I’ll tell you a secret, dear are those to me who don’t fit in, who are outsiders in a perpetual exile. They have tried to belong, to find peace and community, but no sheep..I mean group.. embraces them. These are the deep independent thinkers, the over-feelers who carry an existential burden, the ones who have no choice but to confront personal and collective trauma and grief, most likely on a daily basis.
These highly sensitive beings are always meeting a resistance from the outside — from people who live their mediocre lives in accordance with fear — the fear of things changing, of transformation, such individuals have crushed their own dreams and lost their passions. They therefore desire the same for you.
How dare you even think to do the impossible?! To be different? To be ‘too much.’ Why can’t you be normal? Be quiet and abide by the rules, they whisper.
The system, of which these status quo police are a part (which may consist of family and friends) want lips to be muted and hearts to not find their freedom of self-expression.
The idea of revolution, of a change in the paradigm, makes them quake in their bones. Why? Because it would mean they would have to look deep within and see what evil lurks there — what darkness compels them to police the borders of what is ‘acceptable’ and ‘normal,’ what shadow they see in you that makes them so terrified of themselves.
Those in exile cannot but obey their nature. Imagine telling a scorpion or a bee not to sting when provoked and the same goes for the sensitive ones; their anger, rage and other big emotions that others try to silence only bubbles more to the surface when doused with oppressive words, even more so when personal boundaries are crossed or when worth is diminished.
Dearer are those to me who have the audacity to not care what ‘other people think,’ who continue to speak their truths, act upon their intuition, create their own path and share their unique wisdom.
Who needs the support of these naysayers anyway, when the entire universe converses inside their precious bodies?
Dearest still are those to me who lead the way for the rest of us existing on the periphery of social norms — norms rooted in systemic oppression — a cruelty and violence towards the inner feminine soul that is centuries old.
I have been ruminating a lot on the wisdom from Clarissa Pinkola Este’s seminal book, The Women Who Runs with the Wolves, so much so I wrote a blog post about it!
I encourage you to look at the part of you that longs to belong, that part of you that seeks a home in others but can’t find it, and find instead warped versions that do more harm than good! This part of you that doesn’t belong has a message. Lean in closer. Obey its nature, obey the reality of the piece that doesn’t fit!
Perhaps it’s not meant to. Perhaps you are not meant to.
I’d like you to move closer to the truth, to the life that is longing to emerge, but where you stay stuck because of your desire to look the same as others, or be like ‘them’, to have what ‘they’ have.
When will you give birth to your Self — to your difference? Your magnificence? That legacy that you will leave behind. Your dharma. As Estes implores, ‘if not now, when?’
JOURNAL THIS:
(words by Estes)
“What must I give more death to today, in order to generate more life?
What do I know should die, but am hesitant to allow to do so?
What must die in me in order for me to love?
What should die today?
What should live?
What life am I afraid to give birth to?
If not now, when?”
Rise Up, Warrior
~ Payal
