Catharsis

I take about a year heal from strong emotional situations.  About a year ago, the coven I was a part of disbanded and as usual, I have taken the year to heal.  I know why it fell apart.  Many of us had priorities that just didn't match up anymore.  However, there are some events, that no matter how much time passes, I will never understand why they happened.  I will never truly get the answers that I'm looking for, so all I can do is speculate.  I guess that's not really what matters anymore.

For the better part of a decade, I participated in some sort of group practice or another.  In the fall of 2008, I helped to found the Pagan group at my university, and in my time at school, I was also part of another coven.  When that coven didn't work for me anymore, I continued group practice with the group at school and with one of my spiritual sisters.  She and I continued to practice together even after graduating from college.  About a year after graduation, she was heading overseas to pursue her masters and I had found my most recent coven.  I practiced with that coven for 4 years, which brings us to last year, when it disbanded.  This left me feeling lost and adrift.  What was my practice going to look like now?  I had no idea.  I needed space in many ways.  I needed to decompress.  I knew that I had very little interest in structured rituals or any ritual for that matter.  While I found myself observing the changing of the seasons, I observed them more internally than externally.  I felt the energetic changes within myself more than anything else.  I found myself embracing the physical as well.  I think within the coven, I was trying to "transcend" the physical due some members feeling uncomfortable with it.  To me, that doesn't feel natural.  We manifest in this physical world to experience it and allowing ourselves to have that experience is important.

After the initial shock and hurt of the coven disbanding, I felt a sense of freedom.  I found a lot of literal free time and also emotional freedom.  I was able to go car shopping, work on wedding plans, visit with friends and family, take vacations, and put in the necessary time at work that was required of a hard-earned promotion.  I was able to do all this any time that I needed to without the guilt that might have accompanied various events throughout last year and early this year.  I was grateful for that time and feeling.  I found a deepening interest in yoga.  I know that yoga is supposed to prepare your body for meditation, but for me, the physical flow of yoga is meditative and clears my head and energizes me.  I have a few books that I am reading as well as trying attend more classes.  Eventually, I need to create a personal practice, but as I've practiced Wicca in a group setting for so long, I think that is what I'm used to and need to get out of that frame of thought.

A couple weeks ago, we hit the one year mark since the coven disbanded and I'm feeling that final purge of emotions.  I'm not sure that I'll ever feel friendly with some former members of the coven, but I am feeling more comfortable with the outcome of the coven disbanding.  Recently, I had some of my feelings validated that hadn't been previously and that made a big difference for me.  Although I had held a ritual for release, last summer, I had a dream a couple days ago where a former member insisted that we should still maintain a relationship.  I knew that it was not healthy and so I took the doll that she had that represented me.  It wasn't a poppet, but a sad looking teddy bear that she had tied up with string.  I took it from her and cut the strings and threw it in a river.  And after that, she stood in front of me crying, asking if we could still be friends.  I told her that we both knew that it was not a healthy relationship and then I hugged her goodbye and walked away.  I think my catharsis is almost complete.

An Evolution of Beliefs

I think my beliefs have been evolving for a while, but I didn't recognize it.  It was easy to maintain the status quo as a member of the coven and not really think about my personal beliefs because it is important to conform to the group to maintain unity.  When the coven fell apart, I knew that I didn't want to continue a practice that looked like what we did there.  But what did that look like?  In the coven, I was supposed to hit certain milestones and that was kind of how I ran my practice in attempt to hit those milestones.  Well now I'm on my own with a couple witchy friends to check in with and I've had to spend the past seven months trying to figure out what that looks like.  I'm still not quite sure, but I'm working it out.  Right now, I think I am still Wiccan, but that may change or it may not.  It's hard to say.  I can't say where I'm going, but I can tell you where I'm at.

