This morning as I laid in bed listening to the rain outside I knew it was time to break my blogging log-jam.
I've been talking to Toci's Thirteen Moons circle about the importance of keeping the channel of inspiration clean as we open to manifesting from spirit. When we open up our crown and intuition and listen deeply, guidance comes from the unmanifest source / god / goddess / creator / life into manifestation in the form of inspiration or insights. We then have a choice if we want to feed this spark of spirit into a fire that is grounded on earth. When we choose to take action, we are in a co-creative dance with spirit, bringing the invisible into form.
But if we ignore the messages, or don't take action on something without consciously letting it go, things can start to stagnate in our being. Energy is meant to flow. So when we have an impulse from the divine, a nudge from our highest self, a tap on the shoulder from life, we want to either take action or let it go. For me, joyful creativity is the thread that I want to run through all my actions. We take action by taking steps, which might be gathering more data, talking to others, creating a task list and starting the next baby step, going into meditation to get more insight, getting on the phone or email or a plane to meet with allies -- the list of actions is infinite. But there is also the action of realizing this is not feasible right now, and letting it go. Or the action of: that inspiration that flew by is now gone, stop grasping after it. Or the action of: I don't want to do this, and surrendering it up. Or the action of: not now, later, and setting it aside with awareness. Without this conscious choice to go forward or let inspiration go, we can end up chin deep in unmanifested possibilities and the dried up shells of dreams.
So in the spirit of creating flow again in my blogging world, here is the final blog in a series I started a year ago, on Dissolving a Marriage.
First, thanks to all the folks that have written or shared with me over the past year how much reading my process has helped them. My prayer is that by sharing a part of my intimate process around a big transition in my life, I can help others find a bit more ease and grace in their own transitions.
Synopsis for those who haven't read part 1 Dissolving a Marriage or Part 2 Dissolving Into Light: Last year my beloved, business partner, husband, and friend moved to Colorado and we ended our ten-year partnership, sparking an intense year of healing and transition for me. The journey has been deep into the underground of my being, a shake up of my soul, a shattering of my heart that I chose to step towards, to explore. I wanted to stay with my process, to witness what it takes to heal when it feels like the rug has been pulled out from under your feet and the foundation of what is familiar and loved is gone. I wanted to not abandon myself in the spiritual abuse of: "you shouldn't feel this way. Everything is perfect, why are you suffering?" Instead I embraced my own journey, and my desire to heal from the inside out. I stayed with my broken heart, curious about how we heal as humans, curious about how this being of HeatherAsh would heal her heart.
What I've learned: time does heal the heart when we allow it to. I've watched and felt my emotional body go through the initial stabbing, tearing pain of my loss and grief, to feeling tender and vulnerable and how the pain was only activated by a big event, which would reopen the tears and grief. It has been a process for sure, ups and downs, days where I didn't think about my ex-husband at all, days when suddenly it felt like he and I were energetically continuing a conversation started long ago, weeks when I couldn't stop the cycling of the past, or trying to figure out what I could have done differently.
As I've let go more and more, I've been able to look back with more ease to see my part in the dynamic, where the turning points were, what I might have changed. These are what I call the choice points. It took me a while to find the spaciousness to look back with love and curiosity.
Early on I made an agreement with myself that served me well: To not scour the past for clues of what went wrong if I was in self-judgment or feeing victimized. When I did this, I only created more pain for myself. I chose to focus on nourishing myself, continually asking myself: "what are you missing/craving/needing right now?" I practiced letting go of what I had lost to focus on what I had now. I listened deeper than the pain, not shoving it aside, but peering beneath the waves of grief, anger, despair, frustration, confusion, letting them roll over and through me as I quested for the calm knowing beneath. Sometimes I was smashed by a wave, sent tumbling in emotion and story, not knowing what was up or down. Sometimes I found my breath, inhaled deeply, and dove beneath the chaos of mind and emotions into the expansive silence of spirit.
Many days I face planted in the sticky stagnant swamp of story, caught in the quicksand of "why" and "what if." And over time I learned to avoid the swamp and instead ride the waves of my emotions more gracefully, to weep when I needed to weep, and then to dry my eyes, smile, and move on. I knew I wasn't weeping just for the loss of my relationship, but for all the losses in my life, for all the little heartbreaks I never let myself feel, for the exquisite pain of being human and loving deeply. I learned to welcome the grief and let it wash me clean. This cleansing happened most when I wasn't blaming myself or others, or wishing things were different.
As I got stronger I'd go visit my ex-husband's website to see what he was up to. I downloaded photos of him and his new beloved and sat with them, sending love. I walked towards the edge of my discomfort, leaning into it so I could stretch into this new reality, but being careful not to re-traumatize myself. Some days an Facebook post could leave me in a puddle, some days I found myself smiling when a friend mentioned his name.
I celebrated the day when I received an email from someone saying, "Sorry about Raven ... thought you two were "the match." I smiled, feeling my love and appreciation for Raven and our relationship, and for all the people we touched in our years together teaching and being a couple. Then I smiled bigger, realizing I was happy, and a reminder of the past was no longer a knife of loss but now brought up love in my being. Yay! Happy dance!
In this past year I've learned so much about attachment and learning how to release, but also about the beautiful strength of intertwined lives, and how long it can take to unweave the energetic threads. I've learned that sometimes no matter how much I might crave reconciliation, talking things out, cleaning the past with someone else, it doesn't always look like I wish it would. And how it seems each place I visit or friend I see for the first time without Raven there is a little healing, a letting go that happens, more space that is opened up in my being. At first it is tender, sometimes the grief comes back again, sometimes I just feel a whisper of "we once loved each other passionately and fully here." Yesterday was the anniversary of our marriage, this week is a ten-year cycle of when we first came to the firewalk training together, and left glowing in love to have a hand fasting celebration with our community in Berkeley. I honor these memories. I honor the immense love we once shared. I honor that I have immense love to share, and that I can let it overflow to everyone I meet. And now I can also honor the closing of our relationship, a new cycle opening. I can honor the choices we both made. I can honor that nothing stays the same, that death brings new life, always, when we let the past go.
Writing this is bringing tears to my eyes, not because I wish our marriage had not ended, but because I miss my friend. And I know that friend lives in my heart, always. Nothing can take that away.
None of us are immune to loss on this human dance. We humans are so tender, and so resilient. So fragile and vulnerable, and so wicked strong. My prayers is that everyone who is in a time of transition, of life change, or loss, may dive deep to discover the calm waters beneath the turbulence, but also to learn to let life ravish us open, to let the waters of transformation crash through us, to surrender to the river of life. May we find peace and know the beauty of still spirit ocean in our core as we learn to surf the waves of death and rebirth, death and rebirth.
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