Make Peace With Your Path
Photo by Jack Skinner on Unsplash
Following the nudges of the Feminine in the face of the Masculine
At some point, I have to be okay with my life being so wildly unconventional. The feminine is too nonlinear, cyclical, free to be, to make any logical sense to the masculine. We need the structure and container of masculinity, there is no doubting that. And that’s where femininity and creativity can most thrive. Yet, this path will look different for everyone. It is not always the societally conditioned narrow, tunnel vision of a path of… going to four years of high school, graduating, going to four years of college, coming out with a degree, use that degree to work a job the next 50 or so years that may very well be lukewarm to the soul but you still show up and do until you die. Which includes, somewhere along the way, meeting someone that inevitably you get married to, buy a house with, and have kids with if you do so choose, or worse, if you’ve been told and conditioned to. Some people’s path will be this, authentically. But everyone’s? That doesn’t feel true. From mind, maybe. From soul, no.
My mom is an example of someone who took one of the most traditional and conventional paths, and my dad is an example of someone who voyaged the lesser so. I believe in some ways those path choices were authentic, and in others, they each played it safe. I’ve been influenced and impacted by both and I’m grateful I’ve seen both ways. It gave me choice. It gave me vision. It gave me insight. Some things that I’m so much more grateful for now, on the other side of terrifying life-changing decisions, than I ever was as a child or even a teenager. I look back now and see so clearly ways I’ve tried to do it both ways, tried to “make” pieces fit that didn’t, where I forced instead of flowed, where I trusted outside authority over my own inner voice and guidance system.
And quite honestly, I’m grieving a life I’ve come to know as of four years now, and part of it feels older than that even. Part of me that’s dying off actually feels ancient, from lifetimes before this one. The way I live now is as a continuation of my lineage in a way that actually honors and is best for me, and though it seems otherwise, it actually benefits my ancestors and my parents and my siblings all the same and just as much.
An archetype that is rearing its head to be seen and acknowledged is my mystic. A 40min divine appt I had yesterday showed in the form of a woman with fiery softened orange hair, piercing icy blue eyes, a beautiful sun kissed complexion and the home location of Massachusetts (<3), where she said
“I’ve never heard of anyone refer to themselves as a Mystic before”. Confirmation after confirmation. Hello, to the part of me that isn’t here to make sense to anyone other than me. And allowing that to be new, groundbreaking, unique, and evolutionary.
Only we can trust ourselves to make the best decisions for us. And I’ve never once regretted jumping off that cliff, taking that leap of fate, even if I doubted its accuracy in doing so. It may take a week(s), a month(s), a year(s) before I revisit an old place, job, person, relationship, timeline, before I really am clear on “Yeah, this wasn’t aligned anymore, and I made the right decision with the limited information I had to work with at the time”. The clarity of our no finally fully integrating.
This first came with my decision to go to UVM (first autonomous “adult” choice, that still had slight strings attached to my parents, I had in creating my path) next was an unexpected and equally confusing pivot to leave two years later, next was a decision to enter an energy medicine/personal transformation program in the healing and mystery arts that year, then came my decision to move across the country to live in California a year later, and most recently came the decision to move on from a job I was in for nearly two years steady building a career doing something I could have never previously even imagined doing/liking/being good at. What did these decisions have in common? I realized that, literally anyone — my mom, my dad, my mentor, my last supervisor/boss from my job prior — could build an entire career path just for me, a yellow brick road of one if you will, and there’s no guarantee I’d take it. And not from a place of self sabotage, but from of place of self confidence, values, and alignment. The reality is, big opportunities and possibilities will inevitably eventually present themselves, but are they in alignment with you and your values? And are you in your worth enough to turn down the offers that seem great but aren’t aligned? A path created for me wouldn’t ever be enough to satisfy and fulfill the beast inside of me, I soon realized. And it’s because I’m supposed to create my own. I go back to these “old” places and spaces and timelines and I feel relief and reassurance, knowing I made the right choice that ultimately honored me, my immense growth, my integrated lessons, and my passionate desires, even if at that time it wasn’t 100% clear. All this to say, do the thing that maybe scares you the most, and might even make the least “sense” to you and/or others, if it means it’s coming from a place much bigger and more powerful than you or I. This is about a return back to ourselves and our truth(s), in the face of uncertainty, doubt, fear, insecurity, projection. When you are finally you, you are free to live in your purpose. And with this, attracts just the right people, places, relationships, jobs and opportunities most aligned.
Making peace with my path is realizing how I couldn’t have done differently until I knew differently. I now release any residual guilt, regret, confusion, sadness and grief about how long it took me to get to where I am and know what I know about myself, and therefore, my path. That’s a crucial part of the process and the journey that can’t be skipped, gone around or avoided. We must lean into and move through it all to get to where we are going. We have to learn necessary lessons along the way before arriving wherever we are destined to go. So, drown out the outlying drama and noise, get quiet, still, and centered enough, to hear your own heartbeat. Then, even if it’s a shot in the dark, even if you must close your eyes, make your next move with your heart wide open. You may be surprised by what is on the other side.
