ALONE WITH YOURSELF
Funerals are sad. Life can be sad. And sometimes there's a time and place to travel to a destination alone with yourself and experience the sadness. And also, the greatness in the sadness. I also think there’s a myth behind why every mother feels a bit of guilt when she’s away from her kids. It’s not because she’s a mom. Or doesn’t have the right to leave town solo and enjoy the fruits of her labor unattended by toddlers on a plane with a double Starbucks in hand and a good business book on her lap. Or that the children will die a miserable death by consuming too much pizza fed by Dad or cut their knee open while wrestling with their older sister. It’s more in depth than that. It's more complex. But it shouldn’t be. But it is.
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Being alone with yourself when you’re a mother is accepting that you’re worthy of time with yourself. Time to examine yourself. Be with yourself. Acknowledge thyself and love thyself. It’s the understanding that outside the home, you are a woman of many things, much beauty and as many stars in your eyes as you once had in your twenties. It’s pouring on the confidence and shaming any of those negative thoughts out the airplane window. It’s reading what you’ve been craving for 2 years. And disheveling any guilt that enters your heart.
People underestimate the power of time alone with yourself. By choice, many women stay home to raise their babies while their husbands are gone 7-7 every day gathering the cattle. Those husbands attain alone time every day. It’s simple math. And it’s ok. Not every woman makes this choice. But if you do, it’s beneficial to see yourself on that other side of the universe too. Because being alone with yourself and really getting to know yourself in the great big world without a half a dozen people needing you all the time, is like winning the lottery.
I’m a writer. A creative. And I traveled several thousands of miles this week for a 4 day trip to Hawaii to send my Uncle off to sea. To be with his parents. In heaven. And despite the grueling travel part of the equation, if you step outside of that semi-negative box and settle in to your economy seat and plug into a movie, you might just experience this.
Like, watching the film “LION” and experiencing what cinema was made for. Connecting tightly to the characters and their love and turmoil and search for understanding and healing and home. I was inside that film reel. I could feel the story line with every word of that dialogue and every inch of the haunting yet powerful music. Enraptured with brilliant acting and a story that carries an enormous message to the world and to my heart. What it means to be home. To find home. To love. To love so deep you buckle down to your knees. And to forgive. And let go.
Being alone with yourself gives you the opportunity to ask yourself “why am I soaked with tears on my face right now?” Why does this move me so intensely? Why do I feel so happy arriving in Oahu greeted by my mom and Dad after 15 hours of travel?
It might also feel like, "why does it feel strange and unnatural to be without my babies and husband, but yet I feel this sense of calm and happy with a side of lost in translation?"
It then might feel like you're having an out of body experience while being the adult and watching your sisters kiddos jump off the rock at Waiamea, but when you do it yourself, and suddenly you're back in your body, and you realize time only ticks faster and faster. And your heart races from infinite joy while you see the world looking similar, but yet everything has changed because we're older. And wiser. And still here and able to jump off with reckless abandon. I think the dreamer in me appreciates and salivates while watching the pacific ocean from my balcony and wondering what my next 10 years will be like. And what my babies will become. And why God is so good to me. And feeling my worthiness while the sea winds blow over me steadily. And the feeling of letting go of someone you loved dearly and watch him be freed into the open wide sea. And the feeling you get from the salty air and swimming in the ocean at dusk and watching it cleanse my soul in real time. Freeing it from all doubt and fear. And readying it for life at this exact moment. Being by yourself is a whole other dimension. Filled with wonder and amazement and questions. And I think if we get the opportunity to go, even if we aren't sure, even if it hurts a little because it’s outside the norm of our comfort level, I think we should go. And not look back. And be alone with ourselves. So far, it feels like a re-birth, in one of the most beautiful places on earth. And I’m grateful.
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