In order of importance: I am a survivor on a never ending journey toward recovery and healing. I am a beautiful woman inside and out. I am an independent mother. I am a sister. I am an aunt and a cousin. I am a friend and a colleague. I am a wife separated from my husband of 25 years pending divorce. In each of these roles I have a fierce desire to do the right thing. My problem is I don't always know what the right thing is or if the right thing even exists. This is because I have wrestled with the traditionally defined roles of who I am for most of my life. During the wrestling I've tried to play the game by the 'rules', and I've bucked the system, too. I've proven myself right and wrong. And I'm nowhere near feeling like I have a handle on anything. And rightly so. Because what I've come to understand, most especially as an independent mother, is that I have been afraid of my own light. My own adequacies. Nelson Mandela says it much better:
"Our deepest fear is not that we are inadequate. Our deepest fear is that we are powerful beyond measure. It is our light, not our darkness, that most frightens us. We ask ourselves, who am I to be brilliant, gorgeous, talented, and fabulous? Actually, who are you not to be? You are a child of God. Your playing small doesn't serve the world. There is nothing enlightened about shrinking so that other people will not feel insecure around you. You were born to manifest the glory of God that is within us. It isn't just some of us, it is everyone. And as we let our own light shine, we unconsciously give others permission to do the same. As we are liberated from our own fear, our presence automatically liberates others."
testing
ReplyDelete