Note: this is part two of a multiple-part story. If you have not yet read “Part 1,” you may want to read it first …
After a very intense day of digging ever deeper into the depths of the games I play with Deity, I struggle to go to sleep. Finally, with the assistance of earplugs to block out the noise of a party somewhere in town, I slip into sleep somewhere between 10:00 p.m. and 11:00 p.m. – but I am again awake at 1:15 a.m., and am unable to drift back to dreamland until nearly 4:00 a.m.. At 7:00 a.m., I am again wide awake, experiencing considerable energetic twitching in my abdomen, my head, and everywhere else.
Shortly before 8:00 a.m. on this Saturday morning, May 12, 2012, a small earthquake causes my fridge to lightly rock and vibrate for about ten seconds. As the fridge settles down, the walls and floors continue to bounce gently for another twenty seconds or so. I love these small earthquakes and the metaphor they bring to my emotional process – a metaphor of continually shaking up my conditioned reality, helping to crumble old belief systems and densities.
A Group Sponge
Just after 9:00 a.m., I am sitting on Keith’s porch, preparing for my private session to delve deeper into my God drama – an ongoing journey that exploded yesterday – a journey that I did not feel safe continuing in front of those who would judge and throw stones.
Angela is also present, and the three of us spend the first hour in casual conversation as Keith helps me to settle my projections and perceptions – working with further undoing my lifelong struggle of hooking perceptions as being equivalent to judgment. My perceptions are usually quite accurate, but when I feel them, I feel horrible, judging myself as being judgmental, flogging myself with shame and guilt.
“No wonder I used to feel so insecure and self-loathing in social gatherings,” I share with Keith. “I must have been inhaling the social insecurities of everyone in the room, and then internalizing them as my own, only adding to my self-hatred and desire to run away.”
When I ask Keith to further clarify his comments from yesterday about me, as a teenager, inhaling the emotions of church congregations, etc…, he simply reminds me about all of the times in my life where I have realized that I inhale emotional energy from others.
“It only makes sense that you would have done the same thing in all situations,” Keith reassures me. “You would have deeply inhaled and sponged up such emotional densities from every environment.”
Throwing Stones
As Keith feels guided to read me a quote from the book “Oneness” channeled by Rasha, I sink into deep emotion when he reads a passage talking about how we are each on a unique journey where we are here to stand in our truth, even when those clinging to the old conditioned reality choose to throw stones at us.
“This is exactly how I feel regarding many aspects of my whole life,” I share with Keith through trickling tears. “My truth, and following my heart, did not mesh with the reality of loved ones and friends, and in their attempts to pull me back into their reality, they constantly threw emotional ‘stones’ at me.”
“And last night, as I sat here on the porch, feeling somewhat humiliated, that is exactly how I felt when Paul began to throw judgmental and condescending stones at me.”
Recipe Requirements
The topic soon turns to one I have discussed with Keith several times. We talk about clear memories regarding how in my childhood and youth, my creativity and confidence had been so obliterated by “loving” conditioning that I could not even write a simple two-minute talk for church, or a book report for school, without falling apart and demanding that my mother help me and usually do most of it for me. I was so terrified of my creativity being judged and ridiculed by others, that I could not do anything “out of the box” by myself.
“I do the same thing with God/Higher Energies on any new step that is out of the box, requiring me to step out of rational mind,” I share with Keith. “I still have an overwhelming tendency to demand personal assistance, recipes, instructions books, and outside help with every step that does not involve logical, rational steps.”
A Dark Hooded Figure
Keith soon begins to guide me into a subconscious meditation where I walk down internal steps until I reach my inner conference room. As I attempt to visualize myself descending those steps, I meet fierce inner resistance and distraction. I cannot seem to feel my feet moving down. I briefly mention this struggle to Keith, but rather than ask for him to help me, I remind myself that I DO know how to do this – that I can “Fake I till I make it” and force myself down those metaphorical steps and into the conference room.
“I finally feel as if I am there in my conference room,” I share with Keith.
“Now invite the energy in charge of your resistance to Higher Energies, light, and love – the energy that is your confusion generator – to join with you in the conference room.” Keith guides me further. “Connect with this energy and get to know it.”
At first, I again meet fierce inner resistance, but finally I intuitively glimpse the image of an energy entering the room.
