To What Was and Is to Come

Two thousand fourteen was about shedding: shedding ideas, beliefs, habits, and cycles that no longer served me in my life’s purpose. I entered the year in a Mission Year apartment in Houston, living life with six others who helped peel away those unnecessary layers covering up the light of my true, Divine self. Sometimes they clawed, sometimes they rubbed, sometimes they gently peeled. Sometimes they let me shed at my own pace.

I entered Mission Year feeling compassionate and graceful. I left feeling clunky, understanding my compassion was false because it was based in a desire to control and save rather than a desire to come alongside and love.  I came into the program thinking I was found. I left understanding I was on a life long journey of seeking and finding, and I was learning to be ok with never knowing.  

I struggled with my desire to save and control. I loved my neighbor deeply, to the point I could feel my heart breaking every time I walked to her house. I sought counseling. I hurt my housemates. I hated my housemates. I loved my housemates deeply.

I eventually learned to let them love me, but not until after almost a year of them reminding me again and again I could let go, I could allow others to help me, I could allow others to come alongside me. I learned reciprocity.

I am still learning reciprocity. I am still learning how to let others love me. I am still learning what it means to love, to lead, to serve, to come alongside. Daily. Hourly.

I fell into cycles and habits I had fallen into for years. My counselor helped me work through these cycles and habits, some of which used to serve me, and together we let them go.

I let go.

I let go of a lot. I let go of beliefs I had been raised with, religion that no longer spoke my language, cycles that used to destroy me, habits that hindered my ability to love, control that kept me from authentic relationship.

I learned to see my Divine Femininity, to honor it, to engage with it, to embrace it. I learned to see oppression within patriarchy, race relations, and privilege. I learned to seek reconciliation in ways that honor all people. I learned to be quiet and listen.

I left Mission Year, tearfully, on July 31^st, entering into what I believed to be a hopeful new start to intentional community in Phoenix, the desert home I love. 

Three of us moved into a new house, anticipating the changes, the discussions, and the compromises.

We read about our personalities and vulnerability. We had long tearful conversations about power struggles, community ownership, our feelings of unworthiness, and how we relate to one another. We played games, carved pumpkins, cooked meals for neighbors and friends, and laughed. We made promises we couldn’t keep. We committed to the unknown and shivered in the shadow it created over us.

I fell in love.

Dynamics shifted. Our community changed. My heart broke as I watched my vision dissipate as we built walls, changed commitments, wavered in decisions, and fell short of expectations. A new relationship was being fostered as old relationships were fading into disengagement.

I ached for the loss of intentionality, for the loss of deep relationship, for the apparent death of a dream I had been dreaming for years.

Tension suddenly appeared in an established friendship, a friendship I thought was beyond transgression. The pain lingers.

I stand, knees weak, in the Unknown.

I am in love with a man I didn’t expect, from a place I didn’t expect, in a way I didn’t expect.

As one dream dissipates, other shared dreams emerge. As 2014 comes to a close we are dreaming together, envisioning our future together, our travels, our plans, our paths. Every day I wake up and remind myself it is ok to let go of the way I thought things would be. It is ok to let go of control, to allow this man to speak into my dreams and for me to speak into his.  It is ok to let him love me. It is ok to love him. It is good and healthy and beautiful to be vulnerable, dropping facades, showing my fear, being honest, and allowing him the space to do the same.

2015 holds many paths and choices and dreams for me.

I vow, to the best of my ability, to

live with eyes of compassion for myself and my fellow beings.

treat myself and others with kindness.

engage with tension involving social justice and race and class relations.

continually be aware of my desire for control, and, subsequently, to let go.

ask for help when I am feeling insecure, afraid, or lost.

listen to my deepest self and follow Her whispers.

love as fully as I am able.

seek life in all ways for myself and others.

I anticipate and welcome all the beauty and mess and manifestation this new year promises to bring.