My Path to Healing

My healing is nearing its completion and the feeling of anticipating what is to come is never far from me. I wake up every morning, look in the mirror and smile at what I see - a woman with growing confidence, self-esteem and self-worth. The smile rises from deep within me, reaches my face and radiates through my entire being, giving me back the ‘lift’ I had lost. This road to healing has been rough and I can identify two major bumps that left me spinning out of control but there is always this hand helping me get back up and that voice telling me ‘you can do this’. Now, I feel a lot better about myself and I am more comfortable being by myself. Although I can not quite say which direction I am headed, that familiar feeling of being lost and helpless is gone. I am more patient and I don’t have that I-am-running-out-of-time feeling anymore. The peace I am experiencing is so profound it can only come from one source – God. But I did not get here in a sprint; there were phases I had to go through, personal demons I had to confront, mistakes I had to identify and amendments I had to make. None of these phases were easy, in fact most of them were painful, but how I feel right now only testifies to one thing; it was worth every pain I felt and every tear I cried.

Well, the year is rounding up and the anticipation is building. As it happens to me around this time every year I ask myself what I have achieved so far. When the year began, I put down a list of things I want to achieve and here in the night month of the year I can not say that I delivered on any of them. I was trying to use the professional exam I was preparing for as a consolation but it turned out that the company I work for decided they would not be paying for it until later, next year perhaps. So I decided to try and raise the money, but how am I supposed to get 300 pounds within the next two weeks? Realizing that the chances were slim, I decided to talk to God about it and that was when I realized that my motives for wanting to take this exam were questionable. So I pulled a halt and decided to think.

I am still thinking about what to do. Is it about my desire to take and complete this certification or about being able to congratulate myself for achieving ‘something’ this year? And while trying to achieve something is not a bad idea, shouldn’t I be doing something that is in line with my purpose? Hmmn, there we go with the purpose ‘talk’ again, I am not even sure what my purpose is. I mean I use to have an idea but right now am just as confused as a anyone could be. Someone said I should just start from what I dreamed of becoming when I was a child. I wish it was that simple. For instance, when I was a child I use to say I wanted to become a doctor but trust me when I say ‘that is sooo not my purpose’. Then I remember writing poems and little stories when I was in secondary school. But come on, you will agree with me that my writing so far cannot be categorized as ‘professional’. Then I also remembered that I put together a ‘business plan’ when I was seventeen for a retail outlet that sold practically everything. Now as an adult, I get an average of 4 business development ideas every week, and they are almost about everything, from manufacturing, to gardening, to retail, to architecture, to education, to tourism, to movies, to writing, to recycling, to agriculture, to real estate, to hospitality and I am still counting! So, do you now agree with me that I am quite confused?

However, I am not discouraged because I know that in this confusion lies my purpose and I will discover it and run with it very soon. In the mean time, I will just keep writing to you about the steps I have taken and the progress I have made. Hopefully, someone will find some direction and some truths as they also journey to self-discovery.

Death

Have you ever wondered what happens to us when we die? Yes, I am aware that there are different theories people have come up with, most of which stems from various religious believes. But for a moment, can you step out of that box religion and society has placed you and imagine what it happens or what it feels like to die? My apologies to religious folks, I mean no offence with my reference to religion as a box. It is an attempt to get you out of what you have always been told as you will agree with me that we live in a world where religion and society drives our believe system. And if you belong to the category of people who find my discussion on the subject somewhat assaulting to the senses, I would say ‘please snap out of it already’.

Death is inevitable. It is all around us whether we fail to acknowledge it or not. It is a common leveler; not respecting persons. It does not have special preference, anyone or anything would do. Old or young, rich or poor, male or female, human or animal, it does not matter. It is the one thing we would all experience whether we like it or not. Death is a vehicle, a transition between here and hereafter. Death is a part of living; it’s just like every other thing that happens to us. We eat, we sleep, we cry, we laugh, we walk, we run, we live and we die. It is that simple.

There are many description of what people say happens when we die. Of course we know that the heart stops beating, but the question is what happens to the mind and soul? What exactly does it feel like? Sometimes, I wonder if it is just like we see in the movies where your life flashes before your eyes, and you step out of your body and walk towards ‘the light’ until you disappear. Sometimes I also wonder if it is like my Sunday school teacher taught me where death is described as falling into deep darkness if you have been ‘bad’ or flying into the skies if you have been ‘good’. Most times I am not satisfied with these descriptions; they lack the depth I think dying entails. Details like what happens to your will, memory and feelings in that moment should be described. Not that I would know, after all I am very much alive.

I propose that how you feel in that final moment when you come face to face with death and you realize that ‘this is it’ is a direct result of the quality of life you have lived. The quality of life you have lived is measured by how well you are able to achieve your purpose or like some will call it, destiny. The truth is that we are all on a quest to find our bliss, to discover our purpose and claim our destiny. It is only those who are able to achieve this that will be fulfilled enough to smile through death. Somewhere deep within our subconscious is the blueprint to discovering who we are meant to be but religious demands and social expectations have inhibited the originality of our individuality so that it becomes increasingly difficult to access who we really are. Life is very short and living someone else life with the little time we have is foolish. Death is the final whistle and not knowing when it will blow only makes it more intriguing. My advice is to live everyday like it is your last chance to be ‘you’.