Cracked wide open

Sitting in grief. Cracked wide open. Vulnerable to feel everything. And that is exactly where I wanted to stay.

As I participated in this grieving process, I felt invisible around strangers. In public, I felt like no one could see me, because there is this entity that had taken me over. And no stranger knows my loss. I felt suspended. Out of my body. Just like the loved one I had lost.

Yet, there was a great amount of life in this brokenness. As if all of my nerve endings were on high alert ready to engage at a moment’s notice with whatever memory, feeling or knowingness came my way. The more I felt, the more I opened. To me this was sacred and healing. I was choosing this. Not because anyone told me to. I felt like I was responding to my own guide or an instinct to not fight or ignore the pain, but to welcome it and to trust that this would lead me to a more expanded version of myself.

I began thinking of it as “soulwork.” I didn’t make up this term. I read it somewhere. But I couldn’t think of a better word or a greater purpose than doing this work.

What did it look like?

Falling to my knees. Letting the heartache literally take me down and simultaneously, not fearing that I would never get back up. I learned early that I could do this and that I wasn’t going to stop the flood of emotion, whenever or wherever, it came my way. If you have experienced profound grief, you know what this is. If you allow yourself, you can be taken down by many different triggers – a good or bad memory, a smell, a word, a song, or a sign from your loved one. And the list goes on and on.

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Revisiting places that Tim and I had shared. Doing something this intentional was certainly an emotional set up. But again, I felt this was part of the work. Everyone grieves differently and I know there are many people who choose to avoid places, maybe short or long term, where they have been with their loved one. I wanted to go there, especially, in Colorado. I went to those places we had so recently explored together, and I took Tim with me in a different way. I talked to him while I was there. Mostly in my head but sometimes out loud.

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Reading and asking questions to satisfy my spiritual curiosities. Seeking my own meaning from the enlightened experiences of others. What happened to Tim’s soul and why? And what does MY soul need to do with this? How have others lifted themselves up out of brokenness?

Journaling anything that I was moved to write – memories, feelings, questions. No need to organize it or make my words perfect. No pressure to write, but a commitment to put thoughts down on paper when they came to me.

The wide-open crack in my heart was the breeding ground for my growth, the desire to live in love, and the signs and messages from Tim. To some, that crack, that open wound, may look ugly or painful. But to me, it was like broken, fertile ground where I would plant seeds and water them with my tears.