The Shadow Effect

To every thing there is a season, and a time to every

purpose under the heaven;

     A time to be born, and a time to die, a time to plant,

and a time to pluck up that which is planted;

     A time to kill, and a time to heal; a time to break

down, and a time to build up;

     A time to weep, and a time to laugh; a time to

mourn, and a time to dance ...

     A time to rend, and a time to sew; a time to keep

silence, and a time to speak...

     A time to love, and a time to hate; a time of war,

and a time of peace.

              - ECCLESIASTES  3:1-4, 7-8

 

This morning I was graced with the opportunity to watch The Shadow Effect

on Oprah's Soul Sunday. It was one of the most powerful things I have seen in a long

long time.  I know I will return there again and again, taking in the messages on a deeper and deeper level.    The richness of this program lasted for an entire three hours!  As the program opened, it explained: "The shadow is made up of the thoughts, emotions or impulses we find too painful, embarrassing or distasteful to accept - so, instead of dealing with them, we repress them.

Right now, hundreds and millions of people are living in denial of their individual shadow.  And all of us are being effected by the collecive shadow in more ways than we can imagine."

To 'everything there is a season'  ... and I have finally begun to accept my own denial of the depth of grief I am struggling with over the loss "my person" (as named by her daughter Kay,  as referenced in describing true friendship on Gray's anatomy).  This weekend was the season ... it seemed that people lined up all around me to peel back the layers and allow me to begin to open up to feeling a pain that felt bigger than myself...too big to handle. 

Gratefully, as always, life paved the way to inviting me to do what I need to do before it all closed in around me.  And so, the hard shell that I had temporarily constructed in order to hold back the pain has now cracked open, the pressure cooker is gone, and the light of healing is beginning to shine in and warm and heal the pain previously held in darkness.

Honestly, I don't know what to do without my person.  No longer am I able to thrust it all into the gratitude that I feel that she is no longer in such pain, and is now free of that physical body that trapped her so dreadfully.  

The shadow had me in its grips for a while ... I did not want to appear to be selfish, by wishing her still here ... or weak and needy,  by grieving so deeply.  (You know us people made of that tough German stock!) And, I did not want to break.   Somehow I forgot that it is a both/and world ...Yes, I am truly grateful that she is no longer in pain, AND  I also wish she was still here...I don't know what to do without my person. But, you know what?  I'm going to find out ...because I am back, reconnected perhaps? 

The shadow no longer clouds my vision, and yes, now, finally, I weep.....and the tears are cleansing and allow my vision to be cleared and my heart to be softened so that I am more authentically present to life on life's terms.  This battle is over, and I am finally willing to let go of the struggle, and to surrender...at least for this day.

In that surrender, I feel connected to myself again, and I realize how much I have only been going through the motions ... omg, just those same things I learned in hospice many years ago.

I am back to living in acceptance, in the only way I know how to live ... in surrender to the ONE who has ALL POWER.

I missed me. 

To everything ... there is a season ....

cate