I started yoga about a year ago and I really love the peace I feel when I'm there.  I'm sure I've mentioned before that it is the only place I really feel at peace.  I'd like to explore that more.  I have no desire to have some spiritual practice that tries to transcend this physical world.  I have clearly manifested in this physical body for a reason and I think it's important to explore that.  I am a spiritual being and its important to acknowledge that, but also embrace the experience of this physical body.  I tend to live in the physical first, and acknowledge the spiritual second.  I'm not one of those people that only wants to dwell on a spiritual plane and forgets the physical.  Since I need to bring the spiritual into my everyday life, I need to find a way to incorporate that into my physical life.  Yoga helps me to do that.  I am able to focus on the movement of my physical body and elevate that into something spiritual.  I am working on strengthening my body and the poses and now I think it is important to focus on the theory and spirituality behind it.  This will help me to take my practice in the direction I would like to see it go.  

I also find that the Wiccan belief in just one god and one goddess is very limiting to me.  I am probably on my way to working with a personal pantheon.  I know some Wiccans work with the Lord and the Lady concept, but that is just too vague and impersonal to me.  I know they view all deities as facets of the same energy, so they'll call on any deity that suits their needs.  The reason this does not work for me is that I do not share this belief that they are all part of the same energy.  Instead I believe that all deities are distinct entities, which we must nurture relationships with.  You wouldn't hang out in your house and then when you need a doctor, go knock on your neighbor's door without ever introducing yourself.  I feel the same way about deity.  You need to develop a relationship before asking for help.  Additionally, you wouldn't ask the doctor for tax advice.  The reason I bring this up is because if you do not subscribe to the nebulous Lord and Lady belief, then you must find a matron/patron.  To me, this also leaves something to be desired.  This is like developing a relationship with the doctor and then relying on him for everything even outside of his expertise.  This is where I struggle with the idea of matrons/patrons.  Athena had made herself known to me as my matron.  At the time, I needed a warrior energy in my life.  That's not to say that I don't need that energy in my life still.  What I am saying is that I need a combination of energies in my life, which is why I'm beginning to feel that working with a number of gods may be in my best interest.  I don't know what that looks like quite yet, but I do know I'll never figure it out if I don't start exploring.  For the next year, I'll be working through a book with devotionals to many different goddesses and find how I feel.  

I think all of this will help me to find the next step in the evolution of my beliefs.

Finding Gratitude

So many times whether in ritual or otherwise, I find myself asking for something that is lacking in my life.  But about two months ago, I found myself standing in this temple in a busy part of Tokyo.  I made my offering and began to pray.  I found myself not feeling an ounce of lacking anywhere in my life.  I could not think of a single thing that I needed.  I found myself full of gratitude.  I recognized all that I have received and was so grateful for each beautiful moment.  All I could say was thank you for this moment and everything that led me to this point.  In truth, this may very well have been the first time in my life that I have not felt as though my life is lacking in some way.

I really love that sense of complete gratitude that I felt in that moment.  This is something I struggle with on a regular basis.  I want to always live in a moment of gratitude without a sense of lacking.  I really struggle to stay in the space on a day to day basis though and it is something I am working toward.  It's easy on the good days, but the bad days are really hard.  I find it hard to stay in a positive place and maintain my attitude of gratitude.  This is something I'm working toward.  It's so very hard for me, but it's also very important.  I know that to become the best version of myself, this is something I need to work toward.  When I find something I am grateful for, I am jotting it down so that I can remember all of the good things in my life and not only focus on the bad.

I have to find that feeling again that I found at Sensoji Temple.  It was such a beautiful feeling and I would like to get back to that.  It was peaceful.

Reflections

I like to reflect on the previous year, every year; look at what I'd like to keep and what no longer serves.  I used to do this on Samhain, but in recent years, I've found that I prefer to do this on my birthday, in September.  Maybe so that by the time Samhain rolls around, I've had time to think about the things that I'd like to release from the previous year.  I find myself doing more reflecting, this year, more than I normally do.  So much has changed this year.

