Honoring Milestones

“Sorrow prepares you for joy. It violently sweeps everything out of your house, so that new joy can find space to enter. It shakes the yellow leaves from the bough of your heart so that fresh, green leaves can grow in their place. It pulls up the rotten roots, so that new roots hidden beneath have room to grow. Whatever sorrow shakes from your heart, far better things will take their place," Rumi.

 

I needed closure from a recent change in my job, and the healing work Michele provided in her Support Ceremony (called, "Forward Movement Through Awakening") shifted my conscience and emotional state.  It was the first time in weeks that I felt peace with my decision.  Part of the calm was from the fact that we (including my friend Erin) were sitting on blankets in a location near the water on the Bobolink Trail in Boulder, CO.  The air was cooler than usual and we were sitting near a creek.  Michele had her ceremonial materials including smudging bowl, yarn, scissors, frankincense anointing oil (that Michele bought in Egypt!), and I brought a ceremonial rock. The ceremony felt like a wedding or the most special occasion.  

 

Michele's work isn't just ceremonial, it's journey work, where I had to delve into personal, emotional, and spiritual exploration, to find truth and explore the emotional intensities for my departure.  This pushed me to tears and anger, and then Michele's calm nature was able to ground me back to center, and then I was pushed again to navigate why I am in my profession in the first place and Michele reminded me of my purpose, strength, and direction.  I felt like I was able to shift out of my mental quagmire and get back into a forward-moving solution.

 

The biggest transformation I felt and I continue to feel after this ceremony is that what I was lacking for a long time was peacefulness in my heart.  When we were sitting by the stream, we had several moments of meditation and I was able to experience nature with all five senses, and just be. Had I been more present in the prior months, I would have been awake to the fact that I was ignoring my intuition and trying to fit a square peg into a round hole.  The realization that I wasn't a good fit at that job would have been clearer, earlier. Instead, I shut myself off from the Sunlight of the Spirit and sat in the uncomfortability of knowing I was in the wrong job, and also showed up with image management and people pleasing, in order to appease others while also avoiding the negative feelings that are associated with confrontation, ending, leaving, and starting anew.  Even from the beginning, there were signs that I wasn't the right fit, and I continued to push forth versus surrender.  I was saying yes when I should have been saying no. Sitting by the creek, with the sun overhead and the sound of the brook and birds, my heart softened, and I forgave myself.  

 

Included in the ceremony was also this quote: “There’s a trick to the 'graceful exit.' It begins with the vision to recognize when a job, a life stage, or a relationship is over — and let it go. It means leaving what’s over without denying its validity or its past importance to our lives. It involves a sense of future, a belief that every exit line is an entry, that we are moving up, rather than out.”

 

Michele, thank you for helping me let go and helping me believe that every exit is an entry and that for every area in life where I see walls, there are actually hidden windows and doors of opportunity. 

                                                                                                   ~  Rosia P., N.D.