Today is the 25th anniversary of my mother’s passing.
A month or two ago, as I realized that this milestone was approaching, I started reflecting.
Seeing where I am now, if given the option, would I do it all over again?
As I started to look at this question, I was immediately taken back to the day after my mom’s passing. It had been raining out, almost as if the earth was crying on my behalf, and I remember being at the hospital, having the distinct thought of how long it would be until I saw her again.
It was devastating, and in that moment, and in so many moments to follow, for so many years to come, I would have done anything to bring her back and to fill the hole the loss of her left in my heart.
Simply put, I needed her to navigate through this life, especially my young life.
But, as so many journeys do, while I wouldn’t realize this until much later, my pain would be the beginning to more, if I let it, if I surrendered to it, if I embraced it.
Which brings me back to my original question:
If given the option, would I do it all over again?
As I sat with this, the answer that came to me was a resounding yes. Not because it wasn’t the most heart-breaking moment of my life, because it absolutely was. And, not because it didn’t literally take me down, over and over, because it did. But, also because it took me to places that only our hardest moments can take us. And, it led me to the exact thing, the promise, that many of us as souls come here for—literal heaven on earth, which is something I’m wholeheartedly living every single day of my life.
You see, I have this vague memory, more like an energetic imprint, of being in soul form and being shown this potential. It feels like a potential a lot of us are shown our own version of before we take this journey into the human body. For me, as I imagine it is for many, I know I’ve had many lifetimes of this as an unfulfilled possibility.
Every single time, I’ve vowed to remember. Every single time, I’ve vowed to awaken. And, really, every single time, I’ve vowed to lean in to my most intense moments to show me this in actualized form.
And, while I definitely made some progress in many of those lifetimes, as life does, I often forgot, and instead, I fell victim to my circumstances. I got sucked into the pain and my victim story, instead of fully feeling it and allowing it to help me to rise higher and go deeper than I ever could have gone without it.
This was absolutely okay, as I needed those moments, and this practice in intensity, to bring me to this one. (As I’ve often shared in my workshops, I view our soul life like an infinite roll of film, simply picking up where we’ve left off in the last lifetime.)
Yet, at the end of my time here in these lifetimes, I know I had regrets.
Why couldn’t I have remembered?
Why did I let myself go through all of that pain and not use it to fulfill my soul’s journey?
Why couldn’t I get it right?
Of course, then, after a period of reflection, my soul would choose it again, many times, in a different form and always with the commitment to fully remember.
This time, though, I’m grateful to say that I was actually able to find my way home. While I know this is an infinite and ever-evolving journey, there’s one thing that I also know—I absolutely could not have done this without the impetus of my mother’s passing.
Unfortunately, this is just how most of us as humans, myself included, are wired.
While, of course, in the beginning, like so many of us who’ve had significant pain in our lives, often times, there’s nothing else we can do besides to be with and feel it, if you’re lucky and don’t go in the opposite direction of numbing or escaping. (In various lifetimes, I know I’ve done both.)
For me, at times, as I did this, it felt like the pain could swallow me whole. Occasionally, I’d see glimpses of hope and glimpses of her that would let me know I was going to be okay. Then, I would find myself back at the beginning, deep in it again.
That is, until I made a new choice. This choice would lead me to an opening that would allow me to heal through this, and, while I can still have touch points that take me back to that beginning moment, after many years, I’m happy to say I’ve developed a new relationship with her.
It looks different from the one we would have had in physical form, some of it better, some of it worse. But, she is still there with me in this life.
And, while there’s so much more I could say, and I share a lot of my journey to healing through this in my Living Deeply book, if I can leave you with one thought right now, it’s this:
Don’t let your pain be in vain. After all, it’s already happened to you, so you might as well make it mean something.
With this, let it take you into its depths, and allow it to take you to places that you couldn’t have gone otherwise. Practice leaning into this over and over, until your pain can no longer take you down. (This practice in intensity and feeling is one of the biggest and undiscussed secrets to life.)
That being said, it’s when we do this, that we no longer fear life or anything in it.
Instead, we awaken to its richness, its gifts, its magic and its depths.
And that is when we have truly found our own version of heaven on earth.
Many blessings to you,
Deb
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