Of The Shadows & The Light: A Life Update
Photo by Igor Sporynin
Life is a mess. Sometimes it’s a beautiful mess, sometimes it’s just, a mess. No matter who you are, what your financial status, race, gender, sex, religion (insert more here if you wish), there is a natural ebb and flow to life. Sometimes it’s complicated, and sometimes it’s not. While we can’t always control what happens to us and in our lives, we still do have some choices. We can decide how we are going to react and/or respond (sometimes it’s appropriate to both react and respond), and we can decide to fight life or surrender to it (pro-tip, surrender doesn’t mean agree with or mean surrendering your power). The past four months for me have been a series of rapid ebb and flow, light and dark, joy and mourning.
In August I had double eye surgery. A surgery that I had been avoiding for over ten years. One of my autoimmunes that affects my eyes had finally rendered me completely blind out of my right eye and my left eye was starting to go too. I was in danger of losing my driver’s license, and daily activities that we often take for granted were hard/impossible for me. I couldn’t read a book, I couldn’t see to put a key in a door, I couldn’t see my face well enough to wear eyeliner, the list goes on. To put it bluntly, my fear of dying and loss of control left me quite literally, disabled.
In October I lost my one of my grandmothers. Her death was on the coattails of the death of my grandpa Jay (my dad’s father), and my grandad (my mom’s father). All within one year. While I grieved for my grandfather’s, losing my grandmother was quite literally like having part of my soul removed from my body. And as my family and I assisted her in the dying process, we all received some level of trauma that none of us ever thought possible. Shortly after that, several members of my family got Covid. It was my first time having Covid and I have spent the last two and a half years being worried about my reaction due to all my underlying autoimmune disorders.
While all of this was unfolding, my husband and I sold our first house and bought our dream home. I was in the middle of managing a new behavioral health program in it’s first year, in a role I had never done before, and Brandon and I began the adoption process for a baby. There were tremendous highs and unspeakable lows. By the Grace of God I was given sight again, all while fighting my anxiety. I was again blessed to be with two of my family members as they passed into a new world, and had a last conversation with the third. Brandon and I passed our home study and are on the road to becoming parents. The program I manage successfully flew through its first year of serving our community. I laughed, I cried, I doubted, I was angry, I was scared, I was grieved, I hoped, I was grateful, I was lost, all simultaneously.
Over the last year and months, I’ve had to face my biggest fears, and I’m still facing them today. I’ve learned a lot along the way and am still learning daily. Today I’m giving you some of my take aways from the last few months/year.
1. Life is really a gray area. Our society has conditioned us to think in black and white, good and bad, all or nothing terms. But that is not reality. Life operates on a grayscale. As a therapist trained in DBT I have always known about the danger of rigid thinking, but this last year I’ve really been shown the ways in which I myself fall prey to it, we all do. I’ve learned, and still am learning, to move away from thinking in absolutes and moving more towards holding space for multiple truths to exist at once.
2. Judgement is natural and can be both helpful and unhelpful. My disclaimer here is that judgement is an evolutionary behavior. As cave people, we needed to judge the saber toothed tiger as dangerous. Our brains instinctively judge. While this is still helpful to enable us to survive (don’t eat the tide pod) and identify when to set boundaries (I do not want to be around people who behave like *insert maladaptive behavior here*), it can become toxic when we cast unnecessary judgements on others and/or ourselves. I’ve been practicing non-judgment by allowing people in my life to grieve, process events, and live as they are, without trying to force others to see/live/think/feel the way that I do or believe they should. Regardless on whether or not they are living in a way that I think healthy, helpful, or fulfills their highest potential, my harsh judgement is not loving them well. One of my main missions in life is to learn to love others well, and my unhelpful judgments do not assist in that mission.
3. It’s okay to not be perfect and to take up space. I’ve struggled my whole life to look and be a certain way. I’ve felt that in order to be loved, I needed to fit perfectly in societies standards and expectations of me. I’ve made myself small, set aside my own needs, and not set boundaries. I’ve over apologized and blamed myself for others behaviors and feelings. I’ve taken on too much of other people’s energies and let them affect my own. We also call this co-dependency, but can you imagine being co-dependent with the entire world? Maybe you can, if you’re an empath like me, I probably don’t need to explain anymore. The truth is, none of us are perfect, and we never will be in this life. It’s okay to make mistakes, to apologize when it’s appropriate, to have a voice, to take up your own space, to set boundaries, to say “no,” and to not be everything to everyone all of the time. I can’t save the world, we can’t save the world, but part of making the world a better place starts with us having our own backs and embracing ourselves, mess and all while we work to grow and evolve.
4. Religion can be oppressive. Now, before my Christian friends start to panic and schedule an intervention, I will always be a Christian. The Christ in Christian is for me. I will never abandon Him as He has never abandoned me. But I have become acutely aware of the oppressive structure that organized religion has created over thousands of years. I am not blind to the damage it has done to humans and the unjustified control it asserts in the name of God. Some of you may be reading this and feel ready to unfollow me because that upsets you or scares you. Go in peace, I love you. I am in the process of redefining my relationship to organized religion and assessing what the term church means to me. I’ve not only struggled with the churches long history of abuse, but also with the fact that the church does not seem to hold space for spiritual gifts I have had my entire life. This will I’m sure be a much longer post that will show up eventually when I’m ready to share.
5. Surrender is hard, but necessary. In therapy with clients, I call this radical acceptance. I’ve taught it so much in sessions that I could probably write a thesis. But practicing it in my own life is a totally different story. Learning to accept the fact that I am having a human experience that I do not have full control over in the present or future scares the absolute life out of me. When I am not in a position of surrender, it quite literally makes me sick. My autoimmunes flare and my mental health goes in the trash. I’m learning day by day to surrender with power, knowing that my soul can survive any challenge it faces, whether the outcome is what I think is best or not. In this, my relationship with trusting God is growing and has been truly tested.
6. Last but certainly not least, death is not the end of life. There is an incredible amount of knowledge that humans have not learned, accessed, and some that we are not meant to know while on this earth. Again, the not fully knowing leaves me feeling out of control and anxious, but I can for certain say that when we pass from this life, there is life after. My entire understanding of dying, death, and the afterlife is being rearranged and reconstructed. This is probably something that will continue for the rest of my life, but I am absolutely willing to dance with death as I learn to understand it more fully.
And there you have it folks, all the things that have been going on both externally and internally over the last few months and more broadly, the last year. I share these very personal insights with you to remind you all that no one has it all together. Our souls need connection and to know that we are not alone while we are so disconnected on this planet. While your struggles are unique to you, you are not alone in the art of suffering. And out of suffering, beautiful rebirth and growth can occur, although knowing this doesn’t always make the suffering easier. I’m hoping to make my blog and social media platform a space where we can be together in this wild ride of life, and where you can see me for me, the light, dark, and the somewhere in between. My hope is to give you some insights you may not have had before, help grow insights you’ve felt brewing, and to help you feel seen/heard/loved in some way. May we walk together on both days of light and laughter and day of darkness and shadows. As always, I send you love and light.