When Transformation Changes Who You Are

When I look back to the person I was 10+ years ago it's as if I was another person. I can pull up thoughts, memories, and vague emotions from those times but, with the exception of my mothering moments, the memories are like an outline drawing without the intensity or color of the present. This isn’t true for all my memories, but in general, it is almost like watching a movie about someone else instead of remembering my own life. I have changed so much, and this is a good thing because those were very difficult times. I was suffering from depression and anxiety, trying to dig my way out but feeling like I was swimming in mud with all my clothes on and heavy boots laced to my knees. If I didn’t keep pushing, I would go under – or so it felt.

It came back to me because of a comment from my friend Megan. Well, she is my friend now, but at the time of her comment, we didn’t know each other very well, we had crossed paths here and there but now we were working together. About a month earlier, I had come on as the Executive Director of the agency where we worked and we were having our weekly check-in meeting.  She bounced into my office with her usual exuberance and said “I knew you before a long time ago, but you were a different woman.”

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Now, as someone who remembers many of my own past lives, and can often access other people’s past lives, this wasn't a completely unusual conversational topic, but it certainly wasn’t something I talked about in my current job! So, I paused and just said “Oh really, tell me more…”

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She said, “I used to be a pharmacy tech at Safeway about 15 years ago and you used to come in all the time only then you were blond, you had no light in your eyes, and your smile was only in your mouth.”

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Ooof. Ok, that is a different kind of past life. It was another part of this life, where I was such a different person. I saw her at the pharmacy because I was picking up medication for depression, and I didn’t recognize myself. I was lost, sad, and stuck. That is when I was still married, depressed, and anxious. She was right, I had lost my light, my sense of humor, and my confidence. It brought me back to that outline of myself during those difficult times.

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I laughed as a wave of compassion for my former self washed over me. “oh her, I said, yes, I was a different person then”. We talked about our joint memories. Megan is a mystical, magical woman who will always tell you exactly what is on her heart and mind. “I knew that I knew you, but it took me a while to recognize you because you are so different. I’m so glad you got your light back, I like this version of you much better!”

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I laughed again, filled with gratitude and joy, “Oh so do I!’

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I am so grateful for this journey and for finding the power of transformation and the ability to change and grow. I went home and found this picture and my old diary from just a little after that time. One of my favorite writings in that diary describes a day in my practice when I started to re-discover lost parts of myself. I wanted to share it with you.

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The Glittering Pool

I am in my sacred space, the sun is shining and God is there with me. I am sitting at the edge of the pool with my feet dangling in the warm water. It is my grief, this pool that was inky black yesterday but now, with the divine light shining on us, the water seems less threatening - less murky. 

I decide to really explore so, I dive in. Surprising to find it’s not so scary, this swim I have been avoiding for so long. The water feels welcoming, and I feel weightless, floating along, free of the weight that gravity and grief had given me. I swim as if I were a dolphin or a mermaid, with no need to come up for air. 

I want to explore the cracks and crevices of this place. The bottom of the pool is sparkly as if light were reflecting from above. I move closer to the shiny sand and pick up pieces of shell, iridescent pearls, luminous with their own light. I wonder, what are they doing here, incongruously, in this place? Then I realize, these are the pieces of me I have lost along the way. Dropped into my pool of grief, carried in the sack I drug around as if they weren’t a part of me. 

I am excited and grateful to remember these pieces and feel them like a lost limb that I might be able to re-attach. I look at each one in turn as its holographic image shimmers in the water - the dancer, the artist, the singer, the comedian, and I realize it is the colorful creative parts of myself I have dropped into this pool. 

It’s no wonder the pool seemed murky and dark, my life color had drained from me and mixed into black like washing a handful of paint brushes in a white sink, swirling the drain and mixing. I put them in my pocket. When I re-emerge from this pool I will plant them in my sacred garden and watch with wonder, to see what riotous colorful life blooms from them when spring finally follows this dark winter's night.