the edges of myself

And so it begins…  my blogging life.  For months now the messages have been coming loud and clear from all over the place, write, write, write.  Last week I was in the middle of an energy session with a client when I realized very clearly that this week was the one in which the writing would begin.  I also very clearly realized that once I let the words start flowing, they may be hard to hold back.  It seems I have rather a lot to say.  Appropriately this first post is about the state in which I currently find myself–the state of  being alone.

From the age of 15, when I fell in love for the first time, to the age of 34 when I separated from my ex-husband, I’ve been a serial monogamist.  The comfort of partnership is firmly rooted in me, for many different reasons.  One, I’m a libra, the astrological sign of balance and partnership.  Also, I’ve uncovered many things in the last six months, one of which is a rather seminal past life in which I was an orphan.  That lifetime shaped so much of the one I find myself in currently, and my process for the moment at least, seems to be all about untangling the many webs that were woven in that time.  So, suffice to say that from 15 to the tender age of 23 when I got married, I bounced from one partnership to the next, finding comfort and security in the mere act of being partnered.

After the tender-aged marriage, it only seems fitting that I also had what felt like a very tender-aged first child at 26.  A “surprise” as some would call it, certainly no accident–but without a doubt the most transformative experience at that point in my life.  Among many other things, what the birth of my son Oskar gave me was a truly constant companion.  He also defined me in an entirely different way.  He made me feel memorable in the vast world of San Francisco twenty-somethings that I existed in.  He made me different.  And he was remarkable.

I no longer feared going places by myself–my shyness didn’t feel crippling any longer, because Oskar was with me, and together we were good.  Unstoppable.  He gave me purpose and identity in a whole new way, and he filled a void that I hadn’t been aware of, one that had been created lifetimes ago in a brutal and dramatic time as an orphan.

What he also brought me, while in utero, was a whole new context for my existence.  It was when I was pregnant with Oskar that I began to really be aware of energy, and the web of it that is woven between all of us.  I began to be conscious of deflecting and moving energy from others, rather than just allowing it to heap upon me.  I moved out of the place of being “overly sensitive” (as I had been for my entire life) and into a much more powerful, grounded place of awareness.  I found I was able to channel that sensitivity in ways that were helpful and healing for others.

I’ve always known that carrying Oskar inside of me was what connected me to that greater awareness, but it was only quite recently that a client pointed out to me why.  Protection.  Of course.  A mother will always protect her child.  Of course I figured out how to move and deflect energy–I had a perfect, beautiful being forming inside of me.  I had every reason to protect.

But I digress…  the real point here is, though of course there are many, Oskar, and 3 1/2 years later, Lila, have been my constant companions for the last 9 1/2 years.  Period.  Until Thursday, when I took them to the airport with my parents, dropped them at the curb, said goodbye and drove away.

Yes, I cried a little as I drove away from my babies, who I’ve been raising completely on my own for the last year.  But then I started getting down to business.  I started feeling what my body, my being, feels like without those other two beings latched into it all the time.  I started really connecting to myself, and it felt so easy.  Energetically, layers that have been sitting with me for eons, just started peeling away.  I felt so clearly my soul’s connection with much larger things.  I began to breathe all the way out to the edges of myself.  As parents, we don’t realize all the crap we hold, constantly, habitually.  Sure, we give ourselves an hour or two, here or there, cram in a little “me time” from 10-12 after the kids are asleep.  But we never get to really set it down, that burden.

Now, don’t get me wrong, as I’ve already said, parenting is one of the most amazing parts of my life.  And my kids are incredible.  I wouldn’t trade my life with them for anything.  But what having them 3000 miles away has given me is yet another perspective.  And it comes back to that web that is woven between all of us, that thing that connects absolutely every single being with every other, the one that became so clear to me upon becoming a mother.  I don’t even begin to realize, on a daily basis all of the different directions that my energy is pulled.  And those two bright and shiny beings who share my home with me are front and center at the pulling.

That’s their job.  It’s the nature of a child’s existence.  But my job, I realize now is not just to caretake but to instill in them the importance of self-nurturing and self-sufficiency.  They need to understand that I am indeed connected to them, no matter how far apart we are, but I’m also separate.  I need to be me.  I need to remember this person, unpartnered and vast.  Easy.  Light.  Bright.  I need to find a way to create a balance for myself in my sometimes seemingly very unbalanced existence as a single mother and business owner.

They’re going to come back.  Ten days is not forever.  And while, I do feel like I’ve made up for some serious lost alone-time, the biggest message to me is that I need that time in my life, all the time;  not just in the wee hours of the morning, sacrificing sleep just to be by myself.  I need to create a life that includes that time for me.  I need to nurture me or I’m just no damn good at nurturing anybody.

I’ll keep you posted on how it all pans out.  But I know it will, because it has to.  I’m way too big to fit back into the bottle.