Changes

Inspired by Promise's blog, I started thinking of all the changes I've been going through. Not just in my life, but in me. Sometimes it is difficult to look back and see how far I have come...hard to see the forest through the trees I suppose. It's a different perspective when you are intimately involved. It's easy to see the change in others...yet somehow harder to see it in the one we know best.

I'm happier now than I have been in almost 14 years. I didn't even realise I was unhappy then. Sure, there was sadness, but my life rocked. I had wonderful friends and tons of amazing adventures. Yet I was never settled. I was constantly searching for the next great thing. I tended to flit from here to there and never fully committed to anything - an activity, a person...myself.

The past two years I was blessed with even more close and amazing friends. Friends who are patient with me. Friends who let me be me, whomever that may be at the time - happy, giggly, sad, tearful, angry. They just absorb it all and provide a mirror when I need one. Existing in that environment has been more beneficial to me than I can express. Also my "healing" work (for lack of a better term) with William the past year and a half has been phenomenal. I have worked through and let go of things I didn't know if I would ever be able to. I have let go of so much fear, yet feel overwhelmed by the amount that is still present. In one session I was able to let go of more than most do in a lifetime.

I am just now starting to see myself as my friends do and starting to get an inkling of the power I truly possess. I can finally see how I shut down my sexual/sensual/feminine side for most of my life and how that has prevented me from getting what I truly want. It amazes me to be afraid of something so wonderful and so natural, yet I am. What is even more amazing is being able to heal the rifts within me, and not just within me, but in my mother's spirit as well. Turns out she had done the same thing I did with the sexuality...though maybe not quite to the same extent...for the same reasons - to be accepted by her parents in a Catholic household. I'm not bashing Catholics or Catholicism, I think the message is great. It's just sometimes the way the message is taught that doesn't work. Mom didn't know any better and how to do it any other way...so we are both healing. Somehow her healing is more important to me than my own and I am so grateful William is able to help her during this journey. It's also awesome to know both my parents are still with me even though they are physically gone from this world.

I find myself letting go of the guilt around things I should never have felt guilty about in the first place. I find myself understanding my emotions more and being able to deal with them in a healthy way. I now understand when I am cranky or grumpy that it really isn't about that current situation, but more about whatever I am working through and am (usually) able to act accordingly. I am now able to cry...in front of others...and not be completely bothered by it. That is massive for me! The girl who didn't cry for years and years and wasn't able to when her mom got sick because she had shut herself down so much after her dad dying, now allows herself to cry when she needs to and get comfort when she needs to. It's not perfect, but it's better. Being "brave" enough to ask for help when I need it is still a skill I am learning, but I am getting there.

I am acting more and more like a 5 year old these days, but in a good way. In a delighted by the world around me kind of way. In the ability to giggle at silly things and be playing kind of way. I'm noticing my sarcasm isn't as caustic as it once was and that I notice when it is and start searching for why that is coming out. I'm starting to like me...all of me - what I see in the mirror, what I examine internally, my actions toward others. There is still a long, uphill journey ahead, but I think it is wonderful I started the journey.

I feel truly blessed to be on this path. It's exactly where I need to be. Thank you to those who have stuck by me and continue to be by my side as I slowly emerge from my cocoon.

This moment of reflection was inspired by the letter P and the number 30.