Sometimes I even jot down a note without remembering to include the source. For example, I’m very intrigued with a new word: querencia. Where the heck did I come across it? Oh well. For some reason, the word caught my eye, and I spent some time tracking down its meaning.
During a bull fight, the bull will sometimes stake out a particular part of the ring where it feels safe: its querencia. Perhaps it’s a corner, in a square field, or perhaps it’s a place where the bull successfully toppled a horse. Whenever the bull has a chance, it will return to its querencia.
This is a term that has great metaphoric resonance.
Each of us should find our own querencia, our sanctuary, a place to which we can retreat from the lances that pursue us. Maybe that querencia is a place, like a bedroom or a bikepath – or a mental area of refuge – or a frame of mind.
But the useful metaphor doesn’t stop there.
Apparently, the bull is often most fierce and unpredictable when it’s fighting its way to its querencia. Sometimes, perhaps, it’s so important to us to gain our querencia that we’re hurtful when anyone blocks our way. Maybe it’s so important to believe that a marriage is strong that we ignore what a spouse is saying. Maybe it’s so important to believe that a child is well-adjusted that we don’t understand what a teacher means.
Also, although the bull feels safer in its querencia, its querencia didn’t necessarily afford it any greater protection from the matador.
So what’s the lesson? Identify your querencia, find comfort in it -- but use it as a strong base, not a hiding place.
*Interested in starting your own Happiness Project? If you’d like to take a look at my personal Resolutions Chart, for inspiration, just email me at grubin, then the “at” sign, then gretchenrubin dot com. No need to write anything more than “Resolutions Chart” in the subject line.
