This full moon.
Belonging.
That is what is on my heart. Achieving a sense of belonging.
Recently, I’ve been struggling with forging new and morphing roles in my life: the role of hearth keeper (learning how to manage a household, teaching and guiding my boys, nurturing my relationships with my mate and with my Self), my place in the Oahu community (a black bohemian brooklynite woman living miles away from all things familiar) and as an artist (a wanna be social activist artist/ make art for art’s sake artist/ beaucoup-bucks-making artist).
And I know the inherent answer to Belonging is Acceptance. Acceptance of me. Yes, who I am at any given moment: the Good, the Bad and the Ugly. Saying YES to all of it. But…there’s too much gabbing that goes in this head to hear the Truth. But…sometimes I do. Then there is peace. I’m learning to laugh at myself more and to enjoy the company of that person who is always there, day, night, sleep, awake, every single second and with every breath I take.
Tonight I had an Aha moment about my childhood family unit: Mommy, Daddy, big sis and lil sis. The four of them always managed to love me no matter what Crazy I threw at them. Ask them, they’ll tell you: Crazy. Ironically they never said or did anything directly to ostracize me yet I felt like the black sheep of the family. I would gaze out of our 12th floor terrace and dream of leaving and going beyond This Place. “I don’t belong here.” I felt as though I acted and viewed things differently and couldn’t help it. So I left and went searching for where I did belong. I attended high school out-of-burough, then college out-of-state and now live out-of-timezone. Choices that were different from my parents and siblings.
Now in the upper age of knocking-on-the-door to 40, I better realize that my family’s love and acceptance is my rock, my foundation of personal success. I have always felt confident in them being there for me. Always. The discomfort of displacement was solely mine. A longing to fit-in. Be like the rest. But deep down, the longing was for Self-Acceptance. And since my family did and have always accepted me, I was free to show my Crazy. I was safe to Be, which led me to explore and Grow.
And this is my wish for my sons: to always feel safe to be themselves, to always feel loved. To know their worth and innately know they belong and are an integral part of our family, the world family, the whole. Their existence adds value to my world, our world, the world. They are light-bringers.
Just like you, dear reader. Give thanks for bringing light to this blog. Thank you for being a valuable and integral part of this blogging journey. Know this, you always belong. Here. There. Everywhere you are, you are the added light necessary for deeper seeing.
Shine bright.
