This was written the day after the final day of the Courage and Renewal Retreat. Normally, when I post things I’ve written in my journal, I either edit them, or add material to explain some of the references. \u00a0Today I’m too tired.<\/p>\n
From my journal for Sunday, November 22<\/p>\n
I started yesterday feeling despairing.\u00a0 <\/span>No one tried to talk me out of it, they just listened without judgment.\u00a0 <\/span>We were told to wander outside, or inside, look at something, then turn around and look at something else.\u00a0 <\/span>Try to see them in a different way.\u00a0 <\/span>I looked at the various works of art hanging on my walls: Amazing Grace, the big green painting, the tiny sewn collages, Judy Brubaker\u2019s turtle shield, the objects in my hanging box.\u00a0 <\/span>I took the pomegranate, thinking of the Armenians, and the forced marches into the desert.\u00a0 <\/span>Then we were to do 5 minutes of \u201cspontaneous writing,\u201d what I call \u201ckeep the pen moving\u201d \u2014> there\u2019s a story: Laurie\u2019s \u201ctwo minute writing.\u201d\u00a0 <\/span>The pomegranate pointed me to Persephone, and I wrote a piece that\u2019s similar to one I\u2019ve written before about my journey in the underworld.\u00a0 <\/span>Then they played a piece of music called “with my own two hands.”\u00a0 <\/span>What is there I can do for the world with my own two hands?\u00a0 <\/span>Teaching sacred dance and creating ceremonies is no longer an option.\u00a0 <\/span>Aging and chronic fatigue have made just getting through the day difficult, and I\u2019m losing ground.\u00a0 <\/span>Unless I can find ways to nurture myself, things I can do that give back more energy than they take, I can\u2019t possibly do more than I\u2019m already doing.\u00a0 <\/span>What am I already doing with my own two hands?\u00a0 <\/span>I\u2019m writing this journal.\u00a0 <\/span>And then typing it up.\u00a0 <\/span>And then, if it\u2019s relevant, posting it to my blog.\u00a0 <\/span>This is my line in the sand.\u00a0 <\/span>I take my stand in my truth, and the only thing that can move me is truth itself.<\/p>\n I was thinking that it\u2019s because I inherited money that I had the privilege of being in therapy, of living to write my story instead of killing myself or ending on the back ward of a mental hospital, filled with drugs.\u00a0 <\/span>But it\u2019s also true that the \u201cprivilege\u201d of wealth did not buy me a comfortable life, or only materially comfortable: enough food, a roof over my head, a reliable car.\u00a0 <\/span>I look at Eleanor’s struggle with the bureaucracy and see how it takes every scrap of her energy to keep going.\u00a0 <\/span>Finding help for healing is not an option for her.\u00a0 <\/span>But the truth is: I write in my journal, type it up, use it as raw material for my blog because I can\u2019t not<\/span> do it.\u00a0 <\/span>Even when I question what\u2019s the point I don\u2019t stop writing, typing, or posting.\u00a0 <\/span>I post the question.\u00a0 <\/span>I say yes, I\u2019m in despair, this is what it looks\/feels like for me.<\/p>\n When I realized that the loss of truth in the present crisis is what bothers me the most, that I have always let go of an old truth and gone for a bigger one whenever one came along, I saw that what I can\u2019t forgive my mother for was her denial of the truth, her refusal to listen to the little IRNK inside that warns you, her drowning truth in alcohol.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" This was written the day after the final day of the Courage and Renewal Retreat. Normally, when I post things I’ve written in my journal, I either edit them, or add material to explain some of the references. \u00a0Today I’m … Continue reading