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Walking in Old Wounds

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Here I am again,
holding space for the palpitating panic that I’m experiencing.
Giving it the space to roam free.
A safe, embracing, loving space
of not trying to fix it.
A shaky space of unknowing.

The need to fix, to help,
to soothe, to solve,
taps into my deepest struggle of a core wound.
It still comes up, especially in the role I find myself in.

Somedays I feel like life is playing one big cosmic joke on me.
The joke of putting me front and centre in the fire of my biggest struggle.
Making me face it again again until it’s accepted, healed, dissolved, seen through, felt fully….
I don’t know what, all of the above and more probably!

The need to fix so as not to feel this burning,
this sense of helplessness,
the uncomfortable,
unbearable pain and heartbreak.
The deep feeling for another’s struggle.
My need to fix is my escape,
an escape which solves nothing,
certainly not permanently.

But can I walk my talk?
Can I hold space for this?
Can I let myself fall into this burning,
into my own heartache?
Can I let go of this escape route?

Yes.

Because what is the alternative?
Perpetuating this unhealthy old conditioning of ‘needing to rescue’.
This option isn’t available to me anymore.
I see the futility of it again and again,
I see the dead end and the falseness of it.
No-one is anothers rescuer,
life doesn’t work like that.

I’m not talking about being cold and hard and not feeling deeply for others pain and suffering.
I’m talking about seeing that I cannot fix it.
I can hold space for it, but I cannot get rid of it.
That the real power, the real truth is in letting them see that they too can handle it.
All of it.
That no-one can fix anything for them.
No-one is responsible for their salvation.

All I can do is respect and honour the journey that they must and can walk for themselves.

This is the only sane response to life.
To love, but to let go.
To support, but not fix.

Can I be ‘the bad guy’, the one that doesn’t come charging in with all the solutions and stop the suffering?
Can I stand in my burning uncomfortableness and heartbreak because I know in my heart my ‘need to fix’ is mine, not theirs.

I am no-ones savour,
I don’t have solutions,
I don’t have the answers.
I am just here,
burning in my own fire.
Trusting.
Trusting that life has a plan,
That life embraces all of these struggles.

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This Post Has 2 Comments

  1. PETER A HENDRICKSON

    i too have a need to rescue, to fix others, and yousay its stems from a chilhood wound. I am interested in what that may be for you and for me

  2. PETER A HENDRICKSON

    My son took his own life last week, he was 25. I am struggling like ur poem said, over the years i try to rescue him, help him, give him desperate advice tha he didnt take. Your poem helps, i struggle with over care taking being over responsible for my adult children, causing me excruciating pain, my son dying so violently taking his life, thank u for ur poem, my son was in a lot of pain, thank ufor ur poem, im sorry you get the pain still, i can relate the pain u describe is what i get