The Deepest Self

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The Deepest Self

I am 38 and exist comfortably in what I call a “perpetual state of metamorphosis”. I am on a life-long journey to inner peace and hope to find myself there.

This all started….

Not too long ago, in the midst of a binge on self-pity, I sat paralyzed by life and its challenges that seemed insurmountable and crippling. My mind left and turned itself against me to mock and crush that last bit of spirit that enabled me to get out of bed each morning and go through the motions of the day that stretched before me.

I fell out of myself and burned with a shame, feeling, that I had done everything wrong. I was weak and pitiful had failed at everything and felt that madness would be a fitting place to reside. I wished to go back in time so I could do things over and make different choices. I wanted to run away, change my name, recreate myself and forget.

I regretted everything and valued nothing.

Suddenly there was an audible click. I opened my eyes and looked around me. I was still on my couch in my living room and when I looked at the time on the DVD player I realized that almost 3 hours had gone by since I first sat down. I got scared and confused. How could so much time go by without me knowing? My legs had been crossed and when I tried to get up they cramped in protest of the sudden movement as if to confirm that I had been still for a long time.

The rumbling in my head stopped and time, once again, stood still. I thought, “This is it. I’m on the brink and when I slide there will be no turning back”. My life flashed before me and I saw the faces of those I loved and who loved me. I saw all the good memories I had buried for so long. I remembered all the things that had pleased my senses and felt despair at the thought that if I took one more step I would preempt the creation of another sweet recollection.

I didn’t want to give up and on that swell came a single shard of hope that told me there was still time for happiness and inner peace. Then there was the revelation, that in order for me to achieve inner peace and happiness it would take time.

And, finally, there were the resolutions to give up who I was, as I knew myself, to stop the pursuit of what I felt (thought) I needed and wanted, and to realize that God would never tell me ‘what’ my purpose was, no matter how hard I prayed on bended knee with eyes cast upward. I just had to resolve myself to live with purpose.

It was my finest moment.

I started by reviewing all the events in my life, major and minor, that played significant parts in ‘who’ I had become and then made peace with my circumstances and myself. I confronted my mortality and made myself acutely aware of the passage of time and told myself that I would never again ‘wait until tomorrow’.

I took stock and inventory of the things that I could not change and knew these things for sure: I am a mother, a daughter, sister, granddaughter, cousin, auntie, and niece I am an acquaintance, a friend, a best friend, an adversary, a face in the crowd, and a stranger I am a teacher, a mentor, an advocate and a student I am an employee, a colleague, a customer, a consumer, and a statistic I am a child of God and an instrument of satan I am here.

The things we are called upon to do in order function completely and differently in each of our ‘other selves’ can be overwhelming, confusing, demanding and frightening. And when I think about the times I had to blend my identities to get along and through I stumbled upon ‘conclusions’ that gave me closure to my past, reason to my present, and a map to my future. I also stopped asking questions.

I settled my soul and drew conclusions from experiences resulting from heartaches combined with living in poverty combined with the observations of the trials and tribulations of those close to me combined with what I read in news papers and saw on television combined with logic combined with emotion combined with a wisdom that comes (only) with age. I am not old, but I am older. I am not wise but I have earned a certain wisdom that has served to quell insecurities and create strength within me. I embraced this burgeoning wisdom, not as a new component, not in addition to, or in place of another, but as an awakening of a part of the whole that has always existed in my deepest self.

Once I had defined ‘myself’ I moved to my next and most important task in self-exploration. It was to come up with a plan on ‘what to do with myself’ and it didn’t take long to see that the answer was quite simple.

Nothing…

My blossoming wisdom had allowed me to see that I’d already spent my lifetime absorbing, conforming, yielding, accommodating, blending, complying, incorporating, cooperating, adjusting, conceding, assimilating, coexisting, and synchronizing my self to standards set before me by people who didn’t know me, by people who thought they knew me and by people who told me they knew me. I am not bitter, I am not angry, I am thankful.

The next step, I concluded, was to compile a list of ‘rules to self governance’. I commissioned myself to pay attention to my intuition, observe and learn from everything and everyone, let go to make room, let it be so it could be done, recognize and free the power of my subconscious and lay my self completely open to my self.

I learned to let go of materialism, downplay anticipation, reconcile my desires (that so often lead to disappointment), and to cast aside the interruptions, to my focus, that manifested themselves in the forms of self-doubt and fear of change. I looked ahead, so as not to miss a thing, and found that I craved the fullness of every moment. Soon there was nothing in my life that had more or less meaning, more or less significance.

Everything changed on this journey to my deepest self and I alternated between the excitement at being given another day to try again or do something differently and the regression of spirit where I mourned the loss of time whenever I dwelled with the despair of ‘things’ unfulfilled.

Recently, I read on a billboard outside a church, ‘God does not guarantee a smooth journey, only a safe landing’. The impact of this simple message collided with my deepest self and branded itself into my resolve.

I will continue. I will have faith in myself. I will show kindness and compassion, tolerance and support, forgiveness and understanding to everyone who crosses my path and value my time spent with them. I will work hard. I will play hard. I will love hard.

The truth is in me and I will search, maintain, and spread it on a daily basis even as I comprehend that I will die never understanding why the path to happiness and inner peace has to be difficult and winding. Still, I only have one life to live and life and living is all I know. There is beauty within, around and before me on this path that I’ve been put on and to think ….. I’ve only just begun to see.

Author: Daunette.
info@CTSNE.com