Tag: scars

Living in the Present Heals

On By Moments with MillieIn Essay5 Comments

When do I heal? How long is this pain gonna take?

I get asked those two questions often. My answer is always the same, “It will take whatever time it has to. When you finally forgive that person and/or yourself the process will become lighter. But, it might just be ongoing. I don’t know!”

We carry battle scars. We relieve memories as if they are happening right now. We tell and retell the stories in order to be heard or accepted or whatever. The point is that the pain cannot leave us while we are continuously entertaining it. The healing can only begin when the focus is removed.

My mother visited me in a dream last night. She came in with the same intensity that was her aura while alive. She visited with anxiety and judgment. She sat with criticism and doubt. What had changed was my ability to see her as all she was and not own her pain. Her pain was how she moved and controlled others. In my dream she no longer had power to do this to me. She can’t decide my life choices. She cannot manipulate my fears in order to force me to make life decisions that align with hers.

I love my mother. I loved my mom because her lack of understanding and heartache forced me to be the woman I am today. She died without healing completely. She didn’t know how to let the battle wounds heal. And she took those scars and pain daily to manifest hurt in those around her. She lived in fear of judgment from the world and became the biggest judge of all.

The best lesson my mother has taught me is in letting go. It’s to be in the moment and forget those things, and folks, who have created aches in my heart. Every so often those wounds might resurface but I sit with them and send them back to where they belong…in the past. My stories mean nothing today. Every action and reaction has allowed me to get here.

So…the pain will continue for however long it has to in order to get you to start living in the NOW. Give yourself that gift. It’s a PRESENT you can count on. ~m.a.p.

Surviving Life

On By Moments with MillieIn Essay11 Comments

The other day, standing at the check-out aisle a man asked me if I had survived cancer.  I turned around and with a smile asked, “No!  But do you know something that I don’t? ” He said that my tattoo (which I forget I have since it’s on my back right below the neck) reminded him of someone who had survived some kind of health issue.  I smiled back and said, “I have.  I have survived life.”  He of course, smiled widely.  The cashier at this point laughed.  I continued, “We all survive life one way or another.  As magical and tender as it can be one moment, it can go sour real quick and push you over the edge.”  The cashier mumbled, “I hear you, like working in this place all day long.”

We all wear scars, some visibly while others deep seated inside the soul.  Only we know of their existence.  When we are ready to share with another the scars seem to heal slowly.  Those scars are road maps to the past.  They can guide us with strength onto the next journey.  I was raped at 18.  The scar from the violence laid silence for years inside.  It wasn’t until I allowed the secret to come out that I began to heal.  I choose not to play the role of victim but survivor.  We all survive.  We can survive with dignity and carry those battle scars with pride, or we can play the martyr and victim creating a story for the rest of our life.  Whatever you choose defines you.  There is nothing perfect in this world.  Mind, body and spirit are united to carry us through everything we do in our timelines.

Life is not symmetrical.  It isn’t perfect.  It is full of oxymoron characters, messy contradictions, juicy imperfections, scars of pain, but mostly it is filled with the awareness that the journey is always the best part.   Relish those things you enjoy.  Find freedom through forgiveness.  Wear those scars outside like a tattoo.  I love passing my hands through someone’s scars.  It allows me to be part of their survival.  You have survived every second of your life.  Don’t allow the pain to paralyze you or dictate how you will continue on this beautiful journey.  In the end, those are the moments that will carry you through the path of joy inside.  It is then that Spirit is holding your hands.   Life is to be attended through the joy and contentment of simple moments.  It can be through a conversation at the grocery store with a stranger or while holding your best friend’s hand.  Find the balance between this moment and all that awakes in you.  Experience the awakening and let it take you wherever it needs to go with scars, tattoos and all.

“It matters not what road we take but rather what we become on the journey.” – from a fortune cookie

Superman

On By Moments with MillieIn Poetry1 Comment

The night folds me with its subtleties

while I count your breaths:

up and down,

in and out…

the pain of your scar

crisscrossing the sheets

and vulnerability filled with Kryptonite

magnifying everything that is not.

I need you to heal

completely

allowing the physical you

to override the emotional one.

You are my Superman

and, while I love nursing you,

I need your safe arms of steel

to hold and fold me

as night vanishes into day.

For now I lay my hand

on your chest

rubbing prayers,

silently whispering sweetness to the heavens,

conjuring up a spell

for that very moment,

months from now,

when you can whisk me up

and take me to that place

where dreams reside.

Forgetting Foolishness

On By Moments with MillieIn Essay8 Comments

My neighbors returned from Savannah where they went to spend their spring break vacation.  Sophia came to see me to tell me all about her trip.  She was able to visit many of her friends and classmates from last year when they lived there.  She saw a girl from her classroom who was “really mean” to her throughout her first grade.  The little girl asked Sophia if she remembered her.  Sophia said she did.  The little girl apologized in the most grown-up way for all the things she did to her and said, “We were foolish back then when we were little!”

If a six year old can realize the foolishness and ask for forgiveness then I sure can as well.   I have committed my share of utter foolishness not just when I was little or younger.  I have been part of nonsense many a times in my adult life.  I’ve written letters to those I’ve carelessly hurt and asked for forgiveness.  Most of them have returned with love.  Others, the silence has cut deeply.  Sometimes my foolishness has been caused by hurt or a reciprocating of ego-bruising madness.   Regardless of who or what initiated it I have learned to take responsibility for my story and actions.

Ahhhh!  To hear a little girl’s story while she’s playing with balloons in the kitchen, moving erratically all over the place and her eyes fixed to mine as she retells this story made me want to weep for all my senselessness and rubbish events.  But here’s the thing, without those crazy and irrational moments I don’t think I would have learned a thing.  I learn mostly by the passionate inability of filtering.  My small brain moves like Sophia playing with her balloon. It’s here, there, up, down, sideways, and then…it stops to analyze what just happened.  Sometimes the balloon just pops and I am standing still holding no thought at all.

I went to bed recalling my past foolishness.  As I was falling into slumber I really couldn’t think of much.  I have been trying to desperately forget the hurt from past events.  I must be doing a hell of a job.  In my healing I’ve forgotten the foolishness: from myself and others.  That’s the beauty of finding that the scars are being covered and healed.  It does not mean that the injuries, damages, and suffering did not happen.  It just means that they no longer control my life.  The foolishness, aloofness, carelessness, and lack of knowledge have been forgotten.  Each act of stupidity has allowed me to learn and return to love.  In my own development I have been able to step away from ego and forgiven myself and others.  And, that’s all I need at this moment.  We are all so foolish back then when we were…!