling this feel-good energy remained on her mind throughout the day, popping in and out as they went through the registration process, which was identical to the one she had experienced with Debbie.
The getting to know each other icebreakers were simple enough, and then they settled in for an introductory meditation to help everybody relax and get ready for a wonderful weekend.
Having not been great at meditating and always finding it a struggle—what with all the thoughts in her head—Eden really hoped tips and tricks would be shared to give her a little better technique in terms of shutting down her busy mind.
Her mind always ran amok, her thoughts rampant.
Plus, this time, hopefully her focus was more on the actual retreat and less about her fight with Debbie, like their last time here.
As Eden worked her way through this intro meditation, she felt Eric right beside her, dropping deeper and deeper, seemingly without effort or any struggle, and that was enough to drive her crazy.
When they had their first break, Eric looked over at her, and she frowned at him. “You are frowning. What is the problem?” he asked.
“You,” she muttered in frustration. “I mean, you just come out of the blue, sit down, and it’s like you’ve meditated forever.”
His eyes opened wide. “Did I ever tell you that I hadn’t meditated?”
She frowned and then shook her head reluctantly. “I guess I assumed that you didn’t.”
“Don’t assume,” he said, with a laugh, “because it’s not true.
I may not have a ton of experience, but I’m certainly not totally green at it.
” She scoffed and he chuckled. “Any creative, deep-thinking work can be a meditative state,” he explained.
“It’s not that it’s right or wrong or good or bad.
It’s just the experience you want. So, I find that I do much better at work when I’m in that state. ”
“Right,” she muttered, and then she sighed. “I was just getting so frustrated because I can’t shut down my mind. It’s a maze in there.”
“And what is it that circles through your mind when doing this?” he asked curiously. “I mean, it could be a lot of things. I’m just wondering where your mind is at.”
“Usually it’s problems, like work, other people, and those sort of things, but right now it’s Debbie,” she shared. “And that just makes it even more frustrating because I don’t want her to be part of this.”
“Of course,” he noted.
“I had always wanted to come here and had intended to do this solo. Yet she made a big point of coming along, then ended up ditching me. It was my plan to do all this—the retreat, I mean, to take a break myself.” Eden sighed.
“I wasn’t even quite ready to come. I wanted to save up a little more, but Debbie insisted.
So I ended up with half of it on my credit card, and now here I am doing it again.
I always had to watch every penny, but Debbie spent money as if she had it, as if she always had more than I did. ”
“I thought she was broke, especially after that last boyfriend cleaned her out.”
“Yeah, she was, but she worked a lot of overtime after that. Come to think of it, lately she had a lot more money than I did.”
“Right. So, now we’re back to that interesting friendship you had with her.”
“I don’t know that calling it that is even fair,” she replied, shaking her head. “Maybe I’m the one who was not a good friend.”
“And, as an empath, you would think that immediately too,” he noted, shaking his head. She glared at him, and he just smiled, tucked her hand into his arm, and, although reluctant, she let him. “Let’s enjoy the fresh air.” Ignoring her protests, he dragged her along.
Almost immediately the fresh air hit and sent calming waves down around her. “Oh, this is nice,” she whispered. “I don’t know how you knew this was what I needed, but, boy, you’re right. It is exactly what I needed.”
“Sometimes all it takes is a chance to settle back and to let the frustration go. Sometimes we are our own worst enemy when it comes to this. Just calm down and let your mind drift. Watch the thoughts come and go, but don’t get hung up on them. That’s really all you need to do.”
“You make it sound easy.”
“I know, and, of course, it isn’t. It’s never that easy, and, if it were, everybody could do it and wouldn’t need these retreats.”
“It seems as if everybody is always doing it,” she shared, “and I’m always the one not doing it properly.”
He grinned at her. “It’s really not always about you.”
She looked at him for a moment, blinked, and then burst out laughing. “Thanks for that. That definitely put me back in my place.”
“I’m not trying to put you into any place,” he declared, with a dry laugh. “I’m just trying to give you the freedom to be you.”
She smiled and nodded. “By the way, it worked. And you’re right. I find it far too easy to trash myself.”
“And that comes from a lifetime of not feeling as if you have any value,” he shared.
“It seems you’ve been there.”
