Happy new moon!
I began today with a sunrise fire ceremony. It was absolutely incredible. This mornings ceremony was the first of four ceremonies that I have scheduled over the next two days.
Ceremony is a wonderful way to ignite rapid transformation, to honor where you’ve been and welcome where you want to go. As I welcomed the sunrise this morning with a fire I felt like I was letting go of an old part of me, an old way of living. Tears filled my eyes and streamed down my face. I knew the significance of this first ceremony and I could see how it was igniting a deep soul level transformation.
When I was young, I was hurt very deeply by a man in my life. Over the years I have worked through the many, many, many ways this hurt rippled through my life. Yet there was one piece that remained…I could feel it, but I could not quite identify it.
Pieces were beginning to come to me…like the pieces of a puzzle. But the pieces still felt scattered. Last week a friend casually shared a phrase with me “hurt people hurt people.” Something I feel like I know on a deep soul level…but in such a human way I never really saw myself as the one doing the hurting. In fact, I don’t think that I ever really acknowledged that what happened in my childhood hurt me. I always felt like I needed to be strong for others, so that is what I did. I was strong. I was courageous. I was the protector. I was the judge, I was the jury, and I was the one to punish those who hurt me or hurt the ones I loved.
Funny thing is, I didn’t even know I was doing this…and my friends statement (while I don’t believe she was directing it to me) was spot on and I still didn’t get it until a week later when my husband & I were watching a movie and that phrase was repeated not once, but twice…”hurt people hurt people.”
Yes, I was hurt…and I hurt those who hurt. For me, this pain ran so deeply. It was the pain of instilling trust and having that trust broken that unconsciously rippled through all relationships. I had become guarded and decisively protective of who I connected with and how I connected with them. There was no space for being hurt.
This is a piece I’ve been working with and trying to understand…knowing that in order to fully heal this pattern I needed to do more than make the conscious choices I’d been making, I needed to really understand where and when this pattern began. Today as I opened space for my ceremony I found myself welcoming this man into my sacred space. As he entered I realized he is the hurt person who hurt me…and he is the person I have been punishing all of these years.
So today, in my ceremony, I honored that part of myself releasing the pain and hurt. I honored her for showing me just how deeply I was hurt. I honored her for showing me how to courageously move forward leaping into a new way of being…one that truly knows love, compassion, and forgiveness. I know the pain I’ve felt is not only my pain, but the pain of the collective feminine, the pain of women throughout time who’ve been wounded and hurt for simply being a woman…women who’ve been hurt by other men, who’ve been hurt by the church, by religion, who’ve been raped, beaten, punished, forced to hide themselves, deny their femininity, and even hurt by other women.
As my ceremony came to a close this morning the bells of a nearby church began ringing…I counted them, 20 rings, the crows cawed, and as I entered my home a flash of rainbow spread across the wall. All beautiful, powerful signs affirming my new awareness and the power of my ceremony.
When I sat down at my computer to begin my days work, I took a fb break and came across this video. As I listened, I felt like I was hearing from all who had been witness to and a part of this cycle with me, and in my heart I was echoing back to them my own apology for the ways I too had hurt them.
To all men and all women, I honor you and the journey’s you’ve taken to become who you are. I honor the pains you’ve experienced and I acknowledge with sincere apology the ways I too have contributed consciously and unconsciously to those pains. With all my heart I receive this opportunity and invitation for a new way of being…and I extend this invitation to you.
With deep love,
Lori