I had one of those breakthrough special spiritual moments this morning looking at my aging hands, of all things and I was filled with all these feelings of how much a body endures in a single life. I also had it while enjoying my morning coffee yesterday down at our local markets sitting next to an elderly couple who must have been in their nineties. As they walked away from me, the woman on her walker I was drawn to memories of my mother in her final years and I remember seeing her body as she sat perched in her underwear in the final year and noticed how twisted and bent around it was.
My Mum was a great survivor, she saw a lot of death and tragedy and I have too. I was reading a moment ago some of Tara Brach book on death and parents some lovely writing from Thich Nhat Hahn about how after his mother died he realised she was always with him and part of everything. His mother came to him in a dream about a year after she died in which she appeared young and beautiful and her realised his mother was alive in himself also.
Tara shares how the Lakota/Sioux believe that death brings us closer to the threshold of the spirit world. Trauma I believe also does the same, if we face death or annihilation of our soul on some level, then it is the land of shades that can open up to us.
However today, it was to the living spirit in me that my attention turned. For something animates our bodies while our spirit still lives deep inside of us, if it is not parched and yearning and mired in deep mists or paralyses of depression. I am grateful today for one of the happy days that often follows days after a period of struggle where I have both broken through fears and taken the risk to be honest in close relationships in which I fear abandonment only to see things come right and for repair to happen.
I was thinking too how important it is for trauma survivors especially to honour the depth of the journey, struggles, fears and threat of death they have lived with and nearly been crushed by. I reblogged a post yesterday from a sexual abuse survivor and my sis and I were discussing it yesterday as here in Australia Catholic Cardinal George Pell just lost his appeal against conviction on charges of child sexual abuse earlier in the year. Sue and were speaking of how often the victim blames themselves and how important it is that their stories are believed. The degree of empathy I feel for Pell is less as he has not had the honesty to admit his offences or expressed any form of contrition and while I know there are far larger factors at play in that abusers were often abused and had to dissociate from their inner child the whole thing does seem to also generated by the way sexuality is treated in the Catholic church.
His loss of his appeal vindicated trauma survivors and I am glad for that. We each need to be heard, understood, recognised and believed and we fare far better in life when our inner truth is not negated.
Anyway its so gorgeous and sunny here today. The wattle is in bloom and spring is on the way, temps have been climbing to 15 C though we had minus 5 last night. I want to get out into the beauty of nature and walk Jasper but before I do I just wanted to write something as a reminder to treat ourselves tenderly and honour the journey that has got us to here. None of us get out of this life without challenges, pain and loss, some of us face a larger share of very difficult experiences. I do not purport to think that emotional neglect is as traumatic in some ways as out and out sexual abuse by a parent, teacher or caregiver, the scars that those things leave do permanently affect sufferers many of whose innocence and tenderness was violated by those who should have known better but did not. It can leave them with such a sense of shame and fear of speaking up.
I will say a prayer for those people today, but the best prayer for me today will be a walk by the lake with Jasper and taking some time both to celebrate the spring and the awakening feeling of an alive spirit living within me that is not quite as scared of life as it was even a few months back. Today I feel strength and peace in my heart after facing another week of challenges, I am feeling grateful and I am going to go tenderly and gently with myself.
Emerging From The Dark Night 