Category Archives: Healing

The Heart of Darkness

We’ve all heard of “the ugly cry,” right? When some deeply repressed pain finally floats up, it usually takes us by complete surprise, and we blubber, bawl and wail!

I remember an obscure movie, The Pumpkin Eater, in which Ann Bancroft plays a 1950’s style housewife, self-sacrificing and taken for granted in the extreme by her husband and children. All looks good on the surface until one day she melts down in a department store, sinking to the floor in uncontrollable sobbing. While I think we’re usually much better now at recognizing our feelings, these moments come at one time or another.

I was horrified when my marriage of six years fell apart, mostly at the six years spent building a relationship and lifestyle that came to an abrupt and irrevocable end. I vowed not to take such a big life detour again, especially since it affected two adorable children even more than myself. While I’ve always wanted to remarry, psychological patterns from my childhood stood in the way of creating a healthy relationship, one with less chance of sudden implosion. All these years, the Lord has promised me the blessing of an eternal companion, so I’ve trudged my way through personal transformation while raising my darlings and navigating the work world. It was a slow process, requiring “sucking up” my feelings most of the time, but while I am getting closer, a lot of years have passed!

This last month I hit the wall, the dam broke, and I decided to just let those repressed, raw feelings flow and see where they took me. My two rules: I couldn’t sink into self-pity and I couldn’t take out my frustration on others.

As I wondered why I seemed to be stuck in spiritual and relationship limbo, I thought of a woman I worked with long ago. She was single and nearing age 40, but bitter and angry at life. In spite of our shared Christian beliefs, I failed to lift her faith. Sitting on the bus in downtown Salt Lake after work one December night, I saw her staring wistfully at a store window displaying a child’s doll house. I knew she was imagining the daughter she didn’t have playing with it, and I felt so bad for her. She’s never married and I’ve wondered why not. After all, she was worthy in every way to receive God’s blessing.

Years later, I found a possible answer in the LDS Bible Dictionary under Prayer:

As soon as we learn the true relationship in which we stand toward God (namely, God is our Father, and we are His children), then at once prayer becomes natural and instinctive on our part (Matt. 7:7–11). Many of the so-called difficulties about prayer arise from forgetting this relationship. Prayer is the act by which the will of the Father and the will of the child are brought into correspondence with each other. The object of prayer is not to change the will of God but to secure for ourselves and for others blessings that God is already willing to grant but that are made conditional on our asking for them. Blessings require some work or effort on our part before we can obtain them. Prayer is a form of work and is an appointed means for obtaining the highest of all blessings. [emphasis added]

I realized that I could be too self-sacrificing and fail to more actively ask for my promised blessings. I saw that part of what held me back was an unwillingness to fully feel my own pain. Stuffing it isn’t faith, and it certainly isn’t courage. Perhaps it was better to face it, feel it, and then actively pray for greater inspiration and blessings.

No great revelation or change has yet appeared, but as I stay open and sometimes on the edge of tears, I also feel an unexplained increase in hope. There is a light glimmering in my dark place, I feel I’m on the right track, and how appropriate for the season in which we celebrate the light Christ brings to the world.

I hope that light richly blesses each of you this Christmastime!

A Candle in the Darkness
Courtesy Pixabay.com

The Cycle of Life and Death

Recently I visited with a friend at church who’s going through the “empty-nest syndrome” since her two oldest children went off to college this fall. Her pain was palpable. I tried to console her with prospects of her girls’ future achievements out in the world and grandchildren to come, but I came away feeling that I hadn’t been very successful.

Sitting in my living room last night looking at the twilight landscape, I saw nothing left but dead leaves hanging dejectedly from the “wall of green” shrubbery that I’d enjoyed all summer. I grieved for that lush, living companion that’s now deader “than a door nail”! (Anyone know where that saying came from?) I remembered how much I miss my own children when they were little, making up original songs and building elaborate structures from Lego’s. I miss my grandkids saying cute three-year-old things now that they’re teenagers. I miss Iowa. I miss New Hampshire. I miss my relatives who’ve gone to their eternal reward.

