“It’s not your fault.” These four words were uttered to me in my most recent session with my mentor. My mind knows this, yet a full embodiment of this has not been mine. It resembled a powerful tornado dropping in and sweeping my house of all of the debris and dead wood that I tend to believe is mine and often cling to.
No doubt in my life there are many things that I have needed to be accountable for. Making my amends, realizing the impact that I have on others and trying to recognize it as quickly as I can to work on repairing. Yet the lifetimes I have spent with my shoulders weighed down by this impossibly heavy shroud is not mine to carry into every crisis, challenge and difficult experience that I encounter. I have been learning how to do a body scan to help me to discern if it’s mine, theirs or ours? My mind can muddle it all up, yet tapping into my body to catch how it’s landing has been my most accurate barometer.
If it’s not mine to keep a cautious and guarded vigil over, then whose is it? This always goes back to my fifteen year old daughter reminding me after a tender conversation that everything is not always about me. Those words are as fresh today decades later as they were when first uttered. I can still sense a lingering sting of shame and embarrassment and wonder why I did and still can default to personalizing?
What is it that makes women, especially as this is something I do listen to often, believe that the world turns and spins on its axis solely because of us? Perhaps some of it is grounded in truth because we are responsible for so many of the moving parts within our lives and families. Yet, here is where the overuse of our gifts comes into play.
It begins to feel like our identity, the ways in which we try to remain visible in this world, to find purpose and to matter. Yet the goodness of who and what we are is our innate birthright and does not have to be worked toward, it is a given and is inherently ours.
I am circling back to hearing, “It’s not your fault.” Does that mean that it was not my fault that my son shed his earth suit? This is a heavy anvil I can carry if I choose to. As mothers our circuitry is hard wired to assume fully the responsibility of keeping our children safe and growing them into adulthood and beyond. When this does not occur, a blank script is handed to us that we must craft and pen for our survival. No one else can do this for me and I cannot pick up someone’s script and place my name upon it. This is a day to day, moment by moment moving into acceptance of what is even though I can wish with all my might that I had not received this script. For me it has resembled learning how to drive a stick shift. Some real jerking, grinding gears, whip lash and making screeching noise trying. Until I got the feel for it and realized it was the only way I could continue living my life and carrying the loss of Douglas within and alongside of mine.
My son’s life was and is his. Douglas was discovering what his BEing came into learn and if I inserted myself into every uncomfortable moment I hindered his growth. It was never my job nor was I ever that powerful to believe that I could change his course even though there were times I so wish I could have. Maybe I could offer another fork in the road, for a time, yet what he came in for was and is his, just as mine belongs to me.
How might our inner and outer worlds change, look and feel if we could begin to embrace and truly create and grow this touch tree, “It’s not my fault.” It feels like a key in the lock to something so worth wresting with, feeling into and remaining curious about. Is it possible to fully embody and absorb these four words? I’m not sure and that’s okay as it’s been so worth my energy to drop into this feeling and deep knowing that washes over me as I am able. Flinging open our doors, creating a seat at our tables and inviting this guest to stay awhile as I sense she has a lot to say and I'm listening. How about you?
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