Reclaiming Your Number One Ally
By Keri Lehmann
Even the most diligent person occasionally experience temporary amnesia about being our own best ally. I want to share a story with you that happened to me recently.
A tear slips past my cheek and runs into my ear. Turning to reach for a tissue, I feel the sheets crackle under me as only hospital sheets will do. And I know them well, having finished treatment for breast cancer only a year and a half ago. They’ve just unhooked me from the EKG Monitor. I haven’t had a heart attack, thank God. But how did I get here?
Just an hour ago, my heart was beating so hard in my chest it was visible. Madly trying to finish an email, I knew I was tired, but the adrenaline helped me to override the fatigue and push through. Just keep going, I say to myself. It will subside. But it didn’t. So now I’m here at the ER. What happened to the promises I made to myself? What happened to being self-honoring?
Grief washes over me. I feel so sad. It’s like I kicked myself to the curb and I hadn’t even realized it. I was so excited and so filled with passion when I finished treatment. But passion only took me so far. I don’t remember when the passion wore off and the adrenaline kicked in. I took for granted that I would put my health first. Now I’m paying the price. Tears stream down my cheeks. I feel sad and angry and a bit lost, quite frankly. I let myself feel it. It feels good to cry.
As I feel the grief and hurt, it comes to me that none of this was done for spite. I was excited, I got on a treadmill and forgot that I could step off. Forgetting had me override my emotions and stop listening. Then I reached for an old behavior of shaming myself which made me forget I had choice. More tears now, but they are tears of recognition and understanding. And remorse. The old pattern, the one where I have to earn and prove my existence, is familiar. I think I was trying to prove I could be “normal.” O Gawd! That is so painful.
Slowing things down in order to feel, feels better already. Somehow the willingness to stop and finally listen to myself, to my soul, brings so much understanding. And compassion. The driver has faded more into the background. Now I feel more spaciousness. I feel like I can breathe again.
When was the last time you found yourself on an old familiar treadmill that you thought you’d let go? Or found yourself regretting something you’d done in the past? Maybe even before you began cancer treatment? Hopefully, your experience wasn’t or won’t be as intense or painful as mine was. But there is a point to telling you this story. It illustrates the first step in a much bigger process, a process to becoming your own best Ally.
Step 1: Grieve what needs to be grieved.
Once you wake up to the fact that you’re back on that familiar treadmill, wish you would have done something differently or you’ve gone unconscious about a behavior you thought you’d left behind, let yourself grieve it. It’s the first step toward freeing yourself.
Making the decision to allow yourself to grieve is an act of compassion. Once these gears have been shifted, compassion flows naturally.
Having taken this first step – stopping and allowing myself to grieve, put me on a healing pathway.
We will outline the rest of the process in the next issue. Can you feel what comes? Stay tuned.