“It is like a cloaked figure, in a long dark robe with a hood that covers the face,” I describe my feelings to Keith. “Under the hood, I see no face, just emptiness.”
“This makes sense since this energy has been so obscured and hidden,” Keith continues to guide me. “Is this energy willing to work with your Higher Self? Is this energy willing to talk about a job promotion, or watch a movie of your life, etc.?”
“Let me connect and find out,” I respond to Keith, as I go deeper into attempting to genuinely connect and not just respond from my own rational mind.
“I feel as if I may be scamming myself, because I do not trust my connection,” I respond a few minutes later. “But it feels like the answer is ‘Yes’.”
Cards On The Table
After a long pause where I struggle to feel more connected with this energy, Keith suggests that I begin with gratitude – expressing my gratitude to this energy for being so loyal and dedicated in carrying out my instructions for so very long.
I clearly recognize how this energetic part of me has actually been my protector, keeping me safe in the world until I was ready to open, but as I attempt to connect with this gratitude in my heart, I instead sense fear and intense resistance. I cannot connect. I feel anger surging inside.
“It is time to put all your cards on the table,” Keith guides me. “At times like this it helps to clear the air and put everything out.”
I quickly imagine myself pushing the fear, anger, and pain out into the middle of the table, between this hooded figure and me. Tears begin to trickle down my cheeks as I do so. I genuinely sense that this emotional honesty is proving to be quite helpful. In fact, I feel as if I am establishing a true bond with this energy.
But suddenly, I experience deep unexpected emotions. Feelings of hopelessness consume me, telling me that there is no point in this futile exercise, that it cannot possibly help, that my process is going nowhere, and that I will never connect … blah, blah, blah.
As these emotions blindside me, I sink into intense release with deep gut-wrenching, holding-my-breath, dry-heaving, emotional upheaval. Tears, coughs, teeth-chattering, and energetic vomiting rip me to the core.
“Let it flow Brenda,” Keith encourages.
A few minutes later, I feel much lighter.
A Dramatic Shift
“Connect again with that hooded figure,” Keith encourages me.
Gradually, an unexpected shift completely reverses my perceptions. I begin to realize that this hooded figure is really a very healthy energy – a loyal, loving, and cooperative energy. Instead, I am the dysfunctional lost one, frightened and resistant in my pain.
I am seeing this hooded figure in the same way that I eventually saw my inner child, Sharon, in late 2010. At first I thought Sharon needed my help and fixing, believing myself to be the healthy adult attempting to assist the wounded child – but in reality Sharon was my teacher and it was I that needed to humble myself and be the student.
“Hiding under that dark cloak is an energy that is healthy and more connected to Divine energies than I am,” I share new deep insights with Keith.
“This energy is profoundly knowledgeable about all types of energies that you have encountered in your life,” Keith adds further insight. “This energy’s job has been to block those energies from coming in, to keep you safe from outside emotions, pain, love, light, and everything except possibly negative/dark entities with which you have no agenda in this lifetime. This part of you knows all about these energies.”
New Lightness
“I’m getting that this energy wants to cooperate,” I add with a grin. “It has always known that this day is coming – a day when it would be time to begin allowing in love and light. This part of me is more than willing to work with Higher Self to get guidance, and knows that this guidance will not come from me.”
As I begin to mediate with these new insights and intentions, I feel a gradual lightening of the energies in my body. The feelings of confusion and resistance gradually diminish, and I feel a pleasurable sensation as if light is slowly consuming my throat and high-heart regions. I feel much more energized, and even have a sense of lightness in my abdomen.
Keith soon distracts my focus by discussing the significance of a dragonfly that just landed on the porch near Angela. When I ask him about the distraction, he explains that it is part of my overall process – to provide further lightness to my meditation – to reduce the need for me to feel the heaviness.
Where Is It?
Soon, Keith briefly discusses something about soul retrieval with Angela.
“Is there a part of me that is ready to return now?” Intuitions guide me to ask Keith.
“Brenda, close your eyes and connect to your Higher Self,” Keith then takes me back into meditation. “Ask your Higher Self if there is a part of you that is ready to join you, and if there is, ask it to come near to you. The first task is to locate and feel the energy.”
“Where is it?” Keith asks me to find it.
