Life from the Soul’s Perspective
She moved out on September 4, 2018. I was so mad about how it all went down. She didn’t speak to me for a week and I was scared. A lifetime of love and lessons and fighting and making up — her entire childhood. My world stopped.
Life was becoming increasingly difficult leading up to that day. Mom was in the hospital for most of April; she never fully recovered once she was released. She knew she was going to die. It was just a matter of time. But we didn’t speak of those things. Talking about things that matter isn’t common practice in my family.
On November 8th mom called to tell me she was giving up the fight. No more chemo — no more treatment of any kind. Comfort care only. I remember the glimmer of sunshine beaming through the front window. I remember her exact words and the soft tone in her voice as she asked, “are you okay with this decision?”
“Of course, mom. You know your body better than I. I just want the rest of your days to be as good as they can be.”
Less than two hours later Maddie stopped by after school. While she was now primarily living at her dad’s house in another district, she was still in school here. She dropped by to see her dog, and talk. “I have a question, mom,” she began.
“I’ve been thinking about this for a while. I talked to my dad and he said I have to talk to you. It’s really important to me. I want to transfer to Lancaster.” And she went on to list the reasons why.
I didn’t break down while she was here. We talked rationally. I told her I’d think about it. Eventually I agreed and the process began.
So as mom’s body prepared to die a part of me was dying too. Maddie started school in Lancaster just as mom’s body was physically preparing to leave the earth. I spent that last week of her life with her, amazed at the process. Her spirit was so strong. I kept feeling like her last breath was imminent but instead she cried out, day after day. She wasn’t in physical pain; we kept her comfortable. It seemed as though her soul was going through a transitional phase from this world to the next. It felt as though her soul was agonizing in some way too. It was heartbreaking. Mom talked to her dad a lot in that week. I’m pretty sure she was actually talking to her dad, not just in her imagination.
We think of our physical lives in concrete terms. We don’t recognize ourselves as the spirits we are. We are far more spirit than physical but our culture doesn’t honor or view it that way. Certainly we rarely talk about such things.
A few months ago I began studying numerology and sacred geometry. There are clues to the natural unfolding of the universe in the numbers. As mom was rambling in her final days, she clearly said “six, seven, eight.” I discovered that her birth number was a six; the day of her death, seven. Eight perplexed me for a while, but I recently discovered that eight stood for infinity, the number of God.
There has been so much change and transformation in the past year. I started a job one week after the news from mom and my girl. I didn’t know who I was. I was down on myself. I felt sad all the time. I couldn’t cope and felt like I was in a huge abyss I couldn’t pull myself out of. I began working with a Jungian Therapist and Synchronicity Coach to begin making sense of life.
The work has been transformational. I’ve discovered things about myself I never knew before and I have a deeper sense of my purpose. I’m now loving work and loving life. While I miss them both, I see that everything that happens is here to help me. I’m beginning to see life from the soul’s perspective as opposed to my ego’s perspective. Not easily, not every day, but it’s a process I’m working through.
Things don’t always go my way. In fact, most of the time it doesn’t. But I roll with it. And I grow.
I’ve seen Maddie grow too. She wants nothing more than to play softball at the college level, and she won’t take less than a D1 scholarship. Some synchronistic events happened with Ball State and she was just offered a package last week. Interestingly (synchronously) the offer came exactly nine months from the day she announced her intention to transfer to Lancaster, the same day mom announced she was done fighting. Nine is a completion number.
Life from the soul’s perspective makes sense of the ‘randomness.’
I wrote this nine months ago and forgot about it. I’m publishing as is. Because life.
