Yesterday, I received one of the most beautiful letters of my life. It was written with such a pure heart and the words are a tender reminder of why I love this person so deeply. Our connection began years ago when we met in a room where people gathered to talk about "story". We recognized something in one another; a string between our souls. It reminds me of an ancient Chinese lore, known as the Red Thread of Fate. A belief that the gods have tied a red string around each one of our ankles and attached it to all the people whose lives we are destined to touch. They say this thread may tangle or stretch, but it will never break. It does not matter how long we have known them or how often we see them. The tie is irrefutable. The idea of such a connection is not something that belongs solely to the Chinese people. The red thread of the Kabbalah connects believers to the Holy Land of Jerusalem. To wear it is to encourage the embodiment of the biblical Rachel, who was known for her generosity. In Hinduism, red is the color of bravery and also shows the link between faith and community. While in Buddhism, the color red represents life force and rules the tongue. It is a reminder of the Buddha's teachings, our inexplicable connection to all sentient beings. Displaying it on the body illustrates a deep and personal vow to cause no harm to others and be mindful of what we say. Words can cut deeper than the sword. My friend is the thread to everything I believe. Here, I will call her Phoenix, from the name of a beautiful immortal bird that appears in Egyptian and Greek mythology. After living for several centuries in the Arabian Desert, it is consumed by fire, and this cycle repeats every 500 years. Phoenix has risen time and again from her own ashes. She flies now with a self-awareness that astounds me. Her strength and humanity combines impressively with the heart of an angel, the combination of which propels her to serve others. Constantly. I was not surprised when I finally heard from her yesterday, after close to a month of relative silence. During these past weeks, I knew our connection felt farther away than it ever had, and that our Red String of Fate was thinning. But, I intuitively knew why.
So I waited. When we experience what is known as "anticipatory grief," we become locked in fear. A deep-seated fear based on the knowledge that, ultimately, we have no control over our lives. We anticipate losing what we love. As an example, Phoenix has been locked in the fear that I will not come out of my grief. That our relationship will disappear. That our thread will break. She has been anticipating the loss of me. And that fear has created anger. In her letter, she confessed that she has avoided me. She wants a "quick fix" to my grief and has become impatient that I have not found one yet. Phoenix: Over the past several weeks I have been scared to death that something is going to happen to you and that you will never come back. You are stuck in a grief and a sadness I cannot really understand. I try. I haven't experienced your loss, and if I did maybe I would say something completely different. And then I realize that this is also about my fear. My fear that I have lost you in a way that I can't describe. Maybe I am mad because things changed and we aren't having happy little conversations where all we do is laugh. Perhaps I am selfish and not a good friend. I have had a deluge of thoughts about my reaction and this horrible unsettling feeling that I have. I am scared to call because I know I will hear something in your voice that kills me deep inside. Maybe this is my grief. I am also ashamed to say that I am fighting this because it scares me, hurts me and shakes me to my core. I want to help and don't know how. When I venture out and call you and hear the pain in your voice it makes me want to run far away. My heart can't take it and again I feel self-absorbed. Every single day I think about calling you but I stop myself. You are my beloved friend/soul sister/favorite person in the world and I can't help you and I know it. When I read my friend's long confession, I cried for a very long time. I cried tears of gratitude because the love she has for me is almost blinding on the page. I cried in my love for her, feeling her own pain. I cried from an understanding of the frustration she is experiencing. I cried knowing how frightened she is that she'll lose me to grief. I cried touching her anger as well as I do my own. I cried for the realization that she knows that this year has changed me. I cried seeing that she's worried I have left her behind. A huge part of her letter expressed concern that I have forgotten how to feel joy. That she wants me to go outside and connect with the natural world. To remember I am more than my pain. My friend loves me so fiercely that she wants me to stay grounded in who I am in my Soul. Wants me to remember what it's like to be filled with light. As I started to write a response, I realized that all of her feelings are universal, in a way. Not to reduce her experiences, pain, and feelings to something everyone else endures. I am simply recognizing the universal truth of love and grief and where they both come from. It's the same place in our hearts. I remember feeling inept to say or do anything to help my mother during the two and a half years I took care of her. I flew 3,000 miles to set up hospice after her doctor called with the news that she was in kidney failure. I came home to tell my mother she was dying - despite the fact that her physician and staff had never even hinted at the state of her health in every office visit. The anger I felt scorched every nerve in my body. I was furious, not because my mother was about to leave me, but because there was not a damn thing in the world that I could do to prevent her pain. Another friend shared a conversation she had this week with a client. In the middle of a sales call, they began discussing anger and depression. She's always believed that depression is anger turned inwards. I have always believed that anger is simply fear in and of itself. Her client said (and I paraphrase) anger and depression forms because you didn't get your way. I thought about that for days. I didn't get my way. I