The most private places of my heart and soul are hidden, even to me.
Emotional Tsunamis
Then an unexpected emotional tsunami provides a window offering full view of the lingering demons hidden in the recesses of what Carl Yung calls my “unconscious. Enormous enlightenment nearly always results from these brief window openings. The problem is, even more enormous emotional pain is also part of the process. In fact, the pain may be necessary for life-altering growth.
I know this to be true. I am on the backend of such a viewing. I don’t like it. The pain is hard to handle, but I have no choice. Fortunately (or not) I feel the window closing. These “soul windows” are radically infrequent—like only one or two per decade or so—and remain open for a very brief period of time.
Relationships are Fragile
It all began rather innocently. I was in a text conversation with a friend while in another country when some comment was misinterpreted, only to be further misinterpreted in an effort to clarify. The result was nearly a total dissolution of the friendship. (NOTE TO SELF: NEVER discuss emotions by text!) (NOTE TO READER: All is fine now, but only as a result of conversation.)
An emotional tsunami took ground two times within a couple weeks, the window opened and an onslaught of forgotten childhood emotions arose, like it or not. Emotions that nearly handicapped me into a morose state of emotional despair. I think that is the reason these windows remain closed. We absolutely cannot function living in the presence of such vivid and raw feelings. Effin ugh!!
Again???
The second tsunami occurred when I said three moderately innocent words to a young family member, “Don’t lecture me.” I evidently pushed a button in this person that resulted in a kind of, “F.U. I never want to see you again, keep out of my life—for good.” Whoa!
My window was still partially open from my recent experience and so the new experience found its way into those “demon-filled recesses” of my soul, or unconscious. Fortunately, the pain was not so great at the second wave. I was already raw to the bone. But, it is sad.
Hmm… life is tender.
So… What Did I Learn
I could go on but I choose, for your sake, not to. Instead, I’d like to contemplate some of my key learnings from the window opening.
- Relationship with others is fragile. The tiniest of faux pas’s can destroy, forever, relationships old and new. I find it shocking when I think of family members with decades of love to be torn apart by one act of bullshit. Obviously, there were also decades of undealt-with anger or frustration or pain.
- Relationship with myself is fragile. In a book I am working on I refer a lot to our “memory mansions,” filled entirely with every memory we have ever had. Many of the rooms in our mansions are open for immediate access. Some rooms are locked because we simply make a conscious choice “not to go there.” And then there are the “hidden or secret rooms” that we don’t even remember… until an emotional tsunami.
- I am a decidedly different person than I was before the opening. Hopefully wiser and certainly more informed about myself and other people. I have even more clarity of my inner longings and needs, as well as a more informed temperament considering the pains and fragilities of other people.
- I HATE windows to the soul! But, they may be the best of all routes to intense personal growth.
Windows to Your Soul
Often Reveal More than You Want to Know
Photo courtesy of grinvalds at istockphoto
