Remembering Who We Are

The pictures of precious babies cover the walls of my office. I ask the women gathered together for the workshop to close their eyes and give them the suggestion to use their breath to bring their awareness into the room.

"Whatever needs to join you at this time invite into this space," I whisper. I watch their faces and their breath and their bodies respond to the suggestion. Softly I say, "Gather to you anything now that needs to join you in the workshop." After a few moments and more gentle prompts I say, "Now, open your eyes just slightly. Soft eyes. Look at each of the pictures."

I observe their expressions as they look at each of the seven images. I remind them that each one of them was born precious and valuable and innocent just as these babies were.

They have forgotten who they were born as. As they look at the pictures the women offer words to me to describe babies and young children. They shout, "Magical, uncensored, honest, inquisitive, needy, sweet smelling, spontaneous, enthusiastic, excited, unmarred and loving." I know as they speak that they don't believe these things about themselves now. They have lost these beliefs. Life's struggles and sorrows have given them other beliefs. Ideas that they aren't good enough, that life is scary, that people will always leave them and that they don't matter.

The masks are firmly in place to keep the world out and the child they were born as retreats further and further within. She pulls the layers over her so no one can hurt her or ridicule her or tell her that her body isn't good enough. The younger women fight from behind their shields of anger, the older ones just close their eyes and press their lips tighter together. Either way the feelings are too much.

I ask them to wake up, to reach in and pull that sweet self into their arms. Some fight harder when they realize that they will have to excavate years of pain to find the treasure. Others just sink deeper into the sleep of denial.

A brave few will heed the call. When I ask them to stand before the pain and touch it they do. They scream, they push, they speak, they weep and they release. They bring the shame up and out of their bodies. The unacknowledged places within are accepted. The darkest secrets are spoken. The wounds tended.

Slowly and gradually the child emerges.

What have you forgotten?
What lies buried deep within you?

A suggestion for deeper work:
Find some pictures of yourself as an innocent young child or baby. If you can't find any pictures go through magazines and tear out pictures that would symbolize who you believe you were as a very young child or baby. Now, in your journal write words that describe this precious little one. When you have your list reflect on ways that you can invite these qualities back into your life. Do some visual journaling around these attributes and commit, if you like, to three things you can do in the following week to bring these characteristics into your day.