Unwinding...

Another Purple Flower Droste
Originally uploaded by Josh Sommers
As I have let myself drop further and further into feeling what is underneath several layers of sorrow and guilt which had surfaced in my supervision group Monday, I experienced some powerful insights today sitting on a bench to have lunch while taking my break from a training class.

A question posed about my client who's been diagnosed with terminal cancer actually turns out to be an equally significant question for me: "Who will catch me?" This question originated in a supervision group a few months back when my client was expressing a lot of anxiety about literally falling. In the moment of recalling this, I was transported to my earliest experiences in life -- my entry into the world in a place of the unknown was probably the hugest experience of "falling", then into the laps of strangers who would adopt me, then trying to desperately find somewhere or someone to connect with in my chaotic home. I experienced terror, danger, isolation and abandonment and there was no one available to catch me, no safety net.

In kabbalistic healing, there is a territory called Hesed of Yesod. This terrain is treaded upon when we've gone through enough shatterings and are willing to sip the "poison" of what we've been raised in and know it's not going to kill us. It is our willingness to meet life as it is.

The experience of being close to death when doing kabbalistic healing with a friend's uncle brought me directly into Hesed of Yesod once before. That time around, my friend's uncle was struggling with "letting go" and was resisting leaving this earth. This triggered my entry into the "nega" (dark side) of my experience of abandonment. Both her uncle and I were having parallel experiences of our deep fear of the unknown. I recalled vividly today that I often ruminated what it would be like to die as a child. Sometimes I'd awake in the middle of the night with my heart pounding and in a cold sweat thinking about what happens when you die. For me, it felt very final. A darkness that was beyond terrifying and simply incomprehensible for this little brain.

It is no longer a mystery why I would be visiting Hesed of Yesod land given that I am in relationship to a client who is approaching death. Yet, this go-round is not nearly as intense or debilitating. I could feel being knocked off my center, shaky, yet having enough of myself to remain upright. And it is my client's reference to her own deceased father and what upsets her as she thinks about him in heaven with his eyes closed that peels away another layer for me. I spent all of my childhood, adolescence and young adulthood trying to please my father in hopes that I would feel and know his love. And his eyes were closed. He didn't see me. He could only see the bottles in front of his face as he poured the liquid down his throat.   It was too much for him to bear looking into my pleading eyes.

And the spiraling continues.

The layers of guilt. This is the moment that I become acutely aware about why I have been stalled at the 9th step of my AA program. This is the step about making direct amends. And what I realize first is this: my guilt about telling my client 4 years ago after her mastectomy that she was safe, that the cancer was gone and now having it return with enough force to kill her revealed to me a number of other situations in which I've made "false promises". These are the very situations for which I've needed to make amends and could not bring them fully into my consciousness. The most painful of these is the promise I made to my former partner's father on his deathbed -- that he need not worry about his daughter after he crossed over, as I would ensure to take care of her. And then 4 years later, I left her. And I have never really allowed for the full expression of remorse or taking ownership for my part in this situation because I could always justify my actions as a response to her substance abuse and associated behaviors. It is no coincidence that I made arrangements to do this very step with my sponsor this week.

"Who will catch me?" is not about the reliance of leaning on a human being in my life but rather it is about my own trustworthiness and my faith. It is about being in connection (Yesod) and trusting my own inner wisdom (Tiferet). It is about my relationship with my Higher Power/G-d. This is where my healing work lies. Then there is no longer a question, but rather a statement: "I am caught."