A few weeks back, one of my best friends texted me with some news. She thought I ought to know, and learning it from her was definitely the best way for me to find out. The news itself isn’t the important piece of this story, but what this news brought to me is.
This news was to be expected, and the best part of it is that I had predicted all of it somehow. Down to the last detail, I knew this was going to happen, I knew it would happen in that frame of time, and I knew who would be implicated in it. Once I heard the news, I was flooded by so many different emotions. As I said, I wasn’t really surprised by the news itself, but something else still amazed me. I was surprised by how this news was making me feel. None of those emotions were linked to jealousy, or rage, or anger, or resentment.
So I’m sitting on my bed, early Friday morning, hit by expected news. And all I can feel is this weird feeling that I had never felt this strongly in my life before. At first, I can’t even describe it. I literally do not understand this new feeling. I end up texting and calling a few of my very close friends whom I know will understand, relate, support, hold space for me, and help me accept those new feelings.
The best way I could come up to describe these feelings is; relief. Deep heartfelt relief. More than just relief, I felt this resistance inside of me wondering how she was going to continue existing if she was not needed anymore. Resistance looking me in the face like, “What the fuck just happened? Where am I gonna go now?”
After that long staring look that me and resistance shared, another new friend came in to play; allowance. Realizing that I too, was allowed to let myself feel pure happiness. That I too, was allowed to let go and move on from guilt. And like any new encounter, sometimes we take some distance before we start wondering if we can trust our new friend.
I felt like I was finally allowed to feel pure happiness not tinted with guilt, shame, nor blame. For so long, I felt at peace with what had happened in the past. But I also knew that rage, anger, hurt, pain, shame, guilt, blame, jealousy were always lurking in the background.
That realization of knowing that I had resisted letting myself feel happiness for so long, knowing that fighting it had been entirely pointless, and finally knowing now that I was allowed to let myself feel happy, hit me like a ton of bricks. For years, I had always put this kind of cover on top of my happiness. I had put this lid on it to make sure I could contain it and not feel too happy because I thought I didn’t deserve happiness. I had put in my head that I wasn’t worthy of feeling deep, pure happiness. I held myself back for so long. It was very overwhelming to go through all these realizations within a blink of an eye.
I was just realizing that freedom had been knocking on my door all along, and I was wondering if I was finally going to be brave enough to answer it. We hide behind our resistance, and it becomes our comfort zone. We enter this victimhood land, where we would rather stay than explore new wild and free lands, where everything is possible but unknown. I hid behind my resistance for years, and when I realized I needed to let go because she had no point in existing, I felt like I had lost all my bearings.
What do I do now? Where do I go now? Oh, hold on, now you’re telling me I’m free? Better yet, now you’re telling me I had been free all along? And you’re telling me I did this to myself? Now you’re telling me I get to be happy without feeling guilty or ashamed? Now you’re telling me I can actually move the fuck on when I thought I had moved on a while back?
All this event, from hearing the news to going through a million thoughts per second, to processing all of it, to sharing it with my close friends, barely lasted an hour. Yet, it felt like it lasted for ages. In a split second, I felt like I was looking at the past few years of my life flashing before my eyes. I felt the weight lifted off my shoulders. Literally. I felt my chest being able now to move better and better, lighter and lighter with each breath. It had been weighing me down for so long, without even me knowing it. It was like I had just woken up from a long sleep and asked why I had put myself through this unnecessary fuckery for this long.
The ego definitely took a hit with that one. The ego lives in fear. It lives in wanting to control everything and everyone. It lives in comfort zones and division, so it can easily conquer. But “a bad day for the ego is a great day for your soul.” And there is no greater feeling than the feeling of awakening to your newfound freedom. My higher self already knew about all of this, had already accepted it, had already processed it, had already forgiven all of it ages ago, and was just waiting for me to finally join the party that is my best life.
