Some of the hardest, most painful experiences of my life have been the most important things I’ve moved through.
And they have sucked. Royally. All the way through.
Both these things are true.
Pain can break us down. It can leave us gasping and sobbing on the living room floor (this was actually me on Friday). It does not feel good.
AND... there is an opportunity within every single hardship we face.
We can't expect ourselves to maintain perfect perspective and composure as we move through our deepest wounds.
What we can do — what actually can help us in the moment — is to dive fully into our feelings, and give ourselves grace as we do what we need to do to get to the other side.
We can remind ourselves, as we break through the fog and deep ache, that nothing is truly permanent.
This pain, though it cracks through your chest like a saw blade and burns your bones like wildfire, is temporary. Even when it doesn't feel like it.
And yes. It feels absolutely terrible.
It tears us open and turns us inside out. It tries to convince us we will never feel okay again.
What I've found is: when we let ourselves feel our pain, it never lasts forever. It moves quicker when we allow it to.
I am not here to tell you that it will easy. I am here to tell you that there is more to be experienced beyond the pain.
Every ounce of pain you feel, every tear you shed, every heavy burden you allow yourself to drop from your shoulders creates a new opening for you.
Your pain is not the end point. It is the very beginning. The birth, the rebirth, the crucial change point that leads you into the next new and beautiful chapter in your life.
If you think that pain is all to be found there, if you hold it in and shut it down, if you avoid it, wall it off and never go back to that place again — you never allow yourself to find what lies beyond it.
Pain is not the end. It is the opening, the activator and the initiation. It is the indicator that you have unlocked a door and gained access to something new and precious along your journey — an important gift you hold within.
Every wound is a sacred opening into your inner being.
When you allow yourself to dive in deep, to move through the dark and uncomfortable places and face what you thought was impossible, you actually find what you've been seeking.
You’ve been carrying these gifts within you all along, just behind the walls you erected in an attempt to avoid this deep and holy pain.
In honoring and feeling every ounce of our pain, in moving through it instead of closing off or turning away, we walk through the holy fires of initiation.
Initiation into our true self. Initiation into deeper purpose, understanding, and soul-level activation. Initiation into a higher state of being, of doing, of living, of seeing.
Pain is the portal into all we've been seeking, if we allow it to be.
It is not easy. At all.
It is not meant to be.
And when you allow yourself to lean into this initiation, to surrender to the process and face everything you've held within and around you, you transform inherently.
This is the deepest form of alchemy. There are no words to describe it adequately.
In allowing yourself to feel it, your pain expertly guides you through the deepest of transformations.
This leads you home to yourself. To the gift and divine, sovereign beauty you are and always have been.
To get there, to share all that you are and live out your blessed purpose, you must first give in to this sacred process. And allow it to be exactly what it is — messy, uncomfortable, agonizing, terrifying, freeing, vulnerable.
It will be hard. You may feel like you're breaking in two. And I promise, it will be temporary.
It is safe to feel it. It is safe to heal. If you are being called back there now, it is time.
Love yourself enough to dive back in. Give tenderness to what you see. In doing so, you activate the deep and sacred remembrance held in your bones.
Pain can be terrifying. It is also the key to you.