As I ponder my response, I begin to feel energy vibrations in both my heart and throat regions, and then I suddenly feel a gentle pull of energy stretching from heart and throat to a spot just to the right of my head.
“You will often feel a part of your body pulling in this direction, or part of you being pushed away,” Keith confirms what I am feeling.
As I further ponder, I do feel the sensation of the right side of my head being pulled in the direction of this energy, gently tugging me.
Trust-Building Gentleness
“Ask the energy, under the direction of your Higher Self, to gently return at a pace that you can handle, one that is appropriate for your process,” Keith soon guides me deeper.
Gradually, I feel a very slow and gentle coolness filtering into my head in the area of my right ear, and very slowly spreading to the left. After perhaps twenty or thirty minutes, I feel as if the energy has filled my whole head.
“I feel as if a sense of stability and mental clarity has now replaced the feeling of confusion that was there before,” I eventually express my excitement to Keith. “Wow, what a nice gift to feel more clarity returning to the place where confusion has repeatedly blocked me.”
“It is nice … mild … and gentle,” I add. “I feel as if this is a first step in a trust-building process to see if I can bring in more of my pushed-out self.”
“It makes a lot of sense that you would do this in stages to build more trust,” Keith agrees with my assessment and intuitions.
Squirmy Squeamys
Keith works with Angela for a while as I continue to silently meditate. Soon I begin to feel massive squeamy sensations in my arms and wrists. As I share with Keith, he takes the opportunity to explain to Angela that “squeamy” is a word he uses to describe a sensation of squirming and screaming at the cellular level – and how the cells feel as if they literally want to jump out of the body – that squeamys are emotional densities in the cells that do not need to be felt by the conscious mind.
As the three of us discuss my squeamys, the intense sensations expand.
“It is time to ask the light to help you with the squeamys,” Keith shares his guidance.
As I focus on asking the light for assistance, I feel no change – but I feel no judgment either. I am just allowing the process to unfold as it will.
“Keith,” Angela finally asks. “Is there something I can do, without fixing, to help Brenda in her process?”
Both Keith and I guide her to make herself into a channel for the light, making the light available for my Higher Self to pull through her – not pushing or fixing with the light – but just making it available as a butler, coming through her as a human source.
“The human touch is a large part of Brenda’s process lately,” Keith explains. “It helps her build trust in allowing Higher Energies, and is what she needs.”
Joint Explorations
As Angela puts her hands over my right wrist, I quickly feel a slight relaxation of the squeamys on the right side, and experience some light and cool breeze feelings as well. Eventually, she does both left and right arms at the same time. As she shifts, I begin to feel some cool breeze sensations on the left as well.
Then I begin to feel an intensification of the squeamys. In fact, they are very intense for about twenty or thirty minutes. Both Angela and I feel as if this is a trust-building process … that there is no need for anything to shift today … that this is about me feeling the light and her being able to feel the sensitivities … that we both have an agreement to work together on this.
Eventually, I get the intuitive feeling to silently intend for the light to increase, and suddenly I feel more light energy … but still in a very gentle way. In passing, I mention something about how I have been getting arthritis in my fingers for about fifteen years or so.
“Oh, I am now feeling lots of energy movement in my finger joints,” I suddenly mention.
Angela acknowledges that just seconds before I expressed this observation that she had silently intended for energy to go to my joints. Angela and I continue this “joint exploration” for a while before deciding to try it without her hand involvement – with simply sharing a joint intention for her energy to assist in my process. To our delight, when she moves her hands away, the energy continues to flow.
Finally, we discuss that this is an ongoing trust-building process – how we both know that it will not be complete today.
Obi-Wan Kenobi
Minutes later Keith walks out of his kitchen with three bowls of freshly made banana ice cream – made from frozen bananas, spices, and chocolate that he ran through his juicer. He had disappeared while Angela and I worked together, secretely preparing a special treat.
The three of us talk and visit for another hour or so, enjoying delightful conversation and nourishment.
It is nearly 3:00 p.m. when I finally return home to quickly transcribe notes about a beautiful and special experience.
Later that evening, Angela and Keith take me to a local restaurant to celebrate another special occasion. It is my official “fifteenth birthday” tomorrow. Fifteen years ago, to this very evening, I rested on a hospital bed, excited and eagerly anticipating a surgical intervention that would shift my physical body to match who I really am on the inside. In the subsequent growth-filled years of roller coaster healing, this is the first time that anyone has ever officially celebrated the occasion with me.
