Push to Change

The year has come with an insistent push to change… to change in every area and many that simply needed to happen to enable the growth and evolution of the coming years. While this sounds philosophical and broad, it is pretty spot on.

I have been thinking about the best way to get clear in my mind the magnitude of all of this without

becoming overwhelmed and shaking my head in the disbelief of so much in such a short period of time. It is as though things have come full circle and while this encompasses excruciating pain, it also includes love I thought was long forgotten. However, I continue to speak in riddles.

For some time I have been feeling disconnected and a little lost. My path continuing when it had been destined to end, opening Pandora’s box of what is next. For a number of years I have been playing, searching, for what I will do with my path now that I am sticking around for longer than anticipated.

It is unnerving when life leads to a particular moment and not much was created beyond that point.

In spiritual terms, it was a rebirth. The debilitating, agonising rebirth onto a new path however, seeming continued. But it was not. I did not. One night several years ago I died. That part of me that had fought for so long, had been to hell and back in the most gruesome ways was gone. It was not about forgiveness or anything as superficially human. It simply was an end. Unfinished business finished and the path completed, (which is significantly underplaying the magnitude of this).

Then when I woke the next morning, still being here the pain remained, the loss remained, the memories becoming so much clearer and creating more questions than answers. Yet, in this I knew the answers before the question was even asked. Slowly, slowly I let those answers come to me to put together the new, albeit continued, life.

I endeavoured to follow my passions and yet, they fell short, unable to commit, unable to connect. I felt like an alien in my own body, in this time, in this world. I did not belong, even less than I did before. All the while not knowing what my purpose had become. Was it the same? Had it changed? Why did I choose to stay? Clearly my work was not done; I was not done.

Dragging my rebirthing body through the trenches of betrayal and agony, slowly, ever so slowly, I dug my way out. Every day was harder than the last, and I continued when I could. Facing, healing and dealing with my chronic illnesses, one at a time. Relapsing but continuing, for my girls.

Eventually, which felt like a lifetime unto itself, I inevitably stumbled onto a path. But, I had to start again. This was the only way. Then as the path started to unfold I started to feel something unfamiliar - my ambition and want for more. It had been years since I felt this, most of which had been drowned. So, I continued while I let me come home, reconnect to me and find my voice that was lost through screaming in the darkness for too long.

Then as this new year came. The delusion of a happy year not present, rather a year of turmoil, of incredible beauty and heart wrenching grief.

My girls had to go, despite their tenacity, the inevitable no longer patient came and went. I know they are happy and well as I hear them, feel them and see them in my dreams. Though this seems less of an ability and more of a sad consolation.

The opening of the heart to another is a gracious gift and one never given easily. Particularly amongst grief, betrayal and change faster than a blink of an eye. A door way into a new world unknown to me, a new routine, a new home and a new family. Unsettling and difficult.

What remains are the words engraved for my girls; the words tattooed on my skin: “Forever and always the strength and love in my heart” - this is the gift they gave me so I could continue when I was destined not to.