Death and loss seem to be ever present. This time of year, it can seem pretty bleak – cold rain, gray days, waning energy as winter comes to claim her own. In a book I love, Father Fox’s Penny Rhymes, the mother fox stands gazing out at the relentless rain while her many children whine and cry around her. She moans:

The rain falls down
The wind blows up:
I’ve spent all the pennies
In my old tin cup.

Father Fox’s Pennyrhymes
By Clyde Watson
Courtesy Amazon.com

I know just how she felt. Don’t we all have those hopeless moments? I decided my friend just needed her feelings acknowledged and understood. They’ll evolve in their own time, just as mine always do.

As I sat and reflected, suddenly the moon rose behind those stark branches, full and luminous – promising a new perspective and new life. I know my friend will find her own comfort, and I do enjoy each stage of life with my children and grandchildren. I wouldn’t really want them to stand still.

This full moon is a magical reminder that life is not all loss, that new horizons and new birth are around the corner for all of us.

Fall Moon by the Author

Dealing With Loss

Yesterday I expect we all revisited the horror and sadness of of September 11, 2001. I was teaching in a suburban high school at the time. During first period, my students and I watched in disbelief as the second plane hit the World Trade Center. It was a day of shock, tears, and sober reflection. Where were you that day? I expect you remember it as vividly as I do.

It’s a short step to remembering other losses: my grandparents, aunts and uncles, and finally my own parents. There were other, less obvious losses: leaving my hometown, moving away from my beloved New England, seeing my children grow up and fly the coop. I miss teaching and the energy of adolescence, designing some of my best lessons while walking to the front of the classroom! I am certainly mourning some aspects of my lost youth with its fullness of health and vitality.

How have I dealt with each loss? Sometimes less well. For a long time, I just tried to stuff my grief after moving from New Hampshire to Utah. That simply didn’t work, caused a mild depression, and stopped me from discovering the very real opportunities for happiness and fun all around me, until I realized what I was doing, and stopped living in the past.

A friend once told me about two people in a family who’d lost someone close to them. One avoided grieving and had emotional and physical health problems for a long time, as a result. The other, while almost hysterical in her grief, worked through it much more quickly, emerging on the other side with a balanced focus on good memories.

So I’ve learned to feel my feelings and work through them, no matter how ugly, and I agree it’s a better way. When my elderly mother was dying of cancer in 2004, she was given no hope of recovery, but we had the gift of being able to say goodbye over six months. I took every opportunity to spend time with her. One long August weekend, I was the only visitor. We watched old movies, reminisced, and addressed a difficult dynamic between us. She gave me my grandmother’s china and boxes of books from her shelves. I cried pretty hard on the drive home, but when the funeral came in early January, I could fully celebrate her life and achievements with our large family, a true memorial.

Finally, I have the perspective of eternity grounded in my Christian faith. I recently participated in sealing some ancestors in eternal marriage and children to their parents in the Boise LDS Temple (their choice to accept or not). It’s like a window above my head opened, and I could see the grand vistas of blessing and opportunity that await all of us in the next life. We have the firm hope of reunion with those who’ve gone before us and the promises that we can keep progressing indefinitely. I take a great deal of comfort in that, as well great anticipation.

What will it be like hearing meeting with my Great Aunt Ella who married Judge Henry Shute? She lived in Davenport, Iowa, and he was from Exeter, New Hampshire, a widower with two children. I can’t wait to hear how they met and what their life there was like. He was a judge in the local police court for many years, finally turning to writing fiction about the many boys who came before him. The best known is The Real Diary of a Real Boy (available for free on Kindle). He had many short stories published in magazines like the Saturday Evening Post and was called the Mark Twain of Exeter.

We all have amazing stories behind us and those unfolding before us. That is my focus and ultimate comfort. I hope it is yours as well.

Polstead Church, Suffolk, England
Courtesy Pixabay.com Image 362353

Aligned with Grace

Back in my hippie days, I experimented with “mind control,” another name for auto suggestion or self-hypnosis. I’d sit in my rocking chair by a sunny window, close my eyes, and tell my left arm to rise in the air, all by itself. I didn’t consciously move a muscle and, in a few seconds, up it would float all on its own – groovy!

Next I experimented with positive affirmations and visualization. While in labor with my second child, I closed my eyes during painful hard contractions and visualized a cylinder down the center of my body opening easily to let the baby out. It worked! My pain just melted away and soon, holding a happy baby in my arms, I was totally high and triumphant.

