How All The Pieces Of Me Have Come Home

My pieces are coming home.

I didn’t realize it until it started happening.  I didn’t set out to make it happen. It just did. Living purposefully and mindfully, my pieces started showing up again. And I couldn’t even have told you what they would look like. They’ve just started showing up, one by one.

When I look back on my life, it seems like it’s been one long string of events that have stripped away pieces of my spirit.  I don’t mean this in a back-of-hand-to-forehead, woe is me, victimized by the world kind of way. It’s more like an acknowledgement that, in my years on this planet, I’ve had a lot of life happen. I’m not unique, this isn’t different from many others.

At the same time, my own life is a wild story in its own right.  I’ve weathered some pretty hefty storms. Slayed a few dragons. And I’ve come into middle age with a sense of awe, gratitude and wonder that I made it this far with a certain amount of grace and spirit.

The lost pieces of my spirit

I have lived my life prepared for battle. Not the kind to overpower nor defeat, minimize nor demean others. I’m talking about the spiritual battle. The inner challenge, the journey to emotional victory.

A year ago, I came to the realization that, while still in a place of being centred spiritually, overall I’d become disheartened. Weary. Tired of life being one long inner battle. I wasn’t feeling sorry for myself. I just knew something needed to change if I wanted to find joy again.

Not the feeling of happiness. The experience of JOY. Spontaneous childlike wonder.

And I decided to do Different.

Different choices, different way of living.

Different is capitalized because it was an actual place in my mind. A vision.  I didn’t set out to envision it. In moments of soulful introspection, something profoundly shifted in my awareness and this new space appeared… quietly, gently, yet so strongly that I felt like I was actually, physically standing in it.

My new inner landscape that I called Different.

I saw it so clearly. Beautiful vision. Vibrant trees, glistening ocean. Warming myself around the fire in a sheltering cave high on the rock bluffs. Clean. Clear. Empty, yet inviting and warm. Vibrant and tranquil.

As I stood in Different for the first time, my heart burst open and something amazing occurred to me: I am alone here. I am alone here, which means I choose everything and everyone who will join me in my new inner landscape, this place call Different.

From this point forward, I choose. Everything.

That was a profound moment for sure. But that wasn’t all. It got better.

Because in those few incredibly deep moments, I realized to the bottom of my soul that I would no longer be a slave to whatever I have experienced, felt and known in the past.

A new understanding washed over my heart. I’ve been saying the words for years, but that day I got it. Really got the power of it. More importantly, I began to DO it.

Our scars remind us where we have been. They don’t have to dictate where we are going.

Finally, I knew… going forward, I choose Different. And I do different.

My life changed. (Sounds cliché, but it really did.) My pieces started to come home. The people who are coming and going in and out of my life are bringing the pieces back to me. I am thankful to every one of them.

My love… the biggest piece of all. Love shared with another. Love with my darling, my partner, my sweetheart. He reappeared in my life just in time to join me in Different. Together, we’re learning how to love differently – less selfishness, less drama and crisis, more openly and completely. Not with the pointless magical thinking of youth, but with a maturity of emotions and spirit.

And I am discovering joy again. My own heartbeat of joy. So that I can bring it with me, showing up to my mate and all of my life with strength, compassion, understanding, forgiveness, respect and grace.

Moving forward, doing Different feels like the most natural thing in the world.

Finally.

As an old friend used to say, “If you keep doing what you always did, you’ll keep getting what you always got.”

So I’m doing Different. Not just feeling different, seeing different, experiencing different. I’m actually doing it.

And I am profoundly grateful.