Finding Nemo

The countdown is near; my life as I knew it has been dismantled.  I don’t know what I’ll find in Arizona, since this is where I am being led to go, it’s not as if I am searching for anything.  I’m leaving Ohio in peace, because I’m not running from anything, either.  I think I have made it through the bulk of what I needed to grieve, the only part of my life I am leaving behind are the ghosts of my past.  My children have always been my future, and will continue to be wherever life may lead any of us. 

It took me a long time to find my spirituality again.  I lost it in the haze of medications used to treat a Bipolar illness I didn’t have.  I used to “hear” the voice of my spirit, and I walked in the path I was directed.  When I was one with my spirit, and in tune with the ancient knowledge, my path always guided me toward healing though my life was not easy.  I trusted my life had meaning and purpose without question.  I trusted everything I knew in the hands of the heavens because I knew a greater good would always be the outcome, even if I didn’t know the direction.  I stood firm in the quiet voices which led me to be the mother I was, the person I was, and the champion for my girls in the face of incredible odds.  I could do this with a deep conviction because I met the entity most term as “God” when I was just six years old, far too young to know magnitude of my experience, and not old enough yet to discount what I had seen, what I had felt, and was told to me. 

I “listened” to the voices of the heavens for many years and I was never led away from my spirit.  I grew as a person, and as a soul.  I may have doubted why my life on earth was so hard, but I never doubted the path I was on would lead me precisely where I needed to go.  I never doubted that no matter what the situation was, no matter how dire or grim, ultimately good would prevail over evil.  I never doubted the quiet whispers I heard, the guiding presence in my life, nor did I question once the base of what I learned that day when I was six until someone decided I was Bipolar.  Those medications took my spirit from me, leaving me devoid of everything I knew to be truth, leaving my body any empty vessel, floating in a sea aimlessly. 

I didn’t know a lot about psychiatry back then, but I know a lot more than maybe I would like to now!  I was always centered in my faith, until the medications took the voices I have heard all my life away.  They told me they were hallucinations.  I was told they weren’t real.  The medication left me unable to feel or sense my spirit at all.  For the first time in my life, I was completely and totally lost.  I wandered in this medicated haze for a very long time.  Without my spirit, without a connection to the heavens, I was a functional human being, but I was so very lost.  I didn’t even know how lost I became.  You see, back then I had no point of reference to know the difference between an auditory hallucination, and the quiet spiritual whispers which guided my every move.  Even when the medication eventually created the audio hallucinations, by then I had forgotten the quiet whispers of my spirit, and I had forgotten how to listen to them in my daily life.  I remember how desolate I felt when I asked my best friend “How can there be a voice to the heavens, if the medication can take it away?”  Therefore, my life as I knew it, the beliefs I held dear and firm, were invalid.

I became a reluctant Atheist.  Even after the medication was removed from my life, I discounted everything I knew to be real before the medication captured my mind.  I reasoned my faith and spirituality were nothing more than a youthful fantasy, something I made up so I could feel better about my shitty life.  I wandered about with this empty feeling for a very long time.  I was in a spiritual cocoon, devoid of any sign of spiritual life.   I wasn’t searching for my spirit; I didn’t believe it had ever existed.  It was a lonely and isolated way to exist.  I spent a great deal of time thinking about my life before the medications, and if I really was guided by goodness and light.  I didn’t feel like an Atheist, the term didn’t seem accurate, but I didn’t hear the quiet whispers in my soul anymore.  There was nothing to guide me toward a particular direction, nothing in my life held a greater meaning or purpose.  But just because I abandoned the heavens, did not mean I was abandoned.  I started looking and searching for the peace I felt before the onslaught of medications.  I started to remember a time in my life where no matter what the challenge lay before me, I knew good would eventually prevail.    I started to remember all the difficulties I faced, and how I faced them with a confidence only being one with your spirit can elicit.  I started to remember all that had been dismissed in the haze of medications, and I wanted my spirit back.

It took some work, and a great deal of searching the depths of my soul, but the memory returned, as did the door to the connection.  The voices are returning, a little at a time, and this time I know they are not auditory hallucinations.  I have to be receptive to hear them, for they are so quiet, a gentle breeze would drown out the sound like the crashing waves of the oceans.  The voices are so gentle in tone; the wings of a butterfly would mask the sound.  Since the medication took them away, I have to learn all over again how to listen.  When I was six, I was able to listen without prejudice, and no one ever told me I was mad for hearing them.  As an adult, logic, reason, and an incorrect diagnosis left me bereft of the guidance which led me in a life of grace.  It is harder now, than it was at six, to know the voices when they talk, because it is almost as if they do not talk at all.  It is harder now to listen with an open heart, and an open mind.  But I am working on it.  Finally I feel as if I am in the direction I need to go.  I just needed a swift kick in the ass, and losing my job did exactly that. 

At first I resisted, went about the motions of what I thought I was supposed to do, but as weeks became months and nothing opened up for me, I had to find something productive to do with my time.  I started to research world religion, and went seeking that which I saw when I was six.  What I discovered was text after religious text did not, could not come close to describing what I was in the presence of that day.  The peace, the love, the kindness encompassed everything around me.  It was through me, around me, on top of me, everywhere at once!  This presence blocked out all evil so completely, I could not feel the existence of it at all.  What man has described as “God” is not a God at all, but something so much more wonderful, even my vivid imagination could not do it justice.  That is why I refuse to use the term “God” to describe what I know, because to do so would diminish the power of the presence I was with.  Man uses the term “God” and other names because our language does not afford what I saw.  If I had a term which suited it, I would use it, but I do not. 

I do understand the forces in the world; living makes sense under what I saw. Yes, even suffering and sorrow have merit.  Time for me was running out, I was stagnant and had become spiritually devoid of life.  Like Angels sometimes do, they kicked me in the ass and gave me the time I needed to return to a state of grace.  It may be a profanity laden state of grace, but the spiritual world is not without a sense of humor, either!  I do not feel as whole and as connected as I did prior to the medication stripping me of the truths I held dear, but I am getting closer.  The adult in me is not as trusting as was the child, so I tread my spiritual path with some trepidation.  I want to be sure I am walking in a state of grace, and not wandering around blindly again.  With GPS, I won’t be driving blindly to Arizona! 

So my dear spirit, I am listening, and following your commands. I feel some of the peace I lost so very long ago.  I am excited to see what adventure you have in place, what it is I need to do once I get there.  I’m quite certain if I stray away, if I turn a deaf ear away from the voices, there will be an Angel ready and waiting to slap me upside the head, or kick me in my ass, whichever is deemed the most effective method to get my attention at the time.  I have been on the receiving end of both, so I can assure you they both work quite well.  Welcome back, my old friend, you have been sorely missed.