Healing what we need to release

Years ago in a church circle, I am struck when women in their 60s and 70s name wounds they are still carrying on their shoulders. I am in my early 40s, and I think to myself, I hope I’ll be able to heal a lot or all of my own stuff before I reach their ages. After all, I’ve already been on a healing path, and I certainly don’t want to be talking about the same issues in 20 or 30 more years. I am ready to be free.

My dear mother was a sweet woman, a great cook, a comfort in illness, and a great spelling word quizzer nights before tests. She also ran late a lot and was a perfectionist.

Now that she lives with dementia brought on by mini strokes from severe sleep apnea, she’s been released from her needs to be perfect. Saying that, I see in my mind’s eye the way she can flop onto her bed at night in her clothes. When I take care of mom from time to time, I gently guide her to the bathroom like a toddler, and I help her change into pajamas, me living out my own needs for a bedtime routine at the same time that I want to assist her personal hygiene and comfort.

And dear dad was a wonderful breadwinner, fun to be with Sunday mornings at the deli, no fun to be tickled by, and generous on shopping trips. He also was tyrannical in ways that could create a tense environment. His mail needed to be on the table when he came home, we needed to watch the evening news with dinnertime, and he screamed at us if we fell down. He yelled, Why would I want to go to the band concert!! Those kids can’t play! words that gave me the blessings of deep creative wounds to heal.

Now he’s evolved into doing a beautiful job caring for mom, while he swims laps, takes mom to adult daycare, and juggles his own part-time work life at age 80, all while managing his own health compromised by a pacemaker and diabetes.

I wish them many, many blessings.

Part of the rich legacy they passed to me includes generosity, caring, honesty, achieving, along with layers to heal of the critical and perfectionistic voices they unintentionally planted in my being, part of my unique bag to take off my shoulders.

It’s been quite a journey.

And then there was the astrology reading I had in February when Sajit Greene told me what the planet and stars said about my soul’s journey.

Either you were imprisoned in former lifetimes, or you were in a strict religious order. Your joy was definitely cut off.

My joy was cut off. Wow.

That phrase strikes me in such a powerful way. Yes, I’ve been on a journey my whole life to find my joy. Although people had said how much joy I brought into a room, and on many levels I felt joyful, I also carried a desire to more fully embody a richer joy if I could heal into it.

Sajit suggests I meet Jessica Chilton of Spark Creative Wellness Studio in Asheville, and my first connection with Jessica invites me to seek more exposure to her beautiful presence and wisdom.

Through sessions with her, I’ve been led to a truce with my inner voices, and I engage in a daily Creative Wellness Practice that energizes and grounds me. As my joy continues to evolve, I have less need to talk about the wounds of my past, for I’m living into better clarity and work habits on the path to inspire joy.