She messaged me to check in. I responded right away, telling her I had been sick with the flu. This was my way of apologizing for my lack of communication recently. At this point I still thought it was my lack of presence that was the problem. Admittedly, I had been absent from many of my regularly scheduled activities for several weeks. More than that, I hadn’t seen much of my friends or family, either.
I told myself and those who asked that my state of near-isolation could be boiled down to feeling under the weather. That response seemed to get me by until she didn’t respond how I had expected her to. For whatever reason, I had anticipated the generic “feel better soon” message back. Surely at that point, I could continue my isolation in peace. She had other ideas as she saw through my short responses.
My phone rang with another text. “Have you reached out to your fellow Pranic Healers for healing?”
I knew already she had known the answer to this question before asking. The short answer was no but I knew that wasn’t going to suffice. Instead I opted for a weak attempt at humor with, “I hadn’t thought of that…” I hadn’t thought of that. She proceeded to connect me with a fellow Pranic Healer who was glad to offer me relief.
It should be noted that I myself am a level four Pranic Healer. I could write numerous blogs about the rapid healing I have experienced through Pranic Healing and Twin Hearts Meditation but that is not what this is about. I knew that the Healer that this friend put me in touch with would likely connect me with much relief from healings I have experienced over the course of five years. The question was, why hadn’t I asked? I am glad to offer healing to others who are suffering and have done so on many occasions. It was not until my friend asked me why I had not reached out for healing for myself that I realized that I could count on one hand the times I had asked for help.
I went into the healing session with this question at the top of my mind. When my friend had asked me why I hadn’t reached out, the question had hit me in the pit of my stomach. I didn’t feel I had wronged her or the practice of Pranic Healing that I had grown to love so much; I felt I had been shorting myself. The healer she linked me with provided healing, then reached out to see how I was feeling. I thanked her for the session and explained that regrettably, I had not experienced much relief with my symptoms. Sleep still eluded me, my sinuses were still a mess but mostly, I still didn’t want to face the world.
It was then that the Healer hit me with it. She asked the question I did not know I had been waiting to hear. “What exactly is going on?” Such a direct question. Later I found myself trying to remember the last time someone had been so specific when asking about my well-being. I gave in a little, telling her that I had been sickly, had begun a new semester at college and that my mother was on hospice. She side-stepped the invisible wall I had just put up and probed further.
What followed was an unleashing of a cascade of emotions I had been carrying intractably on my own for months. Suddenly, for an oddly blissful moment in time, I was able to say the unsayable about the realities I am and have been, shouldering. The conversation started with me saying, “these are the things I cannot say,” and ended with me saying just those things. How liberating it was to tell her what it feels like to start a new semester without my only sibling, while caring for my mother who has been on hospice since December. I was overwhelmed by how much lighter these things felt with someone to bare witness to them. Acknowledging these truths had once felt like an indulgence, a betrayal to the strength I have become known for. In this moment, speaking them out loud liberated me.
The weight we carry in our lives threatens to become a part of us that we carry for longer and in more solitude than is necessary. No matter how heavy or awkward the load we bare is, life and the responsibilities that come with it continue to nag at us like a pack of toddlers that missed both snack and nap time. If you can picture that scene, you can begin to picture what those who are grieving, in the process of losing a loved one, or recovering from trauma endure as they face each day. Do not get caught up in the illusion that they must not need help if they appear to be managing all that they have on their plate. Lot’s of us have a great game face.
I was unable to locate my game face the day my friend reached out to me. Because of this, I had retreated to an isolated state, trying to decide which weight in my life was most important to pick up next. Fortunately for me, both my friend and the healer were willing to reach more than halfway to help me figure out how to rise again, carrying a bit less weight this time. Some days we are the healer. On such days, we should reach out to both the weak and to the strong. Other days, we require healing. On those days, may we be strong enough to reach out for healing.
**To learn more about Pranic Healing go to: http://www.pranichealing4me.com
Up Off the Mat 