After my conversion to Christianity, I learned the power of prayer and the miracle of God’s grace. It swept away sorrow, guilt, and worry – at least when I remembered to get on my knees! I’ve been blessed with guidance on hard decisions, forgiveness of my sins and missteps, and a deep healing of the wounds received from others.

The last six months or so, I’ve been revisiting my childhood patterns on a far deeper level, making different choices, and asking for yet more healing. I’ve received it in abundance and I give the glory to God. But a slightly different challenge remained: the small two-year-old within, squashed early in childhood, was finally ready to finish growing up. After trying to manage the process with my own conscious powers and regular prayer, I saw a news feature on meditation. I suddenly remembered those long-ago experiences, plus some advice from John Gray while on Oprah in the late 1990’s: What you focus on increases. So I decided to add auto suggestion to this process.

A couple of days ago, after inviting the Lord to guide this process, I created a quiet environment, got comfortable, and started saying to myself: The old is flowing out, the new is coming in. God and I are creating my highest self. I am a person of energy, creativity, and love. Then I pictured myself enjoying a newness of life.

The very next day, I went out visiting people in NW Boise prospecting for listings. I dropped in on a neighbor of sellers I represented last year and whom I’d met at my open house. We had a great chat, and she gave me several leads. Then I knocked on doors in a nice town home subdivision nearby. I had a good visit with an older couple who are planning to move during the next year. Their daughter lived next door, and her boyfriend said they would move too. I’ll keep in touch with them and felt so encouraged that I was finally on the right track with work, just as I pictured.

God was with me that day, and I felt a new maturity as that small child faced a challenge and triumphed! It was very freeing – the capstone of my efforts to build the supporting pieces: my knowledge of town home and condo management, how to research builders and tax records, what to say at the door, and finally how to decisively pass by a unkempt front door. The master architect was behind it all!

What I learned: Use the human techniques of creative change like visualization and self-hypnosis but don’t leave out God’s far more powerful grace – the real miracle worker!

Aligned with Grace
Courtesy Pixabay.com Image 167062

The Blessings of Healing and Forgiveness

Today was the first really cool morning in several weeks. As I came home from my morning walk, I decided it was the perfect time to trim my three day lily plants – all the flower stalks were dead and the ends of the leaves were brown. I snipped the dead stalks with my rose cutters and trimmed the leaves quite drastically with my kitchen scissors. It was tedious work but it looked and felt great when I was done.

I find that tending my soul is a lot like tending a garden. This week, I’m coming to the end of processing a difficult social situation in which I was unfairly judged, then talked about, and finally the butt of some nonverbal rejection – all without my knowing what prompted it – hurtful in the extreme! I went through a series of reactions:

Lord, was it me? No. But it took a couple of weeks for me to believe it even though God took away my initial pain very quickly.
Lord, how did this happen? I heard a voice in my head of the person and their original words that lit the flame of gossip.
The Lord prompted me to share my experience discreetly with a few of my friends, without naming names. They had neither heard nor participated in the loose talk, and their support was quite healing.
I felt a surge of confidence, and began looking people squarely in the eye.
I met with our group’s leader. We came to a mutual understanding and a changed role for me.
Then, for about a week, I felt righteous indignation and mentally said the words, You trashed my good name – I want it back! It felt very cleansing to acknowledge what happened and it’s effect on me, even if only privately.
Monday, all of a sudden, it didn’t feel good to be indignant. I felt myself cross a line into bitterness and petty accusation, so I decided to create a more forgiving frame of mind. I doubt those involved realized the extent of what they did.
Now I’m planning to initiate a visit with the two people who I know began this and deliver a calm “I Message” of how much this hurt me and our whole group. I’ll urge them to repent and get right with the Lord, then assure them of my well wishes. I’ll practice the wording and feelings of charity so I can speak with the right spirit.