I spent a year as an only child.  My brother lives in Ohio and my sister moved to China for a year.  Originally, this terrified me.  I know I was an only child 27 years ago, but I don't even remember what that was like anymore.  My brother and sister have always been my rocks and I especially relied on my sister, so the idea of her being across the world felt unbearable when she left.  I had two choices: carry on with my life or don't.  Since I wasn't able to go with her, nor did I want to, the only choice I had was to carry on.  In a strange way, I feel like this really helped me to nurture other relationships in my life.  I don't want to say I neglected these relationships previously, but I feel like "alone," allowed me to deepen these relationships.  At the same time, thanks to modern technology, keeping in touch with my siblings was not as difficult as it may have been in previous years.  This allowed me to feel stable and safe and still venture out for a lack of a better term.

I spent about 2 1/2 years training for my current job.  I worked really hard over the first year to master my previous position and prove myself worthy of spending the time to train me for my promotion.  I spent the next year, taking on more and more responsibility and training.  In the last 6 months (just before my previous birthday), came my test.  My mentor had to go on medical leave and that was sink or swim time.  I covered for her completely during the first 3 months and covered part time for her in the following 3 months.  Again, I found myself afraid at first.  What if I couldn't handle this job?  What if I had trained for all that time and I couldn't handle it?  When my regional manager came to visit my branch and did a "mini-audit," there were minimal findings.  I was so proud of myself.  From that moment, I was no longer afraid and was confident that I was capable of doing this job.  Once a position opened up, I was promoted, first as a float, and not long after, I was assigned to my own branch.

I got engaged this year.  My fiance and I were together for 7 1/2 years when he proposed.  I am very excited to be taking this next step in our lives together and I feel like our relationship has only gotten stronger.  We were in our early twenties when we met and so in many ways we've grown up together.  We've supported and loved each other through highs and lows.  I am so in love and so glad that he is the person that walks beside me in this life.

This may be a long term reflection, but it's worth sharing.  I found my old diaries from when I was a teenager and into my early twenties.  There are some things I found that have not changed in 10-15 years and that I must continue to work on.  There are some things that I need to learn to not do.  I need to continue to practice self love.  The good news is there are things that I used to put up with, some very hurtful things that were said and done that I should have never allowed, that I would never allow again.  So I guess in some ways, you could say that I gained some self respect.  I've also said that somewhere over the years, I became more serious and sensitive, and I can't remember exactly when that happened.  I actually pinpointed it, in my diary, when I was about 16 or 17 that I felt heavy and felt myself becoming more serious due to some difficult circumstances at that time.  Now that I've found that, I need to work on healing that part of myself.  I think this could use some contemplation, to say the least.  Maybe this is who I am now or maybe it's a product of my environment, I'm not sure.

My coven ended this year.  I've been hesitant to talk about it, but now that a few months have gone by, maybe now it's something I can talk about.  It didn't end because of divorce, which apparently is a leading cause of covens disbanding.  Just the same, it wasn't a pleasant ending.  I don't want to go into the details as some of them are deeply personal, but I think it's important for me to say what I am able to say.  I'm not exactly sure if there is a point in time that any of us could point to and say that was the beginning of the end.  I also know that not everyone will view what happened the same way.  This is my personal view.  I think somewhere along the way, the coven no longer fit any of us.  I think our spiritual growth was taking us in very different directions and we all had interests that were taking us further and further from each other.  At the same time, I also think we had things in our personal that were pulling us apart.  I think if we had all been open and honest with ourselves and each other, then perhaps the ending wouldn't have been as messy as it turned out.  Instead I think problems were created where there weren't any.  Rumors, for a lack of a better term, were started and used as an excuse for the dissolution of the coven.  I can't say it was all bad or that I regret being in a coven.  That would be a lie.  I gained a lot from it during the good times.  Just the same, I also think it's good for me that it's over now.  There are things that I am doing now and things that I want that would have never been conducive to the coven environment

I have to say that many things that started out scary and awful, but turned out to be great for me.  I am grateful for all that I received this year and grateful for all that I continue to receive.  I will continue to take stock of my life as I've been doing over the past year.  Most importantly, I will continue learn to love myself and learn who I am.  I am still working on the gratitude and forgiveness that I had mentioned in one of my previous posts.  I can't say I'm there, but it's a process.

