Hello my beautiful friend,
A couple days ago, I was texting with my beautiful friend, Laurie about the tricks our minds can play on us.
About how I spent decades of my life feeling scared and unworthy and feeling like a failure and feeling like I didn’t deserve to be on this planet.
How I believed all of the voices in my head that told me those things.
Do you know that feeling? Have you had those thoughts? Maybe you still do? We all do. (Or, most people do.)
***
I was so lucky that I found teachers and guides who helped me see that what we think is not the truth. It is not who we are.
My spiritual teacher, Cheri Huber, says, “Don’t let the voices get you alone in the dark.”
That is something I have repeated to myself a thousand times over ever since I first heard it in 1991, during a period of deep depression and hiding out.
It is counter-intuitive for most of us to reach out when we are scared, lonely, anxious, or depressed. Many of us feel like we won’t be loved if we are not happy.
We all know this is not true.
***
We all know that we love the people in our lives when they are vulnerable and ask us for help. We know that we love to support them. We know that we want to lean on them, too.
Like everything else, this is a practice.
I am practicing this every day. And hoping that my beautiful son will also learn to practice this. And that YOU will practice this.
The more we all practice together, the more we easily remember that we are lovable for ALL parts of who we are. ALL of our human-ness.
***
Maybe there is one person who needs to hear this right now. Maybe you?
Or, maybe there is someone in your life who is afraid to reach out.
If you can, listen closely. Watch closely. Sometimes the seemingly strongest people around us are in big need of help. Please extend a hand or an offer if you suspect someone is hiding/afraid.
I call that part of myself “Cardboard Sherry.” Throughout my childhood and 20’s + 30’s she was front + center. A great coping mechanism, but as Laurie just confirmed in one her texts, “it is not sustainable.”
What is more sustainable is connecting to one another, leaning on one another, holding hands, allowing emotions to arise + move through us.
What is sustainable is really getting it that who we are is completely LOVABLE. Now. Exactly. No matter what is happening.
I’m talking to you. I see your beautiful self. YOU are loved, exactly as you are.
I love you and am cheering you on, always. YOU MATTER.
Thanks for who you are.
Seek celebration — even in the dark corners,
xo Sherry