I don’t know even know how to start this musing. The words are as jumbled up in my head as my emotions have been jumbled up inside of me for oh, about 6 months now. Since August, when the bottom seemed to drop out from under my sense of who I am and what I want for my life, I have only written here one time. ONCE! That feels like pure craziness to me considering what a lifeline my writing has been since Russell died, the last time the bottom dropped out from underneath me. I don’t know exactly where this musing will take me. I simply know that today, right now, I need to finally write something, ANYTHING, in the hopes that I might be able to begin the path back to listening to ME.
My writing has long been mainly about being the way to put voice to the things inside of me that I simply can’t hold within me in such a way to stay grounded. Writing has been a cleansing, a catharsis, a release of crazy intense emotions that simply need a way to move through my body. While physical activity, being outside, and simply journaling can help with this too, writing a blog post and then sharing it publicly has been THE most powerful way for me to feel like I am honoring MY voice, MY dreams and MY needs. It’s been an amazing gift that I have never, ever taken lightly.
There is much that happened in 2019 that nudged me towards the edge of an emotional abyss. Really too many things to want to name here at this time and maybe never in a public way. The letting go of Avalon and all that had ever been for me and that I still dreamed it could be was the final step that dropped me into more emotions then I knew were waiting for me to have time to focus on. The past 6 months have been a very, very dark and solitary journey for me, one that I am just recently beginning to see a light ahead to begin to get out of this place. I anticipate someday soon I will write more about all of this and what all has opened for me to explore but today it is about MY VOICE and the ways that I silenced here these past few months that I need to write about.
Even before Russell died and I started sharing my musings with the world, I believed that allowing myself to speak the stirrings of my soul as they arose was an essential part of living my truest self. In bits and pieces throughout my entire adult life I have either written or spoken of deeper things. In the past almost 5 years, I have written and spoken what is true for me without worrying about what others think or if they agree with me. At least until these past 6 months.
Perhaps because of how lost and confused and alone and rudderless I started feeling, I began to allow other people’s opinions about what I should or shouldn’t share to matter. Very subtle messages I received, or interpreted, as “SHHH, don’t say that.” somehow filtered their way into that doubtful space of myself and took up residence. I started worrying about looking weak and incapable. I started obsessing about sharing anything except positive, forward motion kinds of things. It fed right into some deeply rooted, life long fears and did a fabulous job of shushing up MY VOICE, MY MUSE. Oh, I’ve written in journals, enough to fill three books in 6 months. But sharing my story, my real in this time and in this moment story – nope not an option.
Combine that shushing up I’ve done to myself with the swirl of emotion grieving letting go of Avalon and the swirl of emotion reawakened about Russell’s death and the doubts about what to do next with my life and the feelings of loneliness and the reality of being a single mom and the stress over finances and the internal pressure I put on myself to be the best I can for everyone else, sometimes more so than taking care of myself, and walking with my entire family as my dad learns how to live with cancer and WOWZA it’s been a doozy of a time.
With deep, deep gratitude I am thankful that the light is shining brighter at the top of the abyss I have been in. I am thankful that my Muse has finally said “ENOUGH ALREADY! Your voice is YOUR VOICE and it doesn’t matter what anyone else thinks you should do with that voice. All that matters is what YOU NEED to do with your voice. It is time to shush your own inner critical fearful self and return to living YOUR story and YOUR life. Let others take care of themselves and trust YOU!” I am grateful, grateful, grateful!
I have TONS of stuff to explore about me and what I most need to create my very best life for myself and my kids in the upcoming weeks and months. I am making new choices and stepping onto new paths, many with lots of unknow factors involved. But, it is feeling okay to do this, and I am even excited about the new things ahead, because I am 100% committing to living MY life out loud again and allowing MY voice to be the one that matters most to me.
In this time, in this moment and in every time, in every moment I will live out loud MY story, using MY voice.
Dream Weave Coaching - Lara K Peterson 