Praise

At first, he invited me to embody the scared, little girl part of myself. As I wrapped a blanket around myself, and hid behind a chair, cowering from the rage -I felt ashamed and quite judgmental of this child. I had always considered her to be a weak and pathetic aspect of myself – one that I rarely allow to be seen.

My inner angry warrior has very little tolerance for her. She demands that she stay and fight, or at least face her fears head on. She drags that poor, scared little girl out, rips her hands from her eyes and says “Look at it! Don’t be scared, they can’t hurt you, I will protect you, I will make them pay!” But my scared, little girl doesn’t want to be forced to fight, or forced to face her fears head on. She needs someone to hold her, and pet her head, and say “I am so sorry you are scared, you don’t have to stay here any longer. Let’s go find a safe and peaceful place to be, away from all this.” This was what she never got growing up. No one ever gave her a safe space, away from all the violence, screaming and fighting.

I realized that my scared, little girl is actually afraid of ME – she is afraid of my inner angry warrior. This angry warrior is harsh, volatile, violent, reckless, and reminds her way too much of her own father. Even though the warrior aspect is there to protect the sacred, little girl – she actually developed just to protect her from her father – her strategies and temperament are a bigger threat.

After those two parts of me were able to be seen, and felt, and explain themselves – they stopped judging one another. Giles mentioned that he thought my scared, fragile little girl was quite beautiful. Beautiful!!! I had never seen her as that. I always thought she was quite pathetic. Which is why I always try to come across to everyone in the outside world, as strong, bold, powerful – like the warrior. Now, as I glanced at the crouching child, I could see her with new eyes. She was indeed fragile – but even fragile can be beautiful. How did I not see this before?

As I allowed my scared, inner child to hear my angry warrior’s story and to negotiate some of her strategies for protecting us, her view of the angry warrior changed. Suddenly, she didn’t look so threatening and scary. In fact, she looked majestic -standing there, with her jeweled armor on, sword in hand. It was the first time that my scared, little girl actually saw her as a protector and not a threat. Suddenly the scared, little girl didn’t feel so scared anymore. And the angry warrior didn’t feel so angry.

Believe it or not, that was the easy part of the session. Giles then turned to me, and asked if I wanted to embody my father. My instinct was to scream *#@% NO!!!

But then I reconsidered. If this much healing came from embodying and having compassion for these aspects of myself, why not go straight to the source? After all, my father was the reason why these aspects of my shadow developed to begin with. I knew that there was one part of me that was quite attached to my story of me being the victim and my father being the monster. This story was very comfortable, and had controlled much of my life. What if the story was wrong? What if my father was not a monster – but instead just a man, who had made mistakes but was just as human as me. Then I would have to have compassion for him. And I did not want to have compassion for him. Why? Because then, I would have to abandon my story – which, ultimately, would mean that I would have to step into the unknown. What would my life look like if I could no longer tell my old stories? The thought terrified me.

Well, I did not come to this intense, 3-hour session to walk away with my same damn stories. I knew that my higher-self wanted to let them go, and the only way to let them go was to change them, to shift perspective. Damn, double damn. So, with a little hesitation, I jumped into the fire!!!

I sat in the chair that we had been using to represent my father. My skin crawled at first, my warrior tightened her grip on her sword, and my little girl shrank a little further back.

Giles guided me to embody all aspects of my father, by tapping into the part of my father that existed within ME. Wow. Suddenly I was overwhelmed with sadness, deep emotional pain, and intense regret. Is this how my father actually feels? I began to cry. I had no idea – I was too busy making him a monster.

My ‘inner’ father got to speak to my scared, little girl and then my warrior. Each of them got to speak back and share their pain and how he had impacted them. My warrior stood up in front of him – she was much more calm and centered now. She let him know that she would always be here to protect me, and would be willing to use any means necessary to do so. But she was not angry anymore. She knew her power and strength were now respected. My father thanked my warrior for protecting me all these years – he told her that he wished that he had a warrior do that for him when he was a severely abused child. In the end, they all seemed to come to a mutual respect, as well as a mutual compassion for one another.

At the end of our session, Giles guided me to allow myself to see the parts of my father that I had been blinded to because of my pain. My father was wise, powerful, yet gentle, vulnerable, compassionate and actually quite playful. I made a conscious choice to embrace these same qualities of him within myself – allowing me to experience my own ‘inner father’ or inner man, differently from here forth.

Two days later, shortly after the hurricane passed, I called my parents’ house to see if they were okay. My mom always answers the phone (I rarely talk to my dad, unless it’s just a hello, how are you, okay goodbye) but this time, my dad actually answered the phone (he NEVER answers, he hates phones.) When he answered, I almost didn’t recognize his voice! He sounded 30 years younger, and was lively and high spirited. As we spoke, there was a softness to his voice (usually it is quite harsh and loud -years of suppressed anger.) As we spoke, my heart filled up with love and compassion and I could tell his did too. I don’t remember how long we spoke, but it was, by far, the longest we have spoken in years. It was honestly like speaking to a different person. And then I realized something – because I chose to see him through NEW eyes, he was showing up differently.

What are we capable of changing simply by changing our perspective and opening up to love and compassion instead of judgment and old stories? This actualization opened me up to so many possibilities!!!! We really are the CREATORS of our own reality!!!