Waterfall

_{*I’ve want to give credit for this post to my Reiki therapist, who gave me the prompt for this and then told me “now go home and write the rest.”}

I am at a waterfall.
I am meant to go through.
The answer is on the other side.

Why am I hesitating?

Fear.

Fear of what?

I know joy and peace lay just beyond the water’s permeable walls…

I fear myself. My perceived unworthiness. I need to suffer more- to erase the shame- to prove my worthiness.

I need to walk a thousand miles with bloody knees- no, sweating blood as Jesus did. I need to be so tired and broken- having given every once of myself- to deserve to walk through the falls. I am only worthy when in pain.

Yet my heart (Pacer) pulls me forward, anyway. I dig my heels into the ground, breaking against her pull. She tells me it doesn’t have to be this way. Pain isn’t the way to joy. Joy is the way to joy. Pain simply shows us when we’re not in alignment, when we’re separated from Love, joy, an our true selves.

She tells me, “Those false beliefs that have been ingrained in you, your family- it is your Light that is meant to break the illusion, for you and those you love.”

I remember the beginning lines from one of my favorite Mary Oliver poems:

“You do not have to be good.
You do not have to walk on your knees
for a hundred miles through the desert repenting.
You only have to let the soft animal of your body
love what it loves.” (Mary Oliver, Wild Geese)

So I let my heart pull me forward.
Through the waterfall that has transformed into rays of light.
I step through and exhale…

And then for a moment I step back out. “Actually, what if it’s not that good?” I wonder. “What if none of it’s true and there is still pain and suffering on the other side?”

I guess there’s nothing to lose…

I try again, Pacer impatiently waiting (“patience” is her least favorite “P” word).

All there is is light, even as I keep walking.
It just keeps going, almost holding me even as I take another step.
It feels like safety and I just want to collapse and rest for a bit.
And so I do.

I’m not sure if it’s moments or days later, but eventually I wake up. Pacer and I shake out our sleepies together, but I have the feeling she was watching over me the whole time.
Suddenly, we’re at the edge of the fall of lights. I can see the blurred other side through the rays. This time, I let my heart (Pacer) pull me forward without hesitating.

It’s all the same, really. Almost.

Just brighter. Vivid. More intense.
Yet the colors don’t blind me and the love doesn’t overwhelm me.
It feels like Home.

I am the same too.
Just brighter. Clearer.

Okay, maybe I’m a little taller too.

Joy, emanating off my form.
Clarity. The worry lines on my face have disappeared.
Here, I Know.