I just realized how much I\u2019ve neglected a very important part of my emotional life.<\/p>\n
I\u2019ve been SO afraid of sliding down the path of mental pain again, of going down the rabbit hole of despair, that I haven\u2019t really been able to be with the feelings and emotions I deemed unwanted.<\/p>\n
Right now, while I\u2019m sitting in an ancient Scottish hotel having breakfast, it suddenly becomes very clear to me just how much I have been running away from doubts and grief and sadness since I stopped drinking almost eight years ago, and started my spiritual journey.<\/p>\n
I see now, very very clearly, how much I have smothered many of the small emotional fires that started within me, just because I could.<\/p>\n
My turbulent past has made me so scared of feeling like shit and losing myself in that experience, that I constantly fought to stay away from the suction of the negative vortex.<\/p>\n
For decades I didn\u2019t really know how to be with confusion or feeling lost, so I drank, and I still got caught up SO deeply in mental madness.<\/p>\n
But learning about spirituality has helped me immensely with that.<\/p>\n
It gave me the weapons to battle depression and fear, to start living a life of appreciation and peace, yet I realize that I\u2019ve never dropped those weapons ever since.<\/p>\n
The amazing magic wand I was given to change everything in my life became some kind of addiction.<\/p>\n
And I used it to steer away from an important part of my humanness.<\/p>\n
Successfully, but with a consequence.<\/p>\n
This morning, just a couple of minutes ago, I felt that I\u2019ve totally overused and maybe even misused this power, and now is the time to let go, to breathe, to trust.<\/p>\n
While I was eating my bacon and eggs on toast, taking in the amazing, endless hills in greens and purples on my last day in this fabulous country, it dawned on me how much I\u2019d like to stay here to heal.<\/p>\n
I saw myself hiking the majestic landscape for days on end, stopping to take in the views, and just cry and cry and cry.<\/p>\n
Seeing that I have avoided so much experiences because of an old fear, was one of the biggest insights I\u2019ve had in the last years.<\/p>\n
Realizing that healing is not just about feeling good all the time, but experiencing ALL of it, was both extremely obvious and liberating.<\/p>\n
I thought about pain and it didn\u2019t freak me out, and even felt like a big opportunity.<\/p>\n
It seems I\u2019m finally strong enough to admit that I sometimes feel weak.<\/p>\n
I\u2019m ready to be with my pain, just hold it (but not too tight), just acknowledging it and sit next to it and not run away from it, for I\u2019m no longer terrified of how it will expand and eat me up again.<\/p>\n
Because it won\u2019t.<\/p>\n
I AM OKAY, I really am.<\/p>\n
I know now that I can feel, everything, and be fine.<\/p>\n
And so I did, back in my hotel room, while crying tears of relief.<\/p>\n
Being in Scotland helped me find this piece of the puzzle.<\/p>\n
It\u2019s a big one.<\/p>\n
Oh man.<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
—<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n