Taking My Practice Off the Mat

I was at yoga class the other night and as I was going through the different poses, I realized something.  Yoga is the place I feel most clear and the only time I feel truly at peace with myself and the world.  I often go into class with thoughts from the day or issues weighing on my mind and questions as to how I should resolve them.  I like setting an intention for my practice to find the answers to these questions or just finding peace.  At the beginning of class, I find myself consciously mulling over things. I shoo them out of my head and focus on my breath and my posture.  By the end of class, I find peace and often have an answer to how I should handle something.

Unfortunately I am only able to go to yoga class a couple times per week at best.  I want to take my practice "off the mat," as they say, and incorporate yoga principles into my daily life.  I started reading about how to do this.  Two of the things that stuck out about how to do this is by practicing gratitude and forgiveness.  In truth, I have no idea how to practice forgiveness.  I don't think I've ever really forgiven anyone outside of family members (and the close friends I've had since my childhood).  I hold onto grudges from throughout my life against those who I perceived to have wronged me, like weights that I drag around.  I know it does me no good to carry them, but I have yet to learn how to forgive them.  Gratitude is something that I do know how to practice, but do not do it enough.  I often focus on what's bad in my life and struggle to see the good in my life.  I've started a gratitude journal.  I'm writing down at least three things from my day that I am grateful for.  Right now, this is the best way that I can find to practice it regularly.  It helps me to reflect on my day and find the good in the difficult times.  I have a job that I enjoy, but also carries a heavy load of responsibility and stress.  I often leave it feeling spent, this gratitude journal helps me to find the gems in my day.  It's a slow process, but slowly, I find myself appreciating what I have a little better.

Once I get the hang of gratitude, it is my hope that my perspective will shift and I will find it within myself to begin forgiving.  First and foremost I need to forgive myself.  I made some bad choices in my late teens/early twenties that I am still feeling the repercussions of.  I constantly berate myself for these choices.  I know that's what's done is done and I can only move forward, but sometimes I think what if?  Where would I be if I had made better choices?  What if I had listened to others who knew better than I did?  What if I didn't think myself to be so smart that I knew better?  The logical part of me says I was a dumb kid, move on and get past it.  But let's face it, the guilt I've felt over it has turned into full blown shame.  I need to move beyond that shame and forgive myself.  I think once I do that, I will be able to forgive others.

On Giving Kindness

I find it hard to be kind to myself.  I'm my own worst critic and I have a problem with negative self-talk.  I will stew on it and beat myself up long after the issue has gone by, long after the person that I affected (if someone else was affected at all) has let it go and forgiven me.  One of my goals is to cut back on the negative self talk, but I struggle and recent events have been no exception.

I work in a large commercial bank and have spent the last two years training to become an operations manager.  The manager that trained me is tough and has high expectations of her employees.  She's brilliant and I couldn't have asked to be mentored by a better person.  Recently, I was promoted and put in a branch that was in rough shape.  My company knew that I was capable of cleaning it up and I eagerly rose to the challenge.  My mentor's reputation follows me wherever I go in this company (in truth not a bad reputation to have attached to me) and I continue to hold myself and my branch to the standards that she holds her own branch to.  I always ask myself how would she handle this situation?  What would she do?  And if I don't know, I call her.

