Emotional Transformation

We start life as a butterfly: colorful, free, graceful, full of zest, full of desire to taste every flavor, to visit every flower.  But life bruises, tatters, breaks our wings and poisons our gardens. In the mid of our life's journey we find ourselves deep in a dark wood

having lost our way.

It is in the moment of our darkest despair that if we listen carefully we can hear our spirit calling for a rebirth. It is at that time that we are called to enter yet another cocoon and like the caterpillar go through the difficult transformation that will ultimately give birth to a new butterfly as colorful and zestful as the one we once were.

The world on my shoulders...

Mr. Rearden, said Francisco, his voice solemnly
calm. "if you saw Atlas, the giant who holds the world
on his shoulder, if you saw that he stood,
blood running down his chest, his knees buckling,
his arms trembling but still trying to hold the world
aloft with the last of his strength, and the greater
his effort the heavier the world bore down on his
shoulders- what would you tell him to do?

"I...don't know. What...could he do? What would you tell him?"

"To Shrug"

Ayn Rand, Atlas Shrugged  
 

There is a condition I have coined The Atlas Syndrome 

Emotional symptoms: Anxiety, Panic, Depression 

Physical symptoms: Shoulder and Back pain, IBS, Fibromyalgia, Migraine.

Social history: An alcoholic, or domestic violence, dysfunctional household where very early on the person is casted in the role of the adultified child, the caretaker, the peacemaker.

Chosen profession: Most usually Nursing, Social work, or Stay Home Mom.

General philosophy of life: Everyone else comes first, I can not say No, I can not hurt anyone's feelings, I am afraid of conflict, anger scares me, expressing anger is unacceptable, everyone has to like me, if I say no he/she will leave me.

When I look into the eyes of these patients, I see the light of their spirit flickering, and I get scared that one more minute and it will go dark for ever. I want to tell them, and I often do: just hold on, a little longer, I will  help you take the world off your shoulders....and I promise it will still keep turning.

Poetry Heals the Wounds that Life Inflicts

you are as young as your faith,
as old as your doubt;
as young as your self-confidence,
as old as your fear,
as young as your hope,
as old as your despair.
When the wires are all down
and all the innermost core of your heart
is covered with the snows of pessimism
and the ice of cynicism,
then you are grown old indeed.

But so long as your heart receives messages
of beauty, cheer, courage, grandeur
and power from the earth,
from man and from the infinite,
son long you are young
Samuel Ulman

Awakening...

Your vision will become clear only when you
can look into your own heart.
Who looks outside, dreams; who looks inside, awakes.

 C.G Jung

One night when I was away this summer, I looked at a sky darker than darkness and studded with stars so big, so luminous that I could reach and  pluck them up like diamonds for the diadem of a goddess, and I felt awe.  I felt an energy surging inside me that was both exhilarating and humbling. Some people would call it religious.

I sat up and wondered when in this busy life of mine, in the strife for knowledge, career, and accomplishment I lost the innocence, the enthusiasm, the imagination of the child I used to be.

When I was a little girl I used to look at a similarly mystical sky, but the stars then were not celestial bodies with lives extinguished millions of years ago, they were valiant warriors felled by the hand of a powerful, jealous god. They were lovers to whom the gods granted eternal life in the sky after death. They were Orion and Aphrodite and Perseus and all the heroes who fired my imagination and gave wings to my soul.

The truth is that I missed that little girl terribly. So, I made a promise right there and then: to find her again and bring her back because at this stage of my life, awakening and renewal and purpose come from looking inside and finding the child who knew how to dream.

 

Father's Day

"I know that you will succeed in whatever you set your mind in. I believe in you" These are the best words a father can tell his child.

I know, my father wrote them to me in a letter the night before he died. I was 19 then and preparing to follow my dream. They have been the wind beneath my wings ever since. They have carried me
across the world and over the rainbow and they still do.

So, for all the fathers out there, may your words be as simple and as powerful as those of my father.