So Simple, So Profound

Love, laugh, cry, I heard in my head. Maybe it's sarcasm or maybe it's a little wisdom leaking into my head because I heard these words next: serve, don't take yourself too seriously, and release. How I arrived at that second set of words took years.

Before I made it all the way to elderhood, I didn't get the arc of what life is all about. Back then, I pushed myself. Sometimes I got lucky, like the time I could go to school in the U.S. for two years on scholarships and loans in my twenties. I pushed myself to work really hard to pass my audition, apply for multiple scholarships, and then qualify for a loan.

In my thirties, I worked hard to be a good mom, and to work in the church as I was able. My first husband was a preacher. During my late thirties and early forties, I worked at staying sane while we moved quickly three times as churches and my ex-husband had difficulties. We landed in Lethbridge, Alberta, where I worked long hours providing family daycare for six children and our three older children.

We tried to get help from professionals, from the church, from books we read, but the key ingredients lacking in helping our relationship move forward were honesty and vulnerability. Neither he nor I could pinpoint the cause of what exactly was wrong. Even the professionals disagreed on a course of action. The issues were deep and, by this time, fatal.

All my energy went into working, being present for my children, and being strong, but in the end, I was a puddle of "nothing left to give". Animosity and a difficult divorce marked a dividing point in my perception of how life was proceeding. It felt like failure and misery had joined hands and were doing a victory dance on my heart, pummelling it into fractured bits.

Processing all that had happened took time as I received counselling and was able to buy a home. Into that struggling, but happy home, came a beautiful soul three years after my divorce. He and I found a love neither of us thought we had left as we forged a life together. I could be myself with him. Too bad I didn't know who I really was. For twenty years I worked and dug deep inside myself to uncover the real me while he and our four children gave me the room and support to grow. My amazing husband's support and love never wavered. OK, maybe it got a little wiggly during menopause, but we made it through.

I find myself now in early elderhood, looking back at all the things, the decisions, the actions, the process, and the progress of my life. Three things stand out. I've loved, and still love deeply. Laughing deep belly laughs feels like a wonderful tonic. I can cry now because I'm sad or hurt because I don't need to defend myself physically or emotionally.

These three things–love, laughter, and crying–now feel normal. I think more about service. Service is far greater than most people know. Carolyn Myss calls it as she sees it:

“To be of service to others through your inner gifts, your intuition, your courage, your talents and your creativity is possible for all those who are willing to respond to the needs of others. Toward this end, you must see yourself as healed, having completed the unfinished business of your past. While you may visit your wounds every now and again, you can no longer emotionally or mentally reside in that contaminated psychic field, continually processing wounds that are decades old. Your focus has to be in the present moment. This is where your power is, and being in the present is what your health requires.”

Carolyn Myss, The Call to Be of Service.

Being in the present is harder than it sounds. As much as I can be present, I have the power to hear or recognize an opportunity to serve as a lifter-up for hope, self-love, and possibilities using whatever I create as inspiration. It's the reason I wrote my first book. It's the reason I write blog posts, take pictures, and my latest creative endeavour, a series of chat books about inspiration. These aren't "how-to" creations. They're more like journeys we take together.

Getting out of my way and not taking myself so seriously was also hard. I didn't know who I was, so how could I get out of my own way? Digging up all the lost parts of me was definitely hard work. Making peace with myself wasn't very much fun, either. I looked at all my shadow parts, the ugly, the worst of human qualities inside me and stared them in the face.

The last word I heard was allowing. Funny how I knew I needed to allow after all that pushing, forcing, and overcoming. Overcoming is important, but what if we allowed those around us to be themselves? What if we allowed ourselves to be who we are—shadows, warts, imperfections, and everything else? The hardest one was allowing others to give to me. Receiving something from others graciously and thankfully made my heart grow. It filled me up to share with others.

Go figure. My attitude and allowing made it possible to give to others, not from a need to reciprocate, nor to make myself the more generous giver, but to share from the heart. Far from weak, this kind of giving can be a moment of presence with a person who's wounded, a word of kindness or a smile to a person who's facing a hard day or a hard life, listening with empathy and understanding to someone who has a story they need to tell. Far from insignificant, one of those moments you choose to engage from the heart sometimes is the pivotal moment when another person's life changes.

"It's just those little acts of kindness that can be so powerful for people, and I learned that in spades during that life review. ... That was the only reason I wanted to come back, to correct those little things that I had messed up, whether it was intentionally or unintentionally.... That was the one thing that made me change in a positive way when I came back."

Nancy Rynes, The Near Death Experience of Nancy Rynes, YouTube, Anthony Chene Production, June 3, 2022, 28:48

Regardless of your stance on near-death experiences, they are a widely recorded phenomenon. Nancy Rynes describes two incidents: one where she hurt her younger sister's feelings deeply and an encounter with a grocery clerk at Christmas. She said some kind words to that clerk that turned her whole day and evening around into a lovely evening with her children.

Those incidents may have seemed insignificant, but their effect was powerful enough to make Nancy want to go back to life on earth, and correct them. I still don't know the entire arc of what life is all about, but I know the moments we choose to uplift another person have a powerful ripple effect that changes their life. So simple, so profound.