It was painful weeding out my budding feelings of resentment and growing animosity but the peace that followed was worth it. Then I remembered The Nine Steps of Forgiveness and Healing From Abuse from my files:

Accept reality, come out of denial, acknowledge and condemn sin [but not the sinner]. BLESSING: A fullness of joy
Protect yourself from further harm. [You have a stewardship to care for yourself.] BLESSING: Justice and safety
Pray for your offender, with specifics.
BLESSING: Your heart is softened.
Honest grief over loss and pain.
BLESSING: Freedom to receive real healing [not just stuffed feelings]
Resist bitterness and animosity.
BLESSING: Humility
Be accountable for your own reaction to abuse.
BLESSING: Control and personal power
Receive the Atonement of Christ, face our own weakness and give it to Him.
BLESSING: Your burden is lifted.
Let go of anger, pain, blame and shame/guilt.
BLESSING: Restoration of personal dignity
Offer compassion and understanding [this is not approval of abuse].
BLESSING: Empowerment, fullness of joy (full circle back to Step 1)

My process didn’t follow this sequence in order, but I’ve covered the bases and am working on the final steps. This week, I looked Step 7 squarely in the eye and didn’t like how I was feeling. It wasn’t worthy of a Christian, so I told my ego to “take a hike”! I’m preparing to tackle Step 9 and am asking the Lord to give me the words, the compassion, and the confidence to undertake this in the proper spirit.

I think forgiveness is one of the hardest challenges we face, but it’s also one of the most liberating. It sets us free from the past, and it also sets those who hurt us free – to change or not. Then it’s between them and their maker, not between them and us!

If you’re feeling burdened by the past, please let the Master Healer help release you.

Peace at the Heart of the Rose
Courtesy Pixabay.com Image 270729

There Is a Balm in Gilead

I learned something this year that I wish I’d known a lot sooner. After my conversion 40 years ago, I was taught that God will forgive sin and relieve the guilt that comes from our missteps after we repent. And I also discovered some time ago that He’d heal my painful memories from the past as I forgave those who hurt me.

But when someone says something that hurts my feelings now, I’ve struggled with how to react. My first defensive reaction has been to either get angry or just “suck it up” and stuff my feelings. But neither one really worked to lose those painful feelings and freely forgive.

About three months ago, someone said something a little negative about me in a public discussion that came out of the blue, and it really stung. I didn’t react there, but when I went home, I got on my knees and just said to the Lord, “That really hurt – please help me.” I took a page from psychologists and sent the Lord an “I message” – just describing my feelings but not the other person. Immediately, the pain went away! And then the Lord showed me why that person said what they did and why they were hurting. My feelings of being put down and made small immediately changed to understanding, even empathy. That was a light bulb moment and truly liberating – why hadn’t I tried that long ago?

Since then I’ve practiced this with both big and small hurts. It’s worked every time! My wounded feelings have been healed quickly, then I was guided on how to handle the situation. Sometimes it helps to say something to the person, giving an “I Message” describing my feelings to the other person without accusation. Other times, I let it go, realizing we all have to pick our battles and this isn’t one I need to tackle. Occasionally, a hurtful interaction gives me a necessary signal that I need to change my boundaries with this person or group of people.

I’ve learned we have a stewardship over how we protect and care for ourselves, not in a selfish way, but so we can continue to serve others and be productive. Just as the Lord is mindful of how we treat others, He also cares about our vulnerable side and is lovingly protective. I’ve been amazed to receive clear guidance that I need to take a step back from a relationship – when “irreconcilable differences” have emerged and after I’ve given it my best effort. Much as we want to create connection, not everyone is committed to healthy relationships, and it’s not our fault!

I love the hymn, There is a Balm in Gilead – its lyrics speak to me:

There is a balm in Gilead
To make the wounded whole;
There is a balm in Gilead
To heal the sin-sick soul.

Some times I feel discouraged,
And think my work’s in vain,
But then the Holy Spirit
Revives my soul again.

The keys to accessing this divine balm are being willing to recognize and repent for our part in a problem interaction, not indulging in any hateful behavior in response to another, and being really humble about what is the best, most god-like way to act in the future.

The Lord has truly “revived my soul” and made my “wounded self whole” and I stand all amazed! I hope you find that peace and healing yourself.

Balsam Poplar Bud to Make Modern Balm of Gilead
Courtesy The Naturalist’s Miscellany

Click HERE for an interesting Biblical discussion on God’s healing grace.

The Field Lies Fallow

I’ve been struggling to put my thoughts on paper this week and they hadn’t come together by yesterday when I decided – duh! – to finally pray about it. Immediately the title “The Field Lies Fallow” sprang to mind. Perhaps there was a reason I suddenly felt blah, creatively.

