This 9/11, as we are more “connected” than ever, we can unwittingly forget something important. On this day, we can read articles, sure, and watch videos, and react on Facebook. We may feel like we’re honoring the day. But are we really?

We are so busy these days. We run from one thing to another. Busy busy busy. Accomplishing one task after another. And always, phone in hand. Answering a text, checking social media, watching a video.

But we are missing something monumental. Something vast and beautiful: the self.

The self is the part of us that grieves on 9/11. The self reacts, feels, and knows. The self is who we really are. And yet we rarely allow our self to be heard.

When we keep ourselves constantly busy, we block out the full experience of our humanity, our feelings, our thoughts, our hopes and dreams. You might say that we distract ourselves from our selves.

What do we really feel on this day? Do we feel sad, afraid, grateful, happy, relief? Grief?

Some of these feelings are hard, and we don’t want to let it hurt. We would rather numb, read or watch something, do anything except for being in touch with what is going on inside of us.

This 9/11, I encourage you to pause. Stop, even for just a minute, and and ask yourself how you feel. Remember how you felt that terrible day, and in the days and weeks that followed. Ask yourself how you feel now. Is it what you’d expect?

We human beings are infinitely complex. There is so much going on below the level of our awareness. Denying it is to deny our very selves. Experiencing it is to be truly living.

We owe it to those who perished, and we owe it to ourselves.

Shimmy Feintuch, LCSW CASAC-G maintains a private practice in Brooklyn, NY, and Washington Heights, NYC, with specialties in addictions and anxiety. He is also an Adjunct Professor at the Wurzweiler School of Social Work at Yeshiva University. Contact: (530) 334-6882 or shimmyfeintuch@gmail.com. 

Sign up for the Spiritual Sofa newsletter to receive each blog post before it's posted here!