After returning home with giggles in my heart, I meditate while drifting off to sleep. As I sink into the energies, it suddenly hits me.
“I’m going to call that dark hooded figure ‘Obi-Wan Kenobi’, after the Star Wars character.” I suddenly giggle. “In the movie, Obi-Wan first showed up as a figure in a hooded cloak, giving the feeling of darkness and mystery because his face was hidden. But in the end, he was a magical protector … just as I now see that hooded figure in my own meditation.
Another Dramatic Shift
After a peaceful and sound sleep, I suddenly wake up at 4:25 a.m. – noticing that the lights are on in my living room. When I step into the light, Sufi informs me that she just got home from a long party, and that another woman had lost her keys. She asks “after the fact” if I am OK with this woman crashing at my house for the rest of the night.
“There are lots of big parties going on in San Marcos right now,” Sufi adds another comment that triggers me deeply – triggering my social anxieties to the max.
Just last night I had told Sufi how happy I am to have her here, how I love the growth that her presence is triggering in me – but now I suddenly have other feelings – strong feelings that I keep to myself.
As I attempt to go back to sleep, my mind is obsessed with judgments about a teenage/high school social scene, and how I am now, for the second time in a week, the unwilling refuge for partying people that are unexpectedly stranded. I find myself deeply regressed into painful teenage emotions regarding parties, and this part of me feels deep judgment regarding the people who participate in them. The inner chatter will not stop.
Roommate Regrets
After a very unsatisfying and broken sleep for the next two hours, I wake up at 6:30 a.m. with sharp pains in my abdomen. Intuitions strongly tell me that I have been sucking emotional density from somewhere, that I am “eating” the density, and that it is filling my tummy with swelling pain.
The intuitions also tell me that this pain is not mine … and I believe it is either coming from the unknown woman sleeping in Sufi’s room … or perhaps from the current San Marcos party scene in general … or perhaps from my teenage years. I am totally unsure on everything except the fact that I known the pain I am internalizing is not from my own present-day reality.
Immediately, I focus all of my intentions on ceasing to “eat” this stuff, and instead ask it to go directly to its higher evolvement. But I continue to feel some of the painful density flowing through me. It is quite intense, I am unable to focus, and attempts to bring in the light to energize my heart result in deep feelings of futility.
In fact, I have absolutely no desire to meditate. I get up and attempt to connect with Higher Energies, but I cannot focus. When Sufi walks into the living room at 7:30 a.m., I engage her in a whispering conversation, bluntly sharing how I am struggling.
“I know this is not about you,” I share my conviction, “and that it is not about what it is about, and that nothing changes until I do … but I am struggling with you bringing late night stranded-party-people into my home. I cannot handle the waking up to noises in the middle of the night, having random people in my home around my valuables, and not being able to go back to sleep.”
I literally waste the remainder of my morning losing myself on the internet, computer games, and feeling depressed. I am frustrated and feel deeply trapped, wishing I could isolate and be alone.
“I do not want a roommate anymore,” I silently pout. “It is causing too much stress and triggering me way too much.”
Porch Alien
When I arrive at Keith’s porch to assist in setup for the Sunday afternoon ceremony, I feel depressed, and hope to have a few private minutes to discuss my feelings with Keith – but he has visitors that consume all of his time right up until we pour chocolate.
“I have roommate concerns, and want to talk about it privately,” I whisper before carrying two cups of hot chocolate out onto the porch.
Almost immediately, I feel like an alien on the porch. There are numerous rowdy disruptions from five or six people. Knowing that this is my creation, that somehow I am manifesting this reality, I simply withdraw and isolate on my pillow, observing myself while allowing deep anger to flow through me as the “Glow Meditation” proceeds.
I am feeling so angry that I am unable even to begin the meditation. I make no attempt whatsoever to connect with a smile in my heart, or with the light.
“F@ck the light,” Inner feelings rage in my soul.
I note that as I begin to cry, several people hold their hands out and start to send energy my way. I reject the light, and actually make a whispering/gesturing request for them to please turn their hands away from me.
Intentionally Sinking
Later, after the meditation ends, as others occasionally offer to help, I push them away. The angry child in me wants nothing to do with anyone, anything, or light and Higher Energies in general.