Looking to the past, I realized that I was completing a personal “40 years in the wilderness” this month. In May of 1974, I decisively put my foot on the path of a Christian, having received my first answer to prayer and making a real change in lifestyle. Those 40 years were spent reconciling my three identities: Iowa school girl, New England hippie, and Utah Mormon. It’s been a long trek, punctuated with many blessings, certainly, but also almost constant adversity. Just as the ancient Israelites had to leave Egypt and wander 40 years in the desert of Sinai, to lose its worldly ways, I had to learn to live by Christian principles through the things I experienced.

Looking to the future, I sense new directions on the horizon. I’ve just completed a massive reorganization of my home. I doubled, maybe tripled my energy level by using St. John’s Wort for seasonal fatigue and probiotics for improved digestion. I was excited to expand my writing online, find new real estate clients, and return to family history research.

Coincidentally, my Sunday School lesson last week was about Joshua as Moses’ successor and how he prepared the 12 tribes of Israel for the new challenge of entering, then conquering the Promised Land of Canaan. If they would study and ponder the ancient scriptures, rededicate themselves spiritually, then exercise faith and courage, the Lord promised Joshua and all Israel:

“As I was with Moses, so I will be with thee: I will not fail thee, nor forsake thee.” (Joshua 1:5)

His first challenge soon appeared. Joshua and the Priesthood of Israel had to hold back the waters of the Jordan River for the Israelites to cross over on dry ground, then they conquered Jericho, not through human strength but by obeying instructions from the Lord that must have seemed crazy (walk around the city blowing a trumpet for six days, then seven times on the seventh day, finally giving a loud shout), from Joshua 6. The Israelites had prepared inwardly and then triumphed outwardly as the walls of Jericho all fell down at their shout.

What are the odds that I would be assigned this particular lesson that so closely mirrored my own path? I felt deeply touched and reassured I would have God’s support in whatever lay ahead. How often are we all faced with a new chapter or challenge in our lives, must “gird up our loins” with greater faith, and step into darkness with courage? I think that Joshua’s promise holds true for all people who sincerely seek after what’s good and true.

Finally, I remembered a lovely book, The Faithful Gardener by Clarissa Pinkola Estés. (See my review under Books.) Her opening quote says:

New seed is faithful. It roots deepest in the places that are most empty.

I realized that I wasn’t giving myself time to become empty or “lie fallow” so I could mediate, rededicate, and renew myself. I will slow down in the coming weeks and let the future creep up on me the way plants come back after a forest fire or grass emerges each spring.

Whether your journey changes course through a happy change or through fiery adversity, good can always arise from those ashes. Ms. Estés concludes with A Prayer:

Refuse to fall down.
If you cannot refuse to fall down,
refuse to stay down.
If you cannot refuse to stay down,
lift your heart towards heaven,
and like a hungry beggar,
ask that it be filled,
And it will be filled.
You may be pushed down.
You may be kept from rising.
But no one can keep you
from lifting your heart
toward heaven –
only you.
It is in the middle of misery
that so much becomes clear.
The one who says nothing good
came of this,
is not yet listening.

Fallow Field Courtesy Pixabay.com Image 140589

The Field Lies Fallow
Courtesy Pixabay.com Image 140589

Speaking My Truth in Love

I recently had the opportunity to revisit old emotional patterns by reconnecting with someone from my past. Good memories surfaced along with anxiety about being misunderstood. I was also worried that I would revert to my childhood ways, fearfully holding back my inner self until, in frustration, I would express myself either harshly or in tears.

During my years in education, I learned that losing emotional control causes a loss of personal power. The person who stays calm and rational can prevent an ugly argument and open pathways of understanding. As I applied this in my own life, I made steady progress in self-control. It was disheartening now to see myself go backward.

Needing a break from my worries and normal Saturday morning chores, I found a wonderful documentary on PBS, E Haku Inoa – To Weave a Name, about a daughter reconnecting with her Hawaiian mother, separated from childhood. It was a rocky road for both, with healing and forgiveness only coming from honest sharing over an extended period of time. The daughter finally learned the meaning of her Hawaiian name and reconnected with her lost heritage in the process.

