I find it amazing that gifts appear when you least expect them, not realizing that I actually summoned them on a previous day or blur of longing. The missed phone call, the unexpected rain shower, the too soon woken house, the not yet listened to podcast - all of these things, and things like these, that didn't connect when the connection was asked for, but were there ( or showed up) for me, somehow, when the time was right and I needed it most.
I don't know about you, but on my healing journey self-forgiveness is a big one. A deeply buried voice stirs me into shame, fear, anger, distrust, isolation, failure, fraud, doubt- that can shut out any sort of compassion. As hard as I try, sometimes teasing out the woes and the gratitudes can leave me wondering who the hell I think I am, and why it even matters. I dig a pit so vast and deep that it seems like the light of love will never reach me. I recreate stories of failed attempts, unfinished endings, missed understandings, un-met potential, what could have been's and, and then ... oblivion. I find a place of self loathing where the word "healing" isn't even allowed because its synonymous with facing my own weakness and constant striving. I get stuck between the two me's. The me before my awakening and the awakened me. The confused seeker and the answered one. The inexplicable and the explained. I replay my past of shooting in the dark for fulfillment, to be left with answers that mingled with being over-fathered, under-mothered and, still, an adult child. And then, my own liability disclosed to me at forty-three...
I no longer choose to filter through my past, but rather practice my present and, yet, memory will show up on occasion. A stab, a poke, a cold. A steering into defenselessness, powerlessness, havoc. Ramifications of an undoing that stalled a becoming. A hijacking of self and purity. I am not ready to name it, my layers still gaining strength and confidence. Instead, the innuendos and the words are enough. The stroking, not stoking, of a dormant seethingness that can be let out slowly vs. maddeningly, with careful intention.
So, here and now, I lean into what Sunday's gift of stunning revealed to me. A shared poem from a dear friend who always seems to crack me open when I least expect it. Phase One by Dilruba Ahmed, an uncovering of a new mother's practice of forgiveness towards herself. Her plight and practice in forgiving her faults, mistakes, meanderings touched my scary spot and soothed it. Gave me permission to feel my fear and aloneness- while cradling me in her arms of mantra'd compassion. "Forgive me... forgive me... forgive me." (https://onbeing.org/programs/dilruba-ahmed-phase-one/)
I didn't wake up on this morning feeling alone or open to sitting with my sticky parts. But, at some point on some day I had asked for help from my higher self to continue shining light on my becoming. These 56 lines by Dilruba lulled me to a place of universal worthiness, only to spark an inward tenderness. An intention so genuinely challenging to call upon alone, to ask for with an open heart and believe that you deserve it. A re-witnessing of the innocence I lost as a young girl but now gain as a taker of absolution. The fanning of dormant flames come alive with my own mothering- now aware that the obstinate can be dissolved, the edges can be weathered with time and grace. This personal project of observation invites my own intuition to recognize that I am forgivable.
It's a process. I am learning. The ever- student. Identifying what needs to be named and what can simply be glanced at or barely whispered to create some sort of resonation. INtention is one of those things that has to be felt viscerally, underneath, inward. It doesn't shoot out of you but is culled, developed with hints of desire and understanding. Maybe a gorgeous place I visited in a dream, but I don't know how I got there. A recalling of things beautiful. The must of stillness, silence, listening. Just you and your own love. Hand over heart. Holy.
And I can't help but think that my being here on this island, a place of consistent re-invention, a survivor of exposure, a master of changed hands and best intentions, ravaged and weathered by elements beyond her control, is a teacher. An experienced witness who can take my hand and stand by me, secured in her roots as a receiver of what comes. Open. Willing. Sometimes scared. Aware. Knowing of the ground and her center. Forever forgiving to the rhythms that rise and fade, strengthen and tear down, and become, again.
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