crois en toi
“We cannot tear out a single page of our life, but we can throw the whole book in the fire.”
My sister says she can remember the day I phoned her from the red phone booth like it happened just a moment ago. I kept saying I was fine, which is how she knew I was not.
I spoke with her on the phone for several minutes that day. It was spring, a day like today, balmy and generous. The wind cooled my cheeks and settled the flutter of my soul. It flies up and out to witness what is happening, to avoid the direct experience. I understand. The spirit takes root in the sacred and there is nothing blessed about incontinence.
My legs were sticky. My feet were sore. My back burned and my eyes were itchy. I now recall what I felt, as if it had just occurred. I was not fine; I was mad! I felt insane and reckless. I called my sister to be soothed and when I heard her voice, I was filled with Shame.
Why do I do what I do? What am I trying to escape?
I crave today what I did back then: to be seen and supported. To have those warm arms wrapped around my body. To hear someone whisper lovingly in my ear. To nestle in closer and feel that I belonged.
My soul was seeking in the wrong places. For over a decade, my body made up for the wretchedness.
Sometimes I drank and took drugs to avoid the sadness and the utter loneliness of not understanding who or what I was.
Sometimes I took drugs to fit in.
Sometimes I drank to dim the noise.
Sometimes I got high to avoid feeling myself.
Sometimes I did things I did not want to do to kill a part of myself I could not control.
Looking back, I feel that a lot of the times I teetered on blackout- in between the worlds- what I was really after was a connection to the Goddess.
I wanted to touch the immeasurable quality of Truth. I loved to dance and fling my body to a rhythm with all the other sweaty, needy, consuming bodies! I lurched forward, seeking the sensation of my skin splitting and my soul spiraling out and up, out and up! I wanted to taste divinity. I wanted to dance with the spirits. I longed to feel free.
It has taken me ten years with yoga to understand that this freedom comes from within. I can discover it on the dance floor, soaked in salt and reaching outwards with my fingertips and toes. But I can attain it sober; I do not need to be damp, smokey, and consuming.
Looking back, I don't think I ever hated myself. I felt ashamed of myself. I felt guilty, wretched, and loathsome, but these ideas of who I have come from outside. From the words, other people used to describe me. I would have never called myself the names tossed at my person. Carelessly and unlovingly. I received them all with wide open arms even when daggers were aimed at my palms.
I was never crucified. I learned the art of yoga before my physical death. My guides are also very strong. Someone was watching me. The three gold bands wrap me like an egg. I was protected. I was loved.
I am love.
I understand that my source of discontent was through the desperate search for a thing that was never properly named or informed. I had to fail and flounder. I have been manipulated and abused. And I am stronger from these lessons through adversaries.
My will to live, love, and spread light is much stronger than the grasping, hate, greed, need, loathing, lecherous, and lonesome squabble of the world!
There is something delicate inside of me that I have never wanted to contain. When dancing, I would fling it out into the matrix of misunderstanding. I trusted it would come back, and it always did. I would find it a bit smeared and listless and breathe it back to life. Gently and more tenderly as time passed. Sometimes it took weeks to arrive. Depression is an experience of the soul's vacation.
I realized the recklessness of my actions while wearing a pink romper in the streets of Barcelona. I could tell you that I'd had a terribly romantic night, dashing about the Spanish streets with a lover. I could tell you that we walked hand in hand, hips grazing, through the narrowed archways until we found a small bar with live music. I could tell you about the pennies pushed into the cave-like walls, of how he pulled a few coins from his pocket and winked at me before aligning them in a row on a long craggy lip. I could tell you that we split a bottle of wine with oysters and mussels and bread and a dark green sauce we licked off our fingers. I could tell you that we waded into the warm water and watched the moon kiss the sea. I could tell you that we swam in our clothes and floated with our hair spread out like merpeople. I could tell you these stories and they would be true. They would also be a lie.
How can things be one way and also another at the same time?
How can I love this delicate part of myself yet act in a way that harms my body?
How can I feel the closest to someone I never see or touch?
I cannot think my way out of the paradox. It has to come from my intuitive body- the aspect of myself that is ageless, timeless, and ultimately true.
I know before I know, you know?
The things I dream of keep happening. Forwards and backward- it is all the same. I am in a transitionary phase and the feeling is to adapt and accept. The depth of understanding is limited with the consious mind. Give it to the softness of your soul, She says, and allow it to transform when you are not looking.
Hold your focus on something solid so the subtle elements can seep through.
All this time, I've been working away at something I've never understood. My life stands out like a stone in an archway, painted blue and yellow. Up close, it is a colored rock. Stepping back, I see that it is a portrait of a mandala on a bridge with cars above and boats below. Supporting and sustaining, providing passageways for travelers.
Did you know that the pyramids were constructed to direct weather patterns? The sides reflect the sun and small holes direct the wind. You cannot see the cavities in the pictures. You have to go there to know it.
I want to break the geometric pattern and feel the gap. I want to push my spirit into the chasm just to say I am here! I belong!
Photo source.