It was poetic and the island rhythms gently unlocked my own feelings. Without warning, they overflowed into cleansing tears. My anxiety washed away and confidence returned. I was stunned at the “tender mercies of the Lord” in bringing these lovely people into my living room just at the moment I needed them.

Hawaiian Beach
Courtesy All-Free-Download.com

I remembered the following scripture:

That we henceforth be no more children, tossed to and fro, and carried about with every wind of doctrine, by the sleight of men, and cunning craftiness, whereby they lie in wait to deceive; but speaking the truth in love, may grow up into him in all things, which is the head, even Christ: From whom the whole body fitly joined together . . . maketh increase of the body unto the edifying of itself in love. (Ephesians 4:14-16)

That’s what I think we all want, being “fitly joined together” in understanding and harmony, edified about each other in love. I also believe we each occupy a sacred space in the universe, and we must define and protect it. Speaking truthfully, but lovingly, is how we do that. Besides, holding that truth inside without expression creates a gulf between people and condemns us to loneliness and isolation. We can’t really connect without revealing who we are.

It’s scary to open up the tender places within and put them out there for others to affirm, ignore, or reject, because we often don’t know which it will be. But I believe that the increased closeness that comes is ample reward for exercising just a little courage and tact. It’s worked for me in the past, and I’m hopeful it will continue to do so now.

Perhaps you should try not suffering in silence but with inspiration and gentleness, “speak your own truth in love.”

Climbing Out of The Well

On a recent Monday, I saw the sun finally come out full force after a winter with lots of gray. With fresh vision, I saw new life popping out all around: forsythia, daffodils, pansies, and early blooming trees. It was breath-taking.

I spent this last winter in an emotional gray zone: inventorying my successes and failures, my joys and sorrows. I thought I’d already plowed this ground thoroughly but a new round of self-reproach and grief washed over me. It had been over 40 years since I was divorced and still hadn’t met Mr. Right #2. It seemed like such a waste, for me and for my two children. Wanting to imitate all these spring seeds and bulbs, I saw I needed to break out of the shell of old habits, doubt, and self-pity to enlarge my life and find new adventures, with or without Mr. Right.

The previous weekend when I was at a particularly low point, I prayed fervently for guidance. A talk from the General Conference of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints on Saturday gave me a partial answer. One of our women leaders spoke about how overwhelmed she had felt as the mother of four young children. The counsel she received from one of her leaders was to focus on the essential things first and let some less important tasks take a back seat. Those essentials included daily prayer and scripture study, alone and with her family, plus weekly family home evening.

As I listened, I realized my essentials were daily spiritual practice, launching my writing, and regular exercise, but they often took a back seat to lesser things. That Monday was The First Day of the Rest of My Life – I switched my routine housework to the afternoon and spent the morning writing. Then off to work out, coming home with muscles singing the Hallelujah Chorus to tackle housework. My to-do list was completed before my energy faded – hooray! I felt I was back on track and God had rewarded my two A’s: Asking and Action.

Up popped a lovely memory this morning: the well by my “little red house” in New Hampshire. It wasn’t deep and would go dry every fall. In spite of leaves in the bottom and a friendly frog swimming in it, the water always tested clean and drinkable plus it tasted of the wild landscape all around – a wonderful, bubbly miracle of nature. I had the idea that I should climb down a ladder to the bottom during one of those dry spells and dig out those old leaves so it would be even cleaner. My friend Pam came over with a ladder and she hauled bucket after bucket of leaves and sludge up as I filled them. After a while I came to realize that I could dig forever and all I’d do was find more dirt – all the way to China!

Lesson learned: Once you find yourself in a hole, quit digging, and climb out. Nature takes care of cleaning the water if the well is properly sited and dug in the first place – after that we humans can’t improve on it.

Corollary lesson: If you filter your sorrows and regrets properly as you go, you don’t need to revisit them. They’re healed and forgiven with God’s grace. The result is a return of joy just like my well filled to overflowing again every December. A favorite scripture comes to mind:

Therefore with joy shall ye draw water out of the wells of salvation. (Isaiah 12:3)

May you sort out your essentials and find joy in the journey this spring!

New Life in the Shadow of the Old

He Heals My Heart

Finding God's Grace in Today's World