Looking fear in the face and letting it roll on through

I arrived back in Seattle a few weeks ago. Filled up from my pilgrimage, ready to start a new chapter in my life, DONE! with the old stories, my old way of living. Onward ho!

Except I wasn't. My heart and body had some healing to do. My pelvis had some major fear to release (ask my acupuncturist) and I kept shoving it away because my new story was I'm DONE with that old story. So when all these emotions came up, when my heart was knocking on my head, I wasn't answering the door. Who wants to open that door to all those pesky old emotions? I'm DONE!

So when my afore-mentioned acupuncturist informed me of the fear I needed to let come up and out through my belly, through my heart, throat and jaw, I wasn't pleased. I was angry. BUT I'm DONE! (Apparently the binge tv watching and extra glasses of wine were not seeping in as information that not all was well)

So for the past few days, I've been writing and crying and dancing and cleaning and reading and writing and writing and writing. Letting all this fear move through. Will I ever be able to heal my relationships with men? Stay in my power and truth around them? Will I press my edges of my sensual and sexual life? Will I press the edges of how much love I show up with in the world? Will I practice radical honesty and have good boundaries? Will I truly reclaim my wild? Can I take away the keys to my car from teenager and get her to enjoy the view from the backseat? Can I trust myself to make choices from a wiser place? Can I show myself compassion for these hurts still being here? (the answer to the last one was no, but I'm doing a much better job these last few days). I was just so damn ready to be moving on that I was keeping all this stagnant fear in my system. Which is not a great foundation for a new beginning.

So take some time this week...what needs some space to emerge? What needs to be heard by you? By the world? Write it out, speak it. LOVE IT UP! Because kicking it in the face like I was doing "get away from me pesky girl!" doesn't work and doesn't lead to great things. Welcoming it with loads of compassion and curiosity is a much more loving choice and will truly lead to the next chapter, a much lighter, joyful one at that. 

I saw this on Facebook and loved it. No credit was given. If you know who did it I would love to know.

What Felicity taught me today

This is one of the blogs I wrote this summer and didn’t post. I wasn’t ready to share and really stand for my knowing. A lot has happened these past two months and I realize I just need to share what comes to me and what comes with that…well I’ll deal with it when it comes. So here it is, better late than never or perhaps in divine timing.

Today’s lesson brought to me by: Felicity

I love how the universe brings me movies, songs, tv shows that offer me guidance and wisdom when I am in need (and oh I have been in need lately).

Today while doing the dishes I was called to watch this scene from Felicity (which I didn't discover until I was 36).

Let’s just say I stopped washing the dishes and watched it again.

For all recovering good girls, all sweet empathic souls…read, listen, take this into your heart.  At any age.  Wishing I had heard these words, known this truth at 12, 18, 25, 32…grateful I have found it, believe it and can say them at 41. 

Felicity: 19 year-old woman talking to long sought after boyfriend, Ben

“The truth is I can’t be with you like this. I mean I know I said I could but I can’t.  I just can’t compromise myself like that. I mean I’m an emotional person. I feel things and I need to be able to get upset and talk about how I’m feeling. 

I mean that’s just who I am and I can’t change that. 

I don’t want to.

And the thing is you knew that. You knew it and you still pursued me because you want something with me. You just aren’t strong enough to have it, which in a way makes you a coward. And the saddest part is one day your gonna wake up and realized what you missed and it’s gonna be too late. 

Ben: “I don’t know what to say.”

Felicity “I know. It’s okay.”  

It’s okay because we get it. We feel it. We see it. Swirling about us in our families, our communities, our jobs, our world. We get it’s scary and uncomfortable and new terrain and that there are so few examples of how to be this emotional person in the world.  

The problem is when we DO compromise, we and the world lose out. We lose our truth and the change and wisdom it brings.  Our self-expression and the art and creation of lives, our wants and needs that inspire others. Our value, our joy, our life force energy which balances out the left-brain world.  Because we are managing others emotions or denying our to make others comfortable, to accommodate what others are comfortable with.  We feel the pain, the injustice, the joy and there are so few places for us to express it. We want to scream, wail, moan, rage, delight, dance and the world hasn’t provided us places for this. They took away those places. Our red tents, our men, our women who could hold space for and honor our emotional gifts.  We missed out on examples of people living in their emotions. Holding in, shoving down my emotions for so much of my life cost me years, tens of thousands of dollars, mysterious diseases, divorce, and disconnection.  It cost me living in my truth, sharing my self with the world.

We must stop abandoning ourselves. We must stand and speak and rage and sob. It matters, every beautiful emotion we have shoved down, overanalyzed and not owned matters. It is time for us to own these emotions that are a sacred part of our humanity, of our world. They offer guidance, connection, solace, release, and truth. They bring color, texture and great beauty to our world. 

It is time. It is our choice. No more compromising. 

So thank you to Jennifer Levin and the other Felicity writers for the words I needed to hear today. To spark this reminder that for years I did compromise, adapted to a certain sort of insanity that I took as truth when it fact it was so far from it.  When the very thing I needed to do, the world was starving for me to do was to share all of my gorgeous, resplendent, complicated, oh-so-very-real and powerful emotions and compromise no more. 

I hope this post supports you in sharing your emotions, with yourself and others. I would love to hear about it and as always am here to support your sharing of your beautiful self, the world needs all of you. 

Here’s the clip: you can skip the video after 5 seconds of advertising

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uHYlMTdW5KQ