Healing Times

I feel like I’m at a crossroads. I’ve worked very hard to get to where I am today. A place of self-love and acceptance yet I still have so much doubt, so much guilt, so much shame. I have to admit that this is not an easy topic for me.

I care what people think even though I shouldn't. In the past, I had built up a wall that kept my emotions at bay. I look back and it seems to me that I may have seemed cold and unfeeling at times. I felt it was a weakness and it was my way of not dealing. Nowadays, I wear my emotions on my sleeve for all to see, not really by choice I might add, but I believe it’s all part of the healing process.

As I sort through my story, I’m lucky to have found a friend that I’m very comfortable discussing these things with. He has been through so many of his own trials and tribulations and he somehow has managed to crawl out of his own dark place. Compared to what he’s gone through, and still is, though, my challenges seem inconsequential yet I find them debilitating at times.  He said to me: “Dwelling on it only creates a revolving door of remorse and stupid thinking”. Intellectually, I absolutely agree with him yet on an emotional level it’s so difficult to let go. He often tells me that I spend too much time in my head and he’s right but, believe me, I don’t go there on purpose. It just happens.

There’s something to be said about digging deep down. Bringing up these emotions helps with cleaning house, so to speak. So, after what felt like an excruciating discussion a few weeks ago, I realized that I was stuck in the proverbial revolving door he had mentioned, and I decided it was time to clean house as best as I could. I had started an ‘angry’ journal a few years ago and most of the entries were mostly of current events but, once in awhile, the anger, guilt and shame would make me delve a bit deeper into my psyche to try to sort out the past events that brought forth those feelings. So, at the last full moon, I took a few moments to write out the rest of those painful moments and then I burnt that journal as I relinquished it to the universe. It was freeing!

It doesn't mean that I’m never going to have those feelings again, because honestly, now that I’ve taken down that wall, I feel so much more intensely than I ever have before. It means that, now, instead of bottling up my emotions, I have to learn to acknowledge them and then let them go, the good and the bad.  I’ve learned a couple of things in all this, first of all, your friends are your lifeline. Finding people to talk to that will listen, not judge and accept you for who you are, flaws and all, is indispensable.  Secondly, as difficult as it can be to have heightened emotions, it brings a whole new depth to my relationship with people, places and things. It is who I am, a work in progress, and I embrace it.

Lots of love,

Julie

P.S. This friend I was referring to just recently decided to tackle a couple more of those ‘trials and tribulations’ with a fierceness and conviction that was seriously inspiring. It makes me emotional just thinking about it, but most definitely in a good way.