Today was a huge day for me. I broke up with my therapist.
We’ve been together on&off for six years. She saved me from prozac back in the spring of 2008. She helped me cure a few of my long standing physical ailments with which came a lot of emotional healing too.
She was amazing. She was The One for me. She had exactly what I needed — independence, highly individualised spirituality, toughness, openness, wisdom, intuition, depth, courage, creativity, integrity, playfulness, maturity, honesty and kindness. Basically, all the traits I desperately needed to reawaken within myself.
The work we were doing was digging the gold out of me as well as deepening our bond.
During one of our breaks from therapy we met up to discuss a business collaboration. But I backed out — just like with many other people many times before and after. It actually took me to be out of work for some time to finally accept that I am a lone worker, a free lancers, and not a team player at all.
During another break we met up for a coffee and a stroll around our local park. It was lovely to spend time with her outside the therapy room but it also felt off — bumpy, uneven. She knew everything about me and I not so much about her. Not the most natural or easy starting point for a friendship. We didn’t meet for coffee again.
The last time I reached out to her (this January) I needed help with quite a few physical issues and an overwhelming sense of stuckness. What I didn’t realise was that I already started getting unstuck on my own. And that going back to her was more about closure than seeking help.
For what was to be our last session she suggested I bring a shadow — a part of me I feared expressing the most. For a week I considered them all but none felt scary enough to show to her. And most I already did. This wasn’t surprising though. After all, anything I couldn’t bring to anyone else I brought to her — it was the safest place I had (outside the one I share with Paul).
And then it hit me. The one thing I couldn’t bare thinking about sharing with her was ending my therapy. And there it was. My scariest shadow. The only one worth bringing to her. So I did.
But I didn’t know the half of it! The difficulty I had trying to get the words out! Couldn’t believe it! I struggled for probably good 15 minutes — WTF!!! I thought. I mean — the discomfort, the shakes, the dry throat — the hell of it all!
When I eventually did say the words I was first gutted and then relieved. For the rest of the session we dug out some more gold. When we parted it was with lot of love which helped sooth my aching heart. Yes, heart …… I just ended one of the most meaningful relationships of my life …. but it was time…..
The chapter of my life I’m in now is all about looking to myself for answers. I feel an organic unfolding into the readiness to do exactly that which I never quite felt before. It was triggered by a challenge a friend threw at me recently which among other things rubbed my face into the vast knowledge and understanding of human predicament I accumulated over more than 30 years. A lifetime worth of research, observation, first hand experiences, reading, studying, going on courses, workshops, talks, therapies and talking to other people — and then talking some more and reading some more ……. All of that more than equipping me for the descent into my own darkness to get the light. To face my greatest fears and write home about it.
