I Am Grateful...

Not my usual kind of post, just some words gushed out onto a page to express how I feel.  Hope you all don't mind.

I need to say that this week I have been very grateful for faith, for balance, and for knowing who I am and why I am here.  It's funny how things pop up in our lives that shake us, attempting to throw us off course.  My grandmother died on Tuesday.  I was never really close to her, she always kept me at a distance, and that's okay.  I won't pretend to understand, but over the years I have grown acceptance for the fact that I was sometimes hers and sometimes not.  I was a child caught in the middle of deep feelings that I knew nothing about.  An innocent bystander lost in all of the emotion.

She is my father's mother, a beautiful woman in her day.  I have always loved how beautiful she was.  I have her eyes and delicately arched eyebrows.  I can bring a person to their knees with a twitch of a brow, one of my best and most secret skills.  I see pieces of her when I look in the mirror.  I loved her far more than I think she knew.

Watching her pass away bubbled up all sorts of things.  My father's passing came rushing at me again as if it had just happened.  Like someone tore open the scar that I have worked so meticulously to heal in just the right way.  I felt like I had been blindsided by a train of emotion that I was not prepared to face.  Lots of emotion, lots of confusion.  I cried through yoga on Tuesday night.  I laid in shavasana and wept for all of the emotion, confusion, and pain that I have felt over all these years.  How can a person be so shaken by someone who kept them at bay?  It's simple really; it's that I will never again get a chance to crack open her heart and attempt to squeeze my way in.  I am out...

As I said, gratitude.  Gratitude that I have faith in what is to come.  We all don't share the same measure of faith.  Some have faith far deeper than mine or theirs may manifest in a different light.  Faith is not to be compared, it is very personal, between you and God.  I am grateful for what faith I have, that I do not feel lost, that I feel I have a path to follow that heals.  I know my purpose, I know why I am here, and what I need to work toward.

I am grateful for balance.  I love the quote from The Sound Of Music: "When the Lord closes a door, somewhere He opens a window".  It is true.  Things happen, but God always gives us something to balance what we face.  One thing that teaches me balance every day is yoga.  Balancing when we aren't sure if we can.  It requires a certain measure of faith, a leap if you will, into a position that we sometimes doubt.  The balance that comes is growth, leaps of growth, confidence, and knowing that with balance comes wings.  We can fly.

As I deal with all of this emotion, I have learned to breathe.  My family has faced a tremendous amount of death over the last few years.  Many of those that are now gone were far too young to leave.

Deep cleansing breaths, blow out the emotion, breathe in balance, healing, and love.  

As I breathe I meditate. What can I heal?  What do I need to let go of?  Let it go...  The only way to really heal for me is to simply let go.  Easier said than done, but it can be done.  Balance.

One thing I will not let go of is that gratitude that I have felt over these difficult times.  Gratitude that I have loved, with my whole heart, holding nothing back.  Gratitude for faith that is unshaken in times of grief and sadness.  Gratitude for breath, and balance, and everything around me.

I am grateful...