Every day, for the first three weeks, I went into this branch holding it and myself to her standards.  I would berate myself that it wasn't like her branch.  She trained me thoroughly, why can't I get it in tip top shape?  What am I doing wrong?  I managed her branch when she wasn't there, this should be easy for me.  It got to the point, where I couldn't stop thinking about work, even at home.  I constantly stressed about it, to the point where I even dreamed about it.  Most of the time, if I dream about work, it's usually that my kitchen is the lobby and there's a customer in there, so I can't get to my bathroom.  Now the dresser in my bedroom became the vault door and I couldn't get it open.  I would wake up from my dream and stare at it until I realized it was just my dresser.  I dreamed about not being able to accomplish everything that I needed to get done.  I dreamed about getting audited and failing.  I couldn't disconnect from work.

Finally, about a week ago, I was beating myself up again and wondering what I got myself into when I took this job.  I happened to complete a task that was a big weight off my chest and looked around my branch.  I looked at my employees and marveled.  Part of the problem before I got there was that the previous operations manager didn't promote best practices and didn't really set expectations.  In four weeks, not only had I had set expectations and promoted best practices, but I got my employees on board with me and together we have improved our branch.  It's not my mentor's branch by a long shot, but let's be honest, Rome wasn't built in a day.  She has been in her branch a very long time and she has worked very hard to have it the way that she does.  It took a while to fall into bad habits and it will take some time to get back into good habits.  In this moment, I need to be proud of the what we have already accomplished and not beat myself up for what I have yet to accomplish.  It will all come with time.  And with that, I found a way to be kind to myself.  I didn't berate myself later.  I didn't look for ways that I should have done better.  I simply gave myself credit for what I have already accomplished and acknowledged that while there is still work to be done, what I have done already, is pretty great.

Finding Peace

I have not written in a very long time... like about a year.  I often start posts and never return to them.  I'm going to try to change that, this year.  In fact, I'm trying to make several changes this year.  Why this year out of any other, you ask?  I'm turning 30, much later this year.  30 is an age I have always feared.  To me, it marks the end of my childhood and the beginning of really being an adult.  I've never really felt like I've had it together and to truly enter adulthood without a clue is terrifying to me.  Before you tell me it's just a number or you loved your 30s and the best parts of your life happened in your 30s, let me stop you.  I've heard all this before, and while it does bring some comfort, for some reason I feel like I'm looking over the precipice of the unknown, like something will happen and change me on September 3, 2016.  I'm not the oldest of my friends and family.  There are those who have already crossed into their 30s and have survived without any strangeness.  But just the same, it does cause me some anxiety.

I think one of the hardest things for me is finding peace in my life.  Admittedly I am high-strung and very sensitive all at the same time.  I am very rigid and my feelings are often hurt very easily.  I try to hide all of this with false bravado.  Those who don't know me very well are fooled by it, those who do, see right through it and call me out for it.  It often feels like my insides are in a state of turmoil because of this.  Little comments hurt me, things that shouldn't bother me repeat over an over in my head.  It takes a lot of energy to keep this mask up and it is an exhausting way to live.  I know that I need to make changes.  I've realized that my current way to cope is with food.  That's obviously not healthy in any way, so I'm working on better ways of coping. I want to stop using food to fill a hole in my soul that can only be filled by me.  I don't think it will take just one thing, but will be a multi-pronged approach.  The following are plans in no particular order or priority:

Yoga.  I've always been drawn to yoga, even as a teenager.  I think I probably saw it on Oprah with my mom when she used to watch her religiously.  I looked it up, learned a few poses and went to a few classes, but it never really stuck.  I think part of the problem was that the classes I took neglected the spiritual aspect of it.  And because they neglected it, I had no idea that it was a part of yoga and my attempts to practice it at home lacked it as well.  I was left with what seemed like a series of poses that seemed like they were held for an eternity.  As I got older, I started to learn that there is spirituality involved in yoga.  Recently, a friend of mine brought me to a yoga class where everything just clicked.  I just love the teacher.  She incorporates the physical and spiritual and even more importantly shows the easier version of a pose first and then adds the more challenging versions.  This is really helpful for someone like me who has a few injuries and health issues.  I find peace when I'm at yoga.  I enjoy the stillness and focus on the breath.  My brain quiets and the stress of the day melts away.  I need to get better at going every week and then I will add an at home practice too.

