As a child and as a young adult you learn to make your way in the world. You learn to see and to be seen. You learn how to make your presence felt. You learn how to argue and, very importantly, you learn how to forgive.
As I grew up I did not learn these things. I learned that I was the pretty little ballet dancer, gifted by many things – reading and writing at just 2 years of age, playing the piano at 3. I did not learn how to use my voice. I learned to fade into the background. I learned that my opinions and thoughts were not important. I learned to be a shadow on the fringe. Growing up, I knew I was loved but that made me even more confused – how could I be loved when I was on the outside looking in? Even now my family still think I am the weird one. The hippy. Many of my generation understand what I am saying – at least those who are First Wave Blue Ray Indigo. I could be writing their story.
See? I’ve just underscored my weirdness in the eyes of many.
The thing is, the vast majority of people do learn these early life lessons. It’s usually pretty intense during those teenage years as you start to spread your wings and grow towards the adult you are going to be. But when you don’t get to grow in this way you either stultify and become the person you were trained to be or you find your own way to grow. And that growth can be even more painful, especially as it generally last many, many more years and you don’t have the protective wings of family to support you as you grow.
And making even harder – I had absolutely no idea what it means to be empathic. Very empathic. For the first almost-60 years of my life I lived in a state of overwhelm. I lived in a constant state of emotion, mainly fear, and had absolutely no way to express it. I now suspect that a lot of the emotions that overwhelmed me were not even mine.
In life, everything seemed normal. I fell in love, married, had a child, ran a successful business, emigrated and then lost my husband to cancer. Then I remarried and subsequently moved through all sorts of drama. I also suffered from undiagnosed PTSD, had a mental breakdown and had absolutely no idea how to deal with the wash of emotions that I couldn’t escape from.
I have moved a long way from that younger Sue, and that too has brought about its own sets of drama. I am not the person I was. I am not the Sue that my family and friends of years gone by would recognise and as a result, most of the people I loved best have moved away. They do not understand this new, stronger, Sue. I had another mental breakdown in 2014 and the journey back from that has been difficult but it has also been such an amazing journey. This is where my growth really took off.
Today I discovered just how far behind I have left that childhood Sue. The one who watched from the outside, who couldn’t express herself, who burst into tears at the slightest emotional intensity. Today, my husband visited me and told me he had found someone else. It’s really strange, the very things that had driven a wedge between us – mainly my spiritual beliefs – are one of the things he admires in this new lady.
Our separation is fairly new – at least it is from a legal standpoint – and recently we had a major blow-up. The sort of thing that just a year ago would have had me bawling my eyes out and feeling totally distressed. Instead I stood up and said what I thought. I argued in a clear and concise way without a heap of emotion getting in the way. Probably a first in my life!!! Then I got down to doing the Energy work. I meditated, lovingly removed cords, re-wrote our Sacred Contract, practised Ho’oponopono and it was obvious, even the day after the argument, that there was an improvement. And today, just a couple of weeks after that event, when my husband told me he had met another person – I was genuinely happy for them both and deeply wish them well. I felt the love and forgiveness wash through me and I knew that I had finally grown into the adult I was meant to be.
Auri'An's Journey 