This long weekend, I made it up to Canmore to spend the holiday with Cuppy-Cake and her family. It was great to get away and spend time with an incredible group of people, and the mountains are like my recharging station. Some times, I don't even know that I need a trip until I get there, and once I do, a sense of peace settles over me, like all is right with my world.
As I noted in an earlier post, I have been feeling lately as though I have lost sight of who I am, or supposed to be. I believe I can attribute a lot of this struggle with depression to my slight identity crisis. But by chance I found myself this weekend at a little second-hand bookstore in a basement in Canmore.
Cuppy had been raving about this little treasure for weeks: it's one of her favorite places in the world and as an avid reader myself, I thought I would enjoy it, too. Only, out of the hundreds of books there, I couldn't find a single thing I wanted to read. I looked and looked, I poked in the dark recesses and saw plenty of things that seemed interesting but nothing that shouted "Buy
me! You need
me!". It left me feeling very dejected - I never have bad luck finding something to bring home from a book store. Finally, once all the rest of the company had made their purchases and we were getting ready to leave the store, my hand fell onto a book by one of my favorite authors, one that I hadn't had the opportunity to read yet. I scrabbled it up and immersed myself into the book as soon we got back to our suite.
If I was feeling like I had lost my way before, it was nothing compared to how I began to feel reading this book. It was a tale of the authors personal journey of self-discovery and every word I read made me realize just how far from myself that I have strayed the last few years. It was both a shock and a blessing. A shock because I had no idea it had been happening - and certainly not for that long - and a blessing because I know it's never too late to make changes. And this book presented its self to me as a sign to do just that.
Once upon a time, I was a deeply spiritual person. The magic and mystery of the universe was always at the forefront of my mind. I prayed often and looked to signs to help guide me. I also had a very real idea of where I wanted my path to lead me. I knew I wanted to do things that would make a difference in the world, change lives and help guide me to my highest and best self. And throughout all of this, I was deeply at peace.
I see now, more clearly than ever, that I have changed - I've become almost unrecognizable to myself. The old me would never have questioned the idea of being visited in dreams by a departed friend. She wouldn't have let days go by (let alone years) without stopping and wondering at the beauty to be found every where. And she certainly would never have doubted that Universe was working with her and for her in order for her to reach her highest potential.
Some where along the way, I lost that part of me. I moved and met new friends. I took a job where I never thought I'd find myself (but, hey, bills have too be paid). I met a man that knew nothing of spirituality other than what he had been taught in church. Now, I work a job with no meaning aside from getting other peoples paper work done in a timely fashion. I've stopped drawing. I stopped sitting under trees and contemplating on what it was to be part of something so huge and feeling that, despite my smallness, I was an important piece to the big puzzle. And most importantly, I find myself cut off the world I knew and loved and I feel separated and often horribly alone.
I think back to a brief but poignant conversation I had three years ago with my boss - the one from the store where we sold overpriced clothes produced in third world countries. I was trying to explain to this boss what a "hippie" I had been in Calgary. I used to pray, and have bonfires with singing and dancing. I'd paint murals of mandalas on the walls my friends houses and make wooden jewelry with my sister. I had been a vegan, and even did the raw food thing s for while. I worked at a holistic clinic where they not only treated the body with things like massage and acupuncture, but they treated the soul, too, with reiki and psychic guidance.
At the end of my story, my boss, this woman with an elegantly put-together outfit and lips painted my favorite shade black cherry, leans back and laughs. She shakes her head, almost knowingly and sais "And then you traded it all in for makeup and pretty clothes, and lived happily ever after." At the time I laughed it off. After all, what did she know? But I should have seen right away that what she said was becoming true, and I should have made it stop right then and there.
The journey home from my trip this weekend was a wonderful time of contemplating on all the things I used to, and touching on new and ever more fantastic things to consider. The beauty of the mountains, the way the elements work together was much deeper than I had ever realized, the connectivity I feel to certain people as though we had been placed before each other for some greater reason than just to say "Hi" in passing.
I have changed and now something needs to happen in order for me to find my way back to me. I need to find what it is help me to get to my higher self. I must have missed a lot of signs attempting to show me what was happening and how to get back on my path. I only hope I still have the eyes to see these sign
I have to sleep and pray that that something will become clearer for me in the new day.