Tea.  I know this seems so small, but it really does sooth my soul.  I just feel better when I drink a lot of tea.  It really doesn't matter what kind of tea it is, as long as it's flavorful.  Even the making of the tea is calming.  I just love it.

Crochet.  I am a creative soul at heart.  It may have something to do with why I'm such a sensitive individual.  I went to school for photography thinking that that was what I needed in my life.  I think because I am so sensitive, I have a hard time taking the constant criticism that comes with the art world.  You have to have a thick skin to do well there and I just don't.  Just the same, it helped me to foster my personal creativity.  Along with being sensitive and creative, I am also very tactile.  I think that lead me to my love for yarn.  I started out by knitting, but it took forever to work anything up that I felt good about.  I moved onto crocheting and I found such comfort in it, that I never looked back.  I know it's all repetitive, but that's good for me.  It becomes a form of meditation and my head becomes clear.  I'm bad about crocheting daily, but I'm working on a blanket where I crochet a line each day and the color is based on the local temperature.  Sometimes I don't make it everyday, but I catch up.

Therapy.  I haven't been to therapy since I graduated college five years ago.  There are various reasons why I haven't been, but those aren't really important, what's important is that I found someone that I was comfortable to even call.  I can work on all the stuff I need to work on.  My first appointment is this week, but I feel hopeful and I'm looking forward to going.

These are the things I need to find peace in my life and step into adulthood without feeling someone is going to find out I'm only faking it at adulthood and kick me out.  I know that sounds crazy, but that's how I feel sometimes and I don't want to, so this is my plan.

Splitting In Two

When I started this blog, 2 1/2 years ago, my life seemed to have several different things colliding at the same time.  It seemed to make sense to combine health and spirituality.  Over time, that started to feel a little convoluted, and so I dropped the health portion of this blog and focused on spirituality.  While I still intend to focus on spirituality, I find myself drawn again to work on my overall wellbeing.  This blog will continue to focus on spirituality, while I have started another blog, Fumbling Toward Health and Wellness, to focus on my health.  This will help me to hold myself accountable health-wise, while I am still able to focus on my spirituality here.

Creating Boudaries and Giving Love Properly

I had an excessively long lunch yesterday. When I put my timecard in the system, it turned out I had 45 minutes of overtime. Since overtime is a no-go at my job and I had to close, my manager just added it onto my regularly scheduled 30 minute lunch. On the rare occasion that I'm scheduled to have a long lunch, I usually will bring my coven "homework" or my textbook for the class I'm taking. This impromptu lunch left me completely unprepared. After eating my lunch, I still found myself with an hour of nothing to do and so I grabbed one of the magazines on the table in the break room. I flipped through it. It was mostly Christmas related: Buy a new home in time for Christmas; History of the Christmas Tree and where to find a Christmas tree farm; How to not go into debt around Christmas time; Fashions for Christmas; and an article about things to love about winter. They all helped to pass my time, but were really nothing of substance. Then I came to an article about Love and Relationships. I steeled myself for yet another ridiculous article about love. What I found was different and refreshing. It was an article written by a local relationship and sex therapist.  The following is an excerpt:

"A widely held belief is that love is a feeling. Not only is this incorrect, but the fallout this causes places our long-term relationships in jeopardy. My definition of love is: efforts and actions which encourage and support growth, nourishment, and well-being, while also protecting the other or oneself from harm. So love is action that comes from a choice... If love is only given when positive feelings for the partner are present, no relationship would ever improve once in trouble, and few relationships would stay positive. We must persistently love the partner whether or not we have loving feelings...Love is what we give to be our best and it cannot be based upon our fluctuating emotions and moods. Unless we get love right, obtaining satisfying relationship results will be elusive. 