What is going on inside of me is so intense, that even though I am trying to simply observe, I feel as if I deeply identify and attach to the emotions flowing through me. Yet the intensity of what I feel – the extremely exaggerated emotions that do not match the situation – tell me intuitively that I am accessing the next level of my God drama.
“And I don’t care,” I silently pout. “I am not going to stop trying to play the game with God right now. Instead, I am going to feel the anger that convinces me that this game is real … that tells me that I must play this game.”
“I am F@cking angry,” I continue the inner surrender process, “Today there will be NO LIGHT FOR ME. I hate the light”
I whimper and sniffle and cry, all mixed in with the occasional wheezing and dry heaving. Responding to something Keith has occasionally encouraged, I intentionally clench my body, sitting upright in a bent-forward fetal position, tightly squeezing my fists and legs, crossing my arms, doing everything I can to physically block the energy flow in my body.
I am trying to intentionally sink into and get lost in these emotions. I want to understand why they have so much power over me.
Alien Withdrawal
“Go for it Brenda,” I occasionally hear someone encourage me.
I simply ignore such positivity. I will not listen to outside help. I will not punch pillows, scream, or any of that.
“Not with this group,” I respond to Keith when he later encourages me to go deeper into my process. “I don’t want to do it with this group on the porch.”
Doing so in such a social, distracting, and judgmental (my perception) environment feels like my worst nightmare. In the emotional state I am in, I feel as if I hate everyone here – even though I know at a rational-mind level that I actually feel deep love for most of them.
“I do not belong here,” these childhood emotions continue to rage. “This entire group is made up of aliens … or maybe I am the alien.”
I completely ignore Keith. When people occasionally offer help, I continue to push them away. When someone accidently commits the grievous sin of getting too close and bumping into me I move my feet away, or shift my body, while making a victimized and whiny little sound.
Empathically Numb
At about halfway through the ceremony, nature forces me to take a quick bathroom break. As I close and lock the door, I burst into sobs. Once I compose my emotional state, I return to my seat, pull a scarf over my head, and eventually end up lying down in a curled-up fetal position. For a few minutes, I am so annoyed that I actually get up and go into Keith’s kitchen to isolate, pout, sob, and dry-heave – but soon, I feel guilty for running away and force myself to return to the porch.
As I return, Paul is halfway overlapping onto my seat. I plop myself down on the ground, accidently bumping him quite forcefully as I reclaim my seat. I feel bad, but do not really care right now. He barks angrily at me and I ignore him completely, giving no responsive reaction other than to pull the scarf back over my face.
I spend the next hour or so lying down in fetal position, cycling through deep waves of teeth chattering tears, intermingled by pouting whimpers.
When the ceremony had begun, I was deeply feeling the pains of others on the porch … but now I empathically feel absolutely nothing. Somehow, I know that this realization is quite important.
I have no idea what is happening on the rest of the porch – other than the fact that I hear many ongoing distractions, while I am aware that a few people experience major heart-opening breakthroughs. This latter fact makes me even angrier at God.
Emotional Rebellion
“F@ck you God for giving the energetic blessings to them, while here I am doing the deepest inner work possible,” I allow myself to feel the God-drama emotions that I really know are not true. “What about me? … When is it my turn?”
This “What about me?” emotion deeply hurts, further fueling that childhood anger.
At one point, a dear friend and someone else who has been profoundly stuck, gently leans over to speak to me.
“Brenda, …” he whispers.
I simply ignore him.
“Brenda…” this young man again whispers.
“Yeah?” I finally whisper back.
“You have helped me so much this year,” the young man lovingly offers. “Would you let me share energy with my hand to see what happens?”
“No,” I respond in pain. “Please, no.”
Synchronized Sobs
A while later, when Keith finally finishes his first trip of individual work around the porch – a journey that has consumed several hours – Keith reaches over and gently touches my leg for a minute or so. I recognize his loving intention as he silently checks in with me, but I continue to ignore him. I do not shift position. I do not look up. I simply do nothing.
“I am angry at GOD, period!” the childhood emotions continue to rage inside. “I want no help. I want to feel the anger and tears. I want to let the emotion flow. I want no light … none of that crap!”
Soon, Paul starts to cry in his own process. As Paul cries, I unexpectedly sink into simultaneous waves of intense tears that eerily synchronize with his. As Paul passes through several waves of emotion, I unwillingly follow suit. His emotional depth further triggers my own.
