It’s in the Air; Spring, Transformation, Reflection, & Dreams
So as I re-emerge from the depths of winter retreat, I have been feeling compelled to return to this space to make another entry. I’m fighting all the voices that are telling me:
“It’s been a year since your last blog post”
“No one Cares!”
“Way to go Kate”-hardcore sarcastic tone
“What are you doing?!”
“Wasting Time!”
But I have important things I want to share. A re-emergence that deserves witness, celebration, and vocalization; if only for myself.
I’m rolling in hot on my 39th birthday, so there is no better time than now to take some time to reflect, celebrate, mourn, and envision. If this is the most therapeutic and impactful way for me to do it….then why the fuck am I judging myself so HARD on it?!
Regardless, if it’s one thing I know to be true is that it feels worse if you don’t “do the thing at all”….so here goes something.
My last blog post was last April. So much has changed that I don’t even feel like the same person at all anymore.
I think 2023 was a really hard year for everyone. The collective experience was one of loss, painful transitions, woeful departures, small glimmers of hope, and a lot of restructuring of old belief systems and ways of doing things.
I know personally there was so much healing and transmutation that I thought I would never get through it.
“Courage is the power to let go of the familiar.”
-Raymond Lindquist
I was called into a healing journey when I filed a petition for allocation for my youngest son.
Long story short, his Dad and I wanted two very different things for him, and I was tired of his dad playing narcissistic mind games that were really messing with my son, and our relationship. So I decided to get the courts “help”.
I put help in quotes because our justice system is a joke. After my experiences I have lost total faith in that system and I am very much looking forward to being done with all of this.
Yhup that’s right, after almost a year of back and forth in court, and several thousands of dollars later we are still not resolved and the situation really has not improved. My youngest went back to public school which has been mostly positive, but it is frustrating to now have to deal with the indoctrination of public school systems that I now have to navigate on top of being the only parent who provides consistent healthy emotional support.
Through this year long process, I was allowed the opportunity to actually heal from the narcissistic abuse that I was subject to while in the relationship 12 years ago, and the ongoing microaggressions that pursued long after we split. There was so much that I didn’t understand or see clearly at the time I was in a relationship with him.
After so much space and time had passed; the wound was ready to be inspected, cleaned, and healed. As I was sharing my frustration with the court system with a friend, I was describing the past relationship and she suggested I look into narcissistic abuse, so I started to educate myself. I discovered a lot.
So many instances and circumstances came flooding back; so much hurt, confusion, betrayal, gaslighting, isolation; it became very clear what I was actually dealing with. I cried for weeks, I was depressed, and I overall had to process all that didn’t get processed when I left that horrible situation as our baby was just turning 6months old. I left because things kept getting crazier, I felt totally lost, and I knew I deserved better than what that man was offering. It took almost 11 years to actually understand what was going on, and to confront and heal from the abuse.
But then arose the hopeless for the future feeling of knowing this man has not changed a bit and still employs the staple tactics of a narcissist, but is now applying them to both me and his child. Rage, anger, righteous fury for the way things are and how I cannot change him. Or change the situation. New emotions to sit with and move through.
This experience alone was enough to make 2023 really tough. But I’m sure like many of you, it didn’t just rain a little through the year; there were so many crazy chaos storms that entered and swept through our lives that there was almost a deeper level of acceptance for the necessity of “growing through the shit”.
You see, we either let the fires of transformation burn away what isn’t needed, or we fear the transformation and get burned by the fire.
I practice surrender. That’s how I do it.
I trust, I surrender, I trust, I surrender.
I say it over and over until the anxiety is eased and the hand of the Divine can lend a comforting breath of peace to my being.
I trust in the timing and synchronistic nature of life.
I surrender to the magic and mystery of life.
I surrender not with defeat, but with a sense of ownership. I surrender to the power greater than me. The illuminating spark of life present with each breath.
I trust myself, I trust the Earth, I trust my intuition.
I surrender my fear to make room for love.
So know that we got the heaviest piece out of the way….
There’s so many GOOD things that happened this year too.
My next blog post will be all about the transformation that my business Eclectic Kate LLC has undergone over the past year as well. I just hit the “publish” button on my 3rd book, Behind the Garden Gate; Poems, Songs & Chants. I’ll share more on that in the next blog post as well.
Today, also happens to be the Spring Equinox! A fitting day to “pop my head up” out of the soil and chronicle more of the experiences I get to have on this journey of life. Sharing in hopes that you find comfort, strength, or at the very least a little reprieve from the madness that seems to be ceaselessly swirling out there.
All in all as I come to round out my 38th trip around the sun, I feel more “me-ish” and vibrant than ever before.
I say that with pride because there was a lot of work put into this past year. Undoing, unlearning, restructuring long held beliefs and ways of doing things, accepting hard truths, letting them be a catalyst for change as opposed to a source of shame, grieving- so much grieving, and a more than a handful of magical, vibrant moments that kept me going. And trusting, and surrendering.
I trust, I surrender. I trust, I surrender. Over and over again. The only way out is through.
I’ve made some great strides on my personal non-negotiables and I slowly make those little choices and changes toward a more and more vibrant, sustainable, healthful lifestyle. This lends to an existence in this vessel that allows me to be the blessing I was intended to be.
This was the year of community. As was my intention as I stepped foot slowly and tentatively into 2023.
I was craving new community, expansive community, aligned community; I could put so many words in front of that word until it lost all meaning….I’m learning more and more what community it truly is.
“Survival of the most collaborative”; that self sufficiency thing is cool…but have you tried not doing all the things and having all the skills? It’s a lot less exhausting.
When we can learn how to be in right relationship with ourselves and others we choose (or don’t choose) to be around; we learn to trust and rely on each other. We build webs of resources that can be exchanged and appreciated. There’s so much that I have learned from attending 3 different “Earth Tending” conferences this past year. I speak more to that in the next blog.
It has been a year of deep deep healing, extra igniting inspiration, enlightening education, and having the courage to put myself in new places, new communities, and new experiences to catalyze the growth and healing that was so ready to happen within me, so that I may be of greater service to all around me.
November 2023
Fireside Dinner Theatre With
My Mom & Daughter
I mean…I look like I made through the year with the twinkle in my eye still sparkling; I hadn’t met December or January yet….HA!
So as I round out another year of life;
being a woman; a wife; a mother; a friend; a sister; a daughter; and author; a healer; a greenthumb; a fiery chaotic mess; a wonderous awe filled human being….
I have been humbled by my last year’s trip around the sun. I have been strengthened, fortified, and supported. I have been surrendering to the fires of transformation; the burning away isn’t done yet.