Paradoxically, we need not have good feelings about our partners to love him or her... but can still love by making loving efforts. A significant cause of relationship failure comes from the repeated practice of withholding love when the partner is judged as not deserving it because he or she has behaved in a way that is objectionable. In reality, an 'undeserving' partner and the coinciding at-risk relationship need love the most. A badly behaved partner is an opportunity to practice loving compassion... 

When facing relationship adversity, anger and bitterness are usually provoked, but if we respond with loving actions, our growth results. By choosing loving actions we increase the chance that the relationship may improve, the partner will open to our influence, and we will be clearer about the role we play in the relationship drama... Love is the energy we bring when we act by giving our best to nourish and support, and in long-term relationships it RESULTS in loving feelings."

 I read this and something just clicked.  I do this.  Not just in my romantic relationship, but in all of my relationships.  I judge hard, especially when I'm angry.  Even if I love you, when I am angry with you, I withhold love.  I can be unkind and/or withdraw.  I tend to let the "nuclear fallout" happen and then attempt to fix it later.  I want to make a concerted effort to change my behavior.  What if I continue to be loving, even when experiencing negative feelings?  What if I learned to not lash out in anger?  What would that look like?  I honestly don't know.  I've never done it.  I have a hard time with boundaries and so I let anger act like a shield when I've been pushed too far and don't want my boundaries pushed any further.  I've spent so long without any boundaries whatsoever, that now that I am setting them, it seems to put others off.  It's a struggle for me to maintain them.  I think if I can continue to work on setting clear boundaries and expectations for those that I am in relationships with, then I will also be able to give love even in the most difficult times.

Note: The entire original article can be found in the December 2014 issue of Soco Magazine

On Losing Life's Flavor and Trying to Find it Again

I haven't written in a very long time.  I often find myself starting to write something and then I get to a point where I know someone's feelings will be hurt if I publish it, so I put the post down.  Other times I find myself with so much to say that I don't know how to say it, so rather than say too much, I say nothing.  This is my attempt to say something... if anyone's feelings are hurt in the process, I do apologize.

About a year ago, there was a death in my extended family.  It was traumatic and unexpected.  Nothing could have prepared anyone for it.  It was just before a holiday, and that first of many firsts that the year to come would hold galvanized the pain of that person's death.  I became a caretaker for a loved one who was consumed by this pain.  Not that I wouldn't do it all over, but my approach would have been different.  I think it was right around then that life lost its flavor.  I cried every moment that I was alone (on the way to work, in the bathroom, on the way home, as I cooked dinner... the tears never ran dry), I stopped crocheting, I stopped baking, I barely cleaned my house, I had to force myself to work on my studies for my coven, things such as getting our Yule/Christmas trees felt like a chore and I couldn't wait to get rid of them when the season was over, I isolated myself because I couldn't take one more person asking what I needed when I had no idea what I needed.  All I did was sleep, go to work, come home, try to keep my shell of a home life together, and search for answers where there were none.  I guess you could say I found myself in a dark night of the soul, so to speak.  I felt distant from deity, my covenmates, and worst of all I could not reconcile my feelings with my beliefs.  The answers that I received from Wicca were not sufficient to quell my pain.  It wasn't what I was looking for, and so I found myself sad and angry.  I trudged through the past year, passing every first family event without this person present.  I watched a family fall apart and continue to this day to struggle to find a new structure that can work.

So here we are one year later.  There is still pain and sadness, but it has become less of an open wound than it once was.  We have survived every terrible first and it seems as though the storm that raged in my home has finally broken.  There is love and peace in the air again and the energy of my small apartment is no longer oppressive.  While we will never make sense out of what happened, it seems as though we are no longer "stuck."  I am grateful that this year is over.  I know that it was love that got us through it.  Love gave me the strength to persevere when I thought I had nothing left to give and that I would surely break.  It was love that allowed me to see the best in everyone, and it is love that will help us to continue to move forward and heal.

So this is where I have been.  I am looking forward to finding life's flavor again and maybe stronger than it was before.