“I never expected to experience such despair and loneliness in this lifetime.” Written by 
my 13 year old self.
I cleaned out my closets this weekend. It feels really great to get rid of a bunch of clothes and items that no longer serve me. In the past year, I moved across the country and in doing so let go of almost all my old wardrobe and a lot of material possessions. Its taken me this long to get my closets organized and let go of even more stuff from my “old” life. Hidden in the bottom of a box, lay a folder including all of the poetry, songs and journals I began writing in my teenage years that went into my 20s. Curious, I flipped through some entries and read through those old songs. Its amazing to me how this woman I am still reflects the young girl who shined through those writings.
So much hurt – so much loneliness – so much feelings of alienation, of wanting to leave the Earth, of calling to God asking what the hell is going on? Of desperate pleas for safety, for comfort, for some sort of help to release the agony. I felt like an alien here for as long as I can remember and those old letters reflect a lifetime of trying to get back home…to an invisible place I didn’t know why I missed so badly. I was surrounded by family that loved me, and still I felt all of that anguish.
Where does all that suffering come from at such a young age? I felt like I had experienced it all, and wrote like I was so tired of all the hurting. Yet – in another passage I proclaimed I loved my life and was very lucky, but didn’t understand why I still felt so bad in my own skin.
I know teenagers all experience dramatic changes and are very emotional. But these themes persisted in my adult life. Even recently, after all of my conscious creation, of loving myself, of the infinite spiritual expansion I’ve experienced, I looked towards the darkness and felt this empty despair which lurks. In my finding of myself, the Goddess in the mirror, I see completely different reflections around me.
There was a time that this lonely little girl, forgetting that she is the entire universe, would fill her life with people, places and things no matter if they were good for her or not. This lonely little girl who hated her body, and sometimes her mind, would cling to drama and situations just to escape the mundane normal every day activities. Because – its not the drama or intense situations she feared – it was the mundane. The boredom of nothing happening was far more devastating then the hurtful drama. It was much better to have a relationship, or someone to run to, then to sit within the mundane of existence. Even an abusive and bad relationship was better than the one I had with my own self.
From that place – that lonely little girl ended up in relationship after relationship, brought children into the world, had job after job, party after party…only to find herself right back where she started. Hurt, lonely, and ashamed of herself.
There’s a light that lingers in each of us. A light which never goes out, which burns and flickers and sometimes ignites even further. By leaving so many relationships with people I love, of letting go of everyone as separate from myself, of releasing those lovers back to their own journeys and then returning back to the wholeness of my own creator, I give that lonely little girl a gift so powerful it will light up a universe. Luckily, that universe is mine and its here in the now to experience.
I invite all of you to give the little girl or boy inside of you the greatest gift possible. To choose happiness, to choose to love yourself beyond the way any other person can ever love you…to live each day from the fulfillment of knowing you are here to learn from all the suffering. Let’s rise from the darkness and look forward once again.
Love,
Nicole Ann
