Welcome to this edition of Liminal Walker Musings!
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Dear ones,
If you are a new subscriber, a special WELCOME! Today’s post was both a powerful exploration to write and a deeper introspection into what I needed to see. I hope that this serves you as well. Much love to all!
Brokenness is Medicine
This past week has been challenging for me. I fell into that deep unending hole of believing the voices of shame and unworthiness that ran through my mind. These messages have been constant companions with me my whole life. All of us have these familiars in some way or another. Maybe one would not call them that, but when allowed a seat at our table of life, their magic begins to show itself. Yes, surprisingly, they do have gifts to offer!
Mine is dealing with shame and trauma. Others types of brokenness we see in our world show up as anxiety, depression, PTSD, health issues including physical and mental impairments.
However, the tendency in our current times is to fight with them. Either relegating these uncomfortable patterns and experiences to the corners of our lives or overindulging by identifying with them. We are both perpetrator and victim. Which is what I got caught up doing this past week. Yet by meeting these so-called indignities they alchemize a powerful remedy. A vulnerability that weaves unity rather than separation. Tying our lives back together as a beautiful imperfect integration. A medicine for these times, for ourselves and others.
The Wounded Healer
This archetype has been calling to me for some time, I am not surprised it came up in a tarot/oracle reading the other day. Dhumavati is the smokey crone goddess of wisdom. Embodying this archetype, she guides us to meet our grief without turning away. To embrace our struggles without searching for an escape route. To not get trapped by these hardships by learning to see them as secret blessings, hidden pathways for greater connection. Avenues that nourish the wisdom of the soul through greater compassion and empathy.
We Are All Broken
How does that feel to hear that? What does it mean to sit with the brokenness of life, in and around you?
We are all flawed in some way. Seems to be the nature of life, of being human, living in a world of impermanence. Adding societal, cultural and political issues and conditioning on top of that, it is a commonality we all share. An opportunity to be humbly honest and authentic instead of striving, controlling, competing or hunting down some ideal.
Being broken is not about being damaged goods. We are not born from “original sin.” A Christian viewpoint describing Adam and Eve's transgression of eating the forbidden fruit in the Garden of Eden. Resulting in the removal of God from life and us. Placing “Him”, in the sky above, “evil” in the grounds below. Where the only hope is to be saved by the grace of God. Through transcending our bodies and physical nature.
I succumbed to this tenet, hard not to. It is a pervasive frequency in the western world we live in whether you are Christian or not. For so long I believed that my pain, my splintered self, just needed to be transcended. I needed to be healed of this, wiped clean, made whole! This focus, ironically, only brings more fragmentation.
Meeting the Brokenness
An ongoing inquiry I have is, “what brings greater aliveness, living with a wall around my heart or being open, vulnerable and savoring the way life shows up?” For me, it is the latter, but it is an ongoing process. There is no destination, no arrival or final solution. Inviting the next question, “can I be with what is transpiring no matter how that looks or feels?” And with this question, meeting the brokenness becomes obvious.
In my formative years I learned how to build a box around my authenticity. Being told countless times I was too sensitive, too emotional. I determined I must be impaired in some way. Thus, for the love of my parents, I stowed away what I found later in life to be my most profound gift!
Originally the container I constructed did provide the acceptance I craved. An illusion as it may be, it was the most logical choice for a child. Over time as I grew up this partition became the norm. Where stepping out of it meant revisiting the shame of insufficiency. It was too overwhelming.
Maintaining these barriers came at a high cost, addiction. These hidden things do find a way to the surface. They only want to be known, loved, and included. All energy is life energy after all. But I kept pushing them down with food. When I eventually sought help, I learned I needed to embrace my past and find connection, both spiritually and in community.
Generating this medicine within was and is a process, a part of the Wounded Healer paradigm. Through the years my intuitive, empathic, deep feeling nature has opened up again. I have come home to myself. Yet these ongoing patterns of shame and fears of persecution have stayed with me. At times they are quiet and other times they get louder especially when I listen to my sensitive nature and take action on it.
It does feel counter intuitive to embrace what I want to run from, to turn towards what is difficult, to open amid resistance. True wholeness includes brokenness. Compassionately bringing back what has been demoted to the deeper recesses.
The Deep Well of Our Beingness
Being available amidst disparity and suffering is challenging. Important to realize here that these are not demons. Yet if our reaction is to reject and spurn, this is missing the mark, which by the way is the truer meaning of “sin”.
We are resolutely woven together, what happens to one happens to us all. An invitation to be love! Brokenness is not a breaking down, but a breaking open. An opportunity to apply the balm of forgiveness and gratitude, to meet existence, the reality of the moment. Not trying to fix or bring some idealized restoration. But to kindle our curiosity and awareness and really see what we so desperately run from. Lingering with this sacred holy messy life! Revealing the inherent connectivity and unity we all share together. The birth of immanence.
Each of is like a well. We are filled from the bottom up by the spring of life. Flowing upwards, in and through our bodies. While also receiving the rains of grace, these blessings that fall upon us from above. How essential it is that we allow our depths to be free. Not held captive by dams that minimize this indwelling life force. To also be open at the top, infused with vast perspectives and panoramic landscapes of existence. We must both drop down and rise up. Brokenness teaching us the liminality of immanence and transcendence.
Questions for you…
What medicine are you alchemizing right now?
What does it mean for you to sit with the brokenness of life?
How is your heart?
Would love to know your thoughts and feelings. Let’s have a conversation…
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“Being told countless times I was too sensitive, too emotional. I determined I must be impaired in some way. Thus, for the love of my parents, I stowed away what I found later in life to be my most profound gift!” Yes yes yes. Being the middle with 7 siblings who were not like me made me feel that there was something wrong with me. Like you I came late to realize that difference was also my most profound gift. But boy howdy did I fight that for years thinking I was somehow broken. Thank you for this Julie. Many blessing and peace to you 💜
I resonate with all of this, Julie! And I especially loved this last line "Brokenness teaches us the liminality of immanence and transcendence." As you know, The Wounded Healer looms large in my life too. For me, the wounding came through physical illness and then, maybe more so, the resulting fears/phobias/anxieties. Your reminder to love that part of the self is something I very much needed to read today, so thank you. ❤️❤️❤️