All Of Me

I wrote the other day - "The greatest gift we can give the world is to be all of who we are."

Lots of people responded positively to that. But I never finished my thoughts.

What does it mean to be all of who we are? What does it mean to truly develop and heal and come into our fullness?

It is a vulnerable process. It requires a willingness TO HEAL. It requires a willingness to FEEL. And you know what - FEELING often SUCKS.

How often have I been AFRAID to do something. I have lived a great deal of my life unwilling to do something. "I don't WANT to go through this." I am very risk adverse. Though I seem powerful and passionate and high energy - there is a strong core of safety and stability as well. And this safety and stability (the one who shows up for work, for class, and gives her pets their medicine) - is the one who also clings to situations that won't put me in situations that MIGHT make me deal with lack of safety. (whatever safety is in that moment).

I have often been UP for SPEAKING OUT on behalf of OTHERS. I will be on YOUR SIDE if you need me, even if it is an unpopular side. I will listen to all the perspectives and understand that there are multiple truths and that there is NO ONE RIGHT - everyone can be right. And even this - is not a popular stance - because people might want me to take a stance, and my stance is "yes to all"... and yet I am VERY confident and VERY sure that we are all in it together. And there is no "win" or "lose" unless we are at war with each other.

But when it has come to ME -- I have taken a far longer approach. I have not been willing to FULLY FEEL. What is it to fully feel my anger? My pain? My loss? My grief? What is it to admit I WANT something? What is it to ASK for what I want and then GRACIOUSLY accept it?

I am thinking more about my strengths, my gifts, and what I offer. I am considering my soul imperatives and what I have completed and by what means I have done them. I am also recognizing many ways I have committed what one woman calls "a soul sin" - when you act against yourself.

In many ways I have kept my blog free of all outside family and professional references. I'm reconsidering this view. I'm reconsidering why I have done this and how I have used this. If I am TRULY an integrated being, why is THIS only being used as a patient voice? If I am a woman who has MORE than an identity of "just" a patient, why then have I ONLY shared with you that information.

Often it is to protect my family and students and clients. And - because I am inherently private. And so much of my limiting in this blog is also self-protection - to share in a limited way and to be the Melissa I want to be seen AS and to tell the story I want to tell without telling an INTEGRATED STORY. But I am deciding that in order to solidify the idea that to BE all of who I am - It is a willing process to both FEEL and not numb, and know myself as all of who I am - even if I have never recognized that before - or I was wrong (brains think - but they can think wrongly in a loop). I will share a little more fully without breaking confidences. I will be more integrated here as a symbolic act of healing.