had no control over losing my mother, my brothers, both my dogs, and two relationships that I thought I would never be without. I had no control over losing almost the entire core of my family at the age of 57. I had no control over the decisions made by others that broke my heart. I had no control. Therefore, I didn't get my way. My beloved friend, Phoenix, is angry because she didn't get her way. I say that with all the compassion I have for her - knowing that if she did have her way - I would be "okay" now. I would still be the same person I was at the beginning of this year, prior to all of these horrendous losses. I would be able to talk to her on the phone and not have pain in my voice. I would carry on as before, laughing, seeing the beauty in the world, and resemble the strong person she now misses. If I had my way, I would be all of those things, too. But, neither of us got our way. And now, we are left with figuring out how to get back to some semblance of normalcy. How can I comfort my friend and calm her fears when I cannot do that for myself? How can I say that I know I will not become lost to her when I already am? How can I promise a tomorrow that I cannot assure will come? My friend's precious thoughts and feelings are symbolic of Love in it's purest form. They reflect what all of us go through when someone we love deeply is in pain and anguish, especially knowing there is little, if anything, we can do to help. I want Phoenix to understand a lot of things about me right now, as I am desperately fighting for my life. And that's what this really is ... a fight to live again ... despite the pain in my heart. I want her to know that I AM fighting. I want her to know I have not lost hope or the ability to see beauty in the world. In Mark Nepo's book, Drinking from the River of Light, he challenges us to remember our creative instincts in order to search for our most essential selves; to understand the importance of expression in bearing witness to sorrow, joy, and the depth of life. Working through his book has helped me on the most difficult days. I am reminded that my soul knows coping mechanisms that are still in place, regardless if my mind and heart have difficulty accessing them. Nepo explores writing and its power, being literally shaped by life, and becoming one with our experiences. He does so after beating cancer and now lives purposely in service to others. His latest book explores these concepts and then offers writing questions at the end of each discussion. He refers to them as invitations, to aid in staying open to life even when you feel you cannot possibly bear the light. In one of the very first pages, he discusses the continuity of life and what sustains us. What runs through everything you experience? In other words, what is your Red Thread of Fate? I want my friend to know how I answered that question. I want my friend to know that I have not forgotten.
Nepo: What stays constant for you, whether you are lifted into joy or thrown into pain or sadness? How would you describe the thread that runs through everything as you experience it today? From my journal: The constancy of my life is the burning knowledge that there is more to this than we can see; that we're all connected to each other and our natural world; that animals are souls of a different (better) kind; and that I came here to write/create in service to others and to heal. This thread is Creation and the Divine that lives in all of our world and within ourselves. It is not something "out there" or that we have to wait to get to "heaven" to experience. It is a flow of energy in all things - through all things - and beyond our understanding or capacity to explain or define. But, I know we can experience it through Love. I know that despite everything life has brought to my realm of existence, I understand these events are a means of getting back to our very nature, our Soul. We are being driven to understand our own light. To return to Love. But, most importantly, to recognize the creation within all of life - to expand it, bask in it, see it in each other and in all things. I know Love is the reason, whether I am in pain or celebration. I have known that soulful truth since I was a child and spent hours in the woods, talking to God and trees and animals and grasses. It is the only comfort that remained constant all my days and through every moment of pain and heartbreak. It is still in the quiet knowing of my Soul.
So, my dearest friend, Phoenix, I know you are afraid. And you have every right to be. I am different and nothing about my life is familiar. I have been stripped of all my blinders for reasons I have yet to see. I may not understand why or have an inkling of the lessons to be learned from these losses, but I still trust in the beauty of the world. I may not resemble the person I was prior to
March of this year, but my Soul has never wavered.
I will not leave your life. I will not stop loving you. You will never lose my heart. I am painstakingly growing new skin. The burns will heal eventually. The sadness will dissipate with time. What I ask of you now is to let me crawl through the fire without anything but your promise to be standing by and bear witness to my rebirth. I will get there eventually. I will be the same Soul in an older Human. You don't have to worry that I have gone to a place where there is no return. There are evenings that I watch the sun sink into the water and paint everything left behind in hues of pink. There are mornings that I lay in bed and listen to the birds celebrate a new day. There are times that I am so grateful for life that my whole body trembles with gratitude. There are moments when I gasp and marvel from all the blessings, love, and joy that I am given. I know it seems like I am stuck in grief. But, I am not stuck in grief, sweet Phoenix. I am holding it. I am naming it. I am loving it for all it is teaching me. And when I am ready, I will let it go. When that moment comes, it is you that I will thank for pulling the Red String of Fate tighter. It is you that I will ask to celebrate. It is you that I will pull into my arms, loving even more fiercely, and say ...
Thanks for waiting. Thanks for loving me. Thanks for bringing me Home.