There are times in life when we get pricked by something painful that demands our attention. It lodges into our conscience and jabs at our sense of self.
Losing your job. A relationship ending. An injury. A financial loss. A car accident. A heartbreak. A missed opportunity.
These things are tough. They hurt. I get a pit in my stomach just imagining them. But here is the good news. Whatever the source of pain, this event or state is something that your innate essence will eventually recognize as foreign - not a part of you, but something you are merely experiencing. Something that is temporarily making itself known and crowding your head and heart space. But it's not attached to you or able to control you (without your permission, that is). And, like a splinter that your body identifies as something that does not belong, this state will eventually be pushed out. It will be expelled, because it's too small - too unfamiliar - too separate from the true you. Your essence knows that splinter is unwelcomed and, as such, it won't be able to stay for long.
I've also learned that relationships, jobs, and situations that once felt a part of us - a natural, integrated component of our lives - can transform into splinters. Suddenly, seemingly overnight, they don't belong. And our minds, bodies, and the Universe that we are remnants of, will start to make an effort to excrete them. Sometimes, we are the captains of that release and it's our own conscious choice. Other times, the Universe plucks out the splinter before we are ready to let go. And it hurts. It feels like something was done to us. We feel slighted, abused, unlucky, and victimized. Perhaps you go through the "should-have-saw-it-coming" blame game, or let the extraction prove a limiting belief you have or become a reason to give up and play small.
Let me offer a REFRAME a friend shared that really helped me. What if instead of seeing the extraction as something being done to you, you instead saw it as something that was being done for you? Not as a burden or a slight, but as a favor. A deed granted on your behalf, bestowed by something greater than you - greater than what your mind and current situation could have informed you of.
Like a vestigial organ that once served us in a past life, but no longer has a purpose for our new, evolved selves, we must learn to let go. Are you resisting the shedding of an old layer? Are you holding onto something that once felt familiar and comfortable, but no longer serves you? Let the natural tendencies of your body and mind guide you towards lightening your load and realigning with what is resonant with your intrinsic nature.
As the definition goes, if we can see life's splinters as:
- part of something larger (bigger than our egos and our ideas of how things should go)
- a foreign body (separate from our purest selves and removable)
...we'll be better equipped to treat them with compassion and gratitude, and move about the world with an understanding that they are purposeful and temporary.
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