Finally, and quite strangely, I am suddenly eff-ing tired of this emotional release – this adventure into surrendering to those overwhelming emotions surrounding the pitiful games I have been, and am presently playing out with Deity.
A Little Hope
As I focus on an attempt at meditation, I almost immediately find myself seated at a table in my inner conference room, with my Higher Self on the right, and my personal Obi-Wan Kenobi sitting directly across from me.
“Obi-Wan, can you please help me to start allowing some light now?” I beg for inner assistance from my personal Higher-Energy expert.
As I do so, I begin to gradually experience a little inner lightness … a little hope … hope that maybe enough of the anger has now passed through me so that I can allow some healing to occur.
Unexpected Turnaround
As Paul goes deeper into his own process, he runs right into a blockage that has kept him stuck and in denial for a very long time. When he begins to abandon his process, Angela will have none of it.
I watch with surprise as Angela gets in Paul’s face and demands that he not scam himself. I open my eyes and note that Keith gives Angela a “thumbs up”, following which I quickly do the same. I love watching Angela push this beautiful-but-very-stuck man to go deeper … demanding that he not buy into his self-scamming.
Today, I am impressed by Angela’s loving firmness. I am unaware that later this week, I will also be the unsuspecting recipient of such well-intentioned pushing … but that is a future story.
Loving the fact that Paul is beginning to actually go deeper, I interrupt my process, finish pulling myself out of my own muck, and quietly ask several people on the porch to please cease their noisy distractions and to instead hold sacred space for Paul’s process. I crave for Paul to go deeper. I want him to break through his own inner walls.
Meanwhile, as I hold space for Paul, I continue to work in my inner conference room, working with “Obi-Wan Kenobi” – my hooded mystery figure – in helping me to allow more light to assist me. I am feeling much more positive and optimistic.
True Confessions
“Wow, you’re in a different place,” Keith soon speaks to me during a break in the process.
“Yeah,” I giggle back. “I have been so angry at God, pushing everyone away, wanting nothing to do with Light or Higher Energy … dealing with the anguish of feeling how painful it was to be an unknowing empath throughout all those years … with the agony of bringing in all of that emotional crap and believing it was all my own emotion … believing that I was a socially-dysfunctional loser, hating groups and social situations.”
“But I was not a loser,” I smile as I continue talking. “I was just eating emotional crap from others.”
“Scream that out,” someone in the groups calls out to me.
I simply ignore their comment. I still cannot go to that place with this group. But I am delighted that my emotions are not again flaring as I further describe the journey I took today.
“So many times today I had to literally force myself NOT to leave,” I share my agonizing experience. “I did not want to be here. I wanted to leave. I constantly thought about leaving.”
“We are so glad you stayed,” Angela giggles back to me.
Deepening Inner Drama
As I glance around the porch, I can intuitively tell that my process has touched and impacted several others in some strange way … and I also clearly understand that my emotions where somehow synchronized at the end with what happened with Paul.
But I do not concern myself with these details. I focus only on my own lessons.
In the middle of my conversation with Keith, he is interrupted by someone else, and soon, Keith is diverted into guiding a long group meditation. I step into the bathroom, experiencing a strong feeling of annoyance because of the interruption. I was secretly hoping that Keith might pull some magical process out of his sleeve – a process to help me integrate and solidify my strange day.
But I also realize that this annoyance is another manifestation of my God drama … of my belief that “God” (as projected onto Keith) is again not going to help me on this one. If I want help, I will need to ask, and for some reason, part of me still refuses to ask.
“After what I just went through, I shouldn’t have to ask,” the annoyed child-in-me pouts.
Silent Struggle
This new meditation goes on for an hour. I simply cannot participate. In my present emotional state, I do not relate to the meditation, and I am terrified to even try. I have so much emotion flowing through me right now that the last thing I can do is focus on something else. All of that emotion from the past is continuing to rage through me.
The only way I get through this meditation is to remind myself that this is my “personal holodeck” and that everything that takes place in my holodeck is personally designed for my process.
Finally, when the meditation is over, Keith goes into silence for another half hour, and no one speaks – everyone simply rests on the ground in powerful meditation.
