Once again I have found myself flipped upside down, inside out, a bit sideways, and coming back to a center that has evolved from what it was just a short while ago. This had left me a bit discombobulated - but only when I think about it. When I just move along the threads there is this solidness that is different than the solidness that was there before. This is jingling and jangling the way I am looking at my work and really all of life.
It is common that folks that work in the healing field evolve over time (This is certainly true of any field, but I can only speak to this one and so this is the one that I shall speak to.) How we begin is often very different from where we will be at any present moment in time. Sometimes it's not actually as dramatic as we might want to believe it is, and perhaps it's never really all that dramatic. And still........something has happened in a million trillion different moments that gently stir things and when enough little bits are stirred, sometimes a whirlpool transpires and we are sucked down and spit out in a seemingly abrupt way. We are then left trying to find our footing and how to walk with some bit of grace in this new alighnment that is usually a bit awkward. When we think about it too much, and try and figure out just how to move fowards, we can get caught up, scared, and disoriented. When we just step, the grace seems to flow.
At the beginning of my work as a practitioner, which was almost 17 years ago, I was going to "fix" the world. I was on a mission to help people feel better, improve their lives, and my belief was that the world would change just a little bit, each time a person was healed. This was an incredibly naïve approach, albeit an enthusiastic one.
Over time this shifted, as I learned that I wasn't "fixing" anyone, primarily because I didn't view anyone as needing to be "fixed", (I believe we are never broken, and never actually out of balance in relation to the choices we make.). I also started to realize that "fixing" was an incredibly arrogant approach that actually took away an individuals power to create change within themselves - like they needed a professional to do so.
I started to call myself a "guide", someone who could hold the lantern, the magnifying glass, or the telescope (depending on which perspective seemed needed), which felt like I had removed the "fixer" from it.
Lately I have been thinking how that "guide" is just another word that puts the practitioner ABOVE the client. It still has that arogance to it. It is steeped in a weird "commanding of authority" that just never has sat right with me.
I started working with a flower essence recently, a tree essence, and that's when everything started to unravel and I started to "SEE" things from other possible perspectives that dug into the depths of things, and drag me down into the whirlpool wth them.
Yesterday I had a conversation with a very dear old friend, who I used to be quite close to. Over the years, babies were born, new relationships were formed, people moved away and back and away again, and our paths went in other directions. It was as if we both went on different journeys, but we still so connected at the heart/soul level, that we found our way back to eachother when whatever things needed to be aligned, did so. During this conversation we spoke about our practices and how they have evolved over time. Both of us had similar journeys and these new and curious perspectives.
All of a sudden I realized that healer has been the wrong word all along (even though that is what the masses may want to refer to people that do the type of work that I do are), I am simply one person who has had a certain collection of experiences. When I share those experiences, perhaps there are people who enjoy listening, perhaps there are things that they learn from my experiences, just as there are things I learn from other's experiences from things that I enjoy listening to . And I thought "Well, this feels like a storyteller", because after all everything I share is really just a story of my experiences anyways.
It then expanded and I thought "everyone is just storytellers", there is no better than, or less than, or more than. There are just the many different experiences we have all had together here on this thing we call earth, in this thing we call life.
Through connection, and in a sort of service to this whole grand shabang of things, which include the crows and the rocks and the trees and the waters, and of course, the people, we are all in communities within communities within communities.
Then I thought "what about my practice? What is it that I do, what is it that needs to change, what am I going to do now?"..........I tend to spiral a bit into all potential possiblities that my mind can come up with - out of fear of course. And then I came back to a calmer place, remembered to breathe, and listened.
"I share my stories with folks that show up to listen. Maybe something that I share sparks something in them. Maybe they begin to feel better and they start to find more enjoyment in their moments. Maybe they start to feel more pleasure, more joy, and allow themselves to say no, to feel their anger and express their grief. Maybe, little by little they become more alive."
And then I realized that this still included that "expectation"..........
so I paused and breathed for a longer period.........
and listened.
"I am a storyteller."
I instantly felt at home. Of course it was followed by my mind that said "How the heck are you going to help people with Lyme Disease as a storyteller?"
I listened some more.
"I am a storyteller. I will share stories that I know about Lyme Disease and plants and flower essences."
I expected more to come. A bit more guidance, a bit of a map of sorts.
It did not.
I am a storyteller. And quite frankly, that is all I need to be.
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