“I have been there,” he confirmed, “and that’s okay too. We all must get to the same place on our own pathway.”
“Is that right?” she questioned. “Because plenty of people believe they can get there first, and then they don’t have to wait for anyone else.”
“Of course they do. There will always be people in this world who think they don’t have to do anything for anybody else.
Those people don’t want to help you. They just want to compete with you and win.
That’s because their egos are so damaged and so small that they only feel better if they’re knocking down other people. ”
She winced at that but nodded. “I’ve seen more than a few people like that.” He didn’t say anything. “And you’re right, to a certain extent. That’s exactly who Debbie was too.”
He smiled and nodded.
Eden added, “Yet Debbie would say, It just never really mattered to me.”
He just nodded again.
Eden frowned. “I don’t know how an outsider gets a better perspective on my relationship with Debbie than I do.”
“It’s literally because I’m an outsider,” he pointed out, turning to her. “I’m not caught up in all the drama of your relationship with Debbie. So I can get a much better perspective and can see it for what it is.”
“If you say so,” she muttered, frowning.
The second round of meditation went better, and then they attended some lectures and had a lunch break.
Through it all, everything seemed normal, and Eden was caught up in the enjoyment of the seminar.
As she walked toward the restaurant for lunch, about one hundred people came along too, all from this weekend’s retreat.
She glanced around, looking for Eric, but saw no sign of him. She frowned, waited off to the side, when Richard walked over and asked, “You’re not having lunch?”
She smiled at him and explained, “Absolutely I am. I was just waiting for Eric.”
“Ah.” He smiled and added, “I’m sure he’ll find you.”
Feeling a little foolish for waiting for him, and yet not knowing why, she walked toward the restaurant with Richard.
As they reached the one area where people were sectioning off into two sides of a buffet, he motioned at her and offered, “We have a free chair at our table, if you would like to join us. I’ll be sitting there with my brother and some of the others. You are welcome to join me.”
She flushed and mumbled something odd, not even sure what she said, then hurried over to the buffet section to get her food. The thought of Richard making a pass at her didn’t make her feel special. It made her feel off.
And it somewhat dimmed the enjoyment she had felt so far this morning. When she looked up again, Eric was walking toward her.
Seeing her smile with relief, his eyebrows shot up. As he got closer, he asked, “Problems?”
She shrugged. “Richard invited me to sit over at the main table with them.”
He didn’t say anything, just kept his head down and glanced off to the side, then back at her. “Do you want to go?”
She looked over at him and rolled her eyes. “Pretty sure the invitation was for me only.”
He chuckled. “I’m sure it was. When you look in the mirror, you don’t see the beautiful young woman looking back at you.” He winked at her, and a blush came on.
She stared at him and then shook her head. “I’m in my early thirties, and I think it’s been at least ten years since anybody said anything like that to me.”
He looked at her in surprise. “That’s too bad.”
“Whatever,” she muttered. “Anyway, I don’t want to go over there unless you come with me.”
“If you’re not sure the invitation was for both of us—”
She grimaced because, no matter how lightly he was taking it, joking and all, he was right. “I’ll pass,” she stated firmly.
“Okay.”
He seemed agreeable to it, but she noted that he kept an eye on Richard’s table during lunch. Then she realized that maybe something was off about the whole thing. “You don’t think he knows, do you?”
Eric popped a bite of French bread into his mouth and asked casually, “Knows what? Did he seem to recognize you?”
“That’s the problem,” she noted, shaking her head. “I’m not sure he did.”
He smiled. “Don’t worry about it.” And his tone was just firm enough that she wanted to believe him.
“But he was crazy over Debbie, so why is he scoping out the women here?”
“Hard to say, but, in case you hadn’t noticed, quite a few women are looking at you a little enviously.”
“Yeah, that’s because you’re with me,” she replied. He frowned at that, but she nodded. “You think I can’t tell when other women are scoping out the men in the room? That’s just something women do.”
“It’s a male thing too,” he admitted, “and, yeah, there’s definitely a little bit of that going on, but there’s way more women here than men.”
Surprised, Eden looked around and then agreed. “I hadn’t really noticed.”
“It’s probably at least a 70 to 30 percent mix on this.”
“And is that because most men don’t come to these things?”