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Soulwork that Beckons...Words, Words and more Words, Oh My

My gut is tight this morning amidst some emergent soulwork I had not expected, nor even desired. [Isn’t that the way of it, though? The soulwork that really matters is often quite disagreeable to the ego, to the feelings of personal preference. Such things tighten guts and send us to our amygdala for self-preservation, when the invitation is to get curious and expand…]. 

I think I fear losing a narrative that has been deeply sacred to me but is no longer tenable or shared with the person with whom it all unfolded, over a period of years. What does a sacred unfolding mean when one of you knows it to be of God/de and the other moves into questioning, sadness, fear, and shame/shaming? Who gets to tell the story shared, and how does the connection deepen if the stories diverge into a difference that had been nourishing for us, remains nourishing now only for one? Saddening or painful for the other?


Part of the soulwork then, for me, must be empowering and living into my own anti-shame skills. My companion had been the queen of anti-shame between us, freeing me and inviting me into the More I could not have imagined before. She is now beginning to wield shame and shaming in her own crises, rupture, which hits me in a particularly vulnerable way with her. The sacredness of the journey for me was out of the shame/shaming within my family of origin, into a more expansive graciousness, even a mammalian acceptance of my own body, who I am in co-creating kinship, the power of my body to connect sacredly within and beyond shames and limitations imposed by patriarchal institutions, men’s power-over-habits, all while paradoxically still honoring the primacy of covenantal relationships involved. Boundaries were explored, some surely transgressed, but then restabilized with renewal and self-transformation of all involved. [Or at least all who showed up to do their own sacred work, emotional labor (which suggests not all in the web)]. One man’s ego and refusal/inability to do his own emotional labor becomes the seed of shame and shaming, once again. My soulwork is therefore developing the Queen of Anti-Shame within me, around me, knowing I can do that–have done it, am doing it. My companion can move into the currents she is choosing, has chosen, all while her experience of our narrative becomes her own, and my story of it all remains as it is for me. Maybe even deepened in importance and truth, surprisingly. Less contact may make all of this easier for both of us, particularly as I do not desire shaming-sources in my own sacred journey any longer.


Which brings me to another soulwork edge: getting really clear on who I am as a friend–the kind of friend I strive to be, regardless of the friendship mirrored back to me–and what limitations or boundaries do my own finitude and needs require? I accept the realities that we don’t get to choose who we are for the people in our lives, nor do we remain the same person for them as each of us grows. My fierceness and sense of soul-eternity has often kept me in life-draining situations and relationships longer than was healthy for me and for the other. While I had never imagined a scenario in which this divergence would happen with this friendship, companionship, I am open to its divergence and relinquishment now. Endings bring new beginnings, for all involved. I could quip that “we’ll always have Paris,” honoring that she will always be a part of me somehow…and honor that the transformations ongoing in our relationship today mean less and less alignment, congruence, contribution for one another. And that’s okay.


No big banners or gestures necessary to name any of this aloud, with her or with others. But it is good to feel Spirit’s urging me into words and more words–my pathway into kinship and loving-first contributions so attuned with my B/beloved–as I pray my friend’s need for wordlessness is met in every way her spirit desires. 


I remain open to Spirit’s leadings in each moment, willing to be surprised if/when connection unfolds, however it finds me. In peaceableness and some relief, I devote my own faithing-forward into all that is beckoning me, known and unknown. Relieved of any obligation to her, her needs, but hope for her own healing and delight, as she chooses.


Fare thee well, my dear friend. Talk to you, if/when I get to.

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Wisdom Walker
I am a scholar, companion, friend, contemplative, wife, daughter, teacher, poet, and most importantly for this space, a writer. I learn best by entering into practice, listening deeply, and remaining open to those who will share their path and passions with me.

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