I imagined a certain life for myself. I’m sure everyone does. This imagined life was built year upon year, experience upon experience, heartbreak upon heartbreak.
It was like a cozy blanket I would use to protect, shield & comfort myself. But, at the end of the day, it was still only an imagined life & at the age of 30, my life started unraveling. It seemed like I had sewn a wrong thread in this beloved blanket of mine. That one wrong thread had to come out. It was making everything else in the cozy blanket unpleasant. The stitches were much too tight as well. The blanket couldn’t take it anymore. It gave way & everything seemed to come apart.
Now, there was nothing to protect me or comfort me.
Reader, if you have ever had a wrong thread in your blanket, then you can imagine the devastation I felt. On some days, it was like I had stepped out of my house, naked & everyone was acutely aware of my presence. On other days, it was like sitting on a rollercoaster, riding from one feeling to the next in the matter of mere seconds. There were days when I wanted to hibernate like a bear & days when it felt like I was wearing the Invisibility Cloak from Harry Potter. I was just moving from one day to the next, holding my now tattered blanket close to me.
So began my journey to find myself & a new blanket. It felt daunting & impossible, like journeying to the Middle Earth. Finding myself & this new blanket wasn’t going to be easy. I would have to start from scratch & discard the old, tattered one. New, stronger threads would be needed.
This new blanket was going to be amazingly creative & filled with everything I held dear to me. Most importantly, I wasn’t going to weave it on my own. So if I needed help with it, I was going to ask for it. The new blanket made me realise that I don’t need to do this alone, in isolation. Sometimes, I would just wrap myself in the half-made blanket because doing anything else was exhausting. The blanket took in all my feelings, without judgement, with love.
And slowly, as painful & as frightening as it was, I weaved it & shed the old blanket from my life to make space for the new one. And ever so gently, it taught me to build myself if this blanket were to tear too.
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