Eventually, in deep emotion as I think about being the first to leave, I stand up and step into the bathroom. I have had enough. But when I come back out, most others on the porch have also stood up and are preparing to leave. Rather than walking away myself, I again sit back down on my cushion, wrapping myself up in a blanket. I know I am not done, but I am exhausted and have done all I can possibly do today.
When I ask Keith for another private session on Monday (tomorrow) morning, Angela volunteers to participate if I want her there.
“Probably not,” I respond, “but maybe. I will let you know.”
Just Flowing
Finally, after most people have left, I step into Keith’s kitchen to say goodnight.
“I am a total wreck,” I tell Keith as tears unexpectedly resume their flow.
To my surprise, Keith gives me a huge supportive hug – something I really need at the moment.
“I hate everyone right now,” I express my unbelievable pain. “I hate life. The way I feel right now is that I don’t even want to go on anymore.”
“That is exactly what you went through in your life,” Keith reassures me. “It is really intense when these things flow through you.”
“Wow, this is just stuff FLOWING through me,” I more deeply grasp the concept. “These emotions are not really me and they are not present-day. This is a regression, even though I am profoundly identified with what I feel … deeply attached to this reality.”
Seconds later, a young man – the one who had so lovingly offered to share energy with me earlier – steps into the kitchen. He approaches me with hesitation, and I quickly grab him and wrap my arms tightly around him. As I do so, I sob for at least five minutes with neither of us saying a word, even when he walks back out onto the porch.
“I am actually in a very good place,” I share with Keith after a few more minutes of conversation. “Even though I feel like absolute crap, I know I am in a very profound and powerful process. I will probably cry all night, getting no sleep, but I know I am doing what I need to do.”
Walking Tears
“Thanks again,” I tell Keith as he walks me out to his gate.
“Congratulations on your process,” Keith tells me as I step onto the street.
“I actually do believe congratulations are in order,” I respond as I begin to climb the steep road.
“But I still feel like sh#t,” I call out a second later through a new layer of tears.
I make it about 75 feet up the steep road before I collapse in tears and sit down on the pavement, sobbing for about five minutes. Paul and another young man walk by me in the middle of my tears. I ignore them and they ignore me. When they are gone, and after the tears settle, I walk slowly toward the center of town, gradually inching my way. Just after crossing the canal, I bump into another beautiful young woman who was at the ceremony today. As I hug her, I again burst into sobs. We have a heart-sharing talk for ten minutes – one that helps to further restore my sanity.
As I again resume my snail-pace walking, Angela quickly catches up with me. As we hug, I am pleased that this hug does not result in even more tears. The two of us engage in nonstop conversation as she walks with me to the gate of my apartment’s stairway.
“I will either be crying all night, starring at the ceiling all night, or watching movies all night,” I share my prediction with Angela.
“Chose the movies,” Angela smiles back at me. “Sometimes it is best just to get lost.”
The Edge Of Craziness
As I step through my front door, I am nearly blown away by what smells like a strong rose scent – an odor so strong that I can hardly breathe. Floral scents have a strong tendency to stuff up my sinuses. Immediately I assume that Sufi must have sprayed a rose-scented perfume spray all over my apartment, even though I had told her once that such scents make it difficult for me to breathe. (It is only later that I discover Sufi did no such thing.)
“I want my privacy,” I begin to pout. “I cannot handle having a roommate. I need my freedom without random people sleeping in my house, without late night showers and noises, without the awkwardness of shared finances, etc…”
“I know I was inspired and guided to invite her to stay,” I ponder in frustration, “but I get to choose my path, and I DO NOT WANT a roommate.”
I am so lost in my pain, so deep in childhood emotions, and so frustrated by social struggles that I just want to scream.
After a quick round of note taking and dinner, I surrender to the almighty computer, watching videos until nearly midnight. Finally, I retire to my bed, hoping for a little sleep, but unsure if my wish will be granted.
Hopelessness consumes me as I finally drift off to sleep. I am struggling so deeply with these crazy emotions – yet I also know that what I am experiencing is an integral part of a profound healing process.
I cannot wait until tomorrow morning at 9:00 a.m. when I have an opportunity to dig deeper. I am so anxious to find peace and closure to a process that has me on the edge of checking myself into a mental hospital.
… to be continued …
Copyright © 2012 by Brenda Larsen, All Rights Reserved