Goodbye
Goodbye to not listening to my gut, not following my intuition.
Goodbye to opening up channels of energy when I know it's not safe.
Goodbye to overextending myself and then feeling overwhelmed and then cancelling.
Goodbye to collaborations with mediocre white men who overestimate themselves and let people down.
Patterns are easy to spot but hard to break.
Joy comes in circles, dependably, if you trust the orbit.
What a nice invitation: to view the neutral encounters of your day as seeds you might look back on as having grown your most sacred flowers.
I release my routineless life. I forego the floppiness and bloatedness of no daily schedule, while also letting go of the many boons that come from not having things just so. I invite more rigor around spiritual practice, writing, reflection, and care. I say goodbye to overscheduled social plans, replacing them with open space.
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And then this happens: a crack in time, fortified by six nuns breathing in and out.
I am in an abbey, surrounded by silence.
I am looking at the stained glass that comes to life each golden hour.
I am shrouded, content with sisterhood.
I inhale. I sing a note, then another. I kneel in reverence.
I count beads of wood, a gift from my parents.
I am safe in God’s glow. I have enough, and I am good.
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I let go of self-judgment that I am not enough. I let go of my obsession with my inadequacies. I let go of being around people who constantly bring these to the surface. I let go of caring about achievement for its own sake. I let go of the idea that I was supposed to have done something specific by now.
One of our most special traits as humans is the ability to imbue things with meaning.
This act makes the mundane miraculous, the routine ritual.
I like this about us, we humans. We like making things special.
I release the spell placed on me all those years ago, when not-enoughness first set in. I release you, insufficiency. I won't be opening the door to you. You'll sneak in, yes, but you are not welcome here. I lay down the crown, too heavy, break it apart in pieces and distribute it back to the earth. I reject the idea that this much compounded education entitles -- obligates -- me to rule over others. It does not. I simply want to live, to create, to love, to help.
I say goodbye, with love for the structure and stability they've gotten me so far, the too-worn grooves that still give shape to what success looks like for someone like me.
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They are waiting, the nuns with their beads. They are calling from another time, to me, their sister.
They await, cackling with joy, to fold me into their arms.
They beckon to a place without a tether, without the constant need to respond to and affirm others.
To a place where silence sits with open arms.
