It's Saturday morning. Rain hammers my window on the wet coast. Wind tears through the trees. A bald eagle hovers outside, suspended in the storm, completely still in the chaos.
I'm feeling my wound extra big this week.
My biggest wound is that I'm never enough. That no matter what I do, I'll never be enough.
I've done the work around this. Years of it. I've invested every dollar I've ever made into my own healing. Not counting, but if I'd kept all that money, I'd have enough for a down payment on a nice farmhouse on a small island off the coast of British Columbia. In another timeline, I'm living a pleasurable, blissful life, ignorant to this version that seems to have taken on the work of a few lifetimes—plus my lineage.
I've encouraged that little boy in me to pursue his truth, his sense of life and adventure.
And so, he's lived a hell of a life.
So many jobs. So many relationships. So many retreats. So many ayahuasca ceremonies and vipassana sits. So many teachers. So many places lived. So many connections earned. And lost. So many identities gained and shed. So much shadow work. Mix in an NDE and a couple decades of tussles with his own psyche, and you get a man trying to reclaim autonomy over his own life.
Trying to break free of a burden he didn't shackle himself with, but one he's made his sole goal to break free of.
And then sharing with others the best pieces of whatever he's learned along the way.
All of it trying to find his rapture. Then sharing it so others may find theirs.
In Human Design, I'm a 3/5. The Great Experimenter. The one who does and tries everything, who learns through no other means but his own failures. And then shares the lessons from those failures.
I've made good progress on that journey of finding self-worth within myself.
And still, on some days, that old wound comes back.
Stronger than ever.
"You're not worth it," he says.
"Who could love you? Who would love you?" he berates me.
Who is this boy who still comes alive, after all the work I've done with him? Haven't I eased him enough?
And then, I realize...
I betrayed him yet again.
Last week, I had a rupture in my relationship. First big one in a while. It took us down - not all the way, but deep enough to feel the ground shift beneath us.
And in the aftermath, sitting with my thoughts for the first time in weeks, I saw it clearly:
I gave my worth away to the relationship.
I forgot to check in with myself. I forgot to use the practices I have - the ones that bring me back to him, to that little boy, to me. The practices that let me pour from a full cup instead of scraping the bottom, trying to give what I don't have.
In relating with another...
In my pursuit of a more perfect union this time...
In my quest to finally find my salvation in someone...
I lost him. Again.
I got captured in someone else's rapture instead of staying in mine. Again.
Sound familiar?
This is the pattern. The one I see in myself. The one you might see in you. In every person who's been taught that love means disappearing into another person. That devotion means abandoning yourself at the altar of connection.
But here's what I'm learning, over and over, through every relationship, every rupture, every return:
It's a practice to continuously remember who you are.
Not once. Not after you "do the work." Not when you finally heal that wound for good.
Continuously. Daily. Moment by moment.
So what does that actually look like?
It looks like pausing before you say yes to plans you don't want. It looks like feeling the contraction in your chest when you're about to abandon yourself - and stopping. It looks like morning time alone, even when she's reaching for you. It looks like returning to the practices that ground you in your body, your breath, your own rapture - not because you're selfish, but because without them, you have nothing real to give.
It looks like catching yourself mid-betrayal and turning back toward yourself with the same tenderness you'd offer her.
The eagle outside my window isn't fighting the storm. He's not trying to prove he can handle the wind. He's just hovering - still, present, completely himself in the middle of the chaos.
That's the practice.
Not perfection. Not finally healing the wound so it never comes back.
Just returning. Again and again.
To yourself.
To your rapture.
To the little boy who's been waiting for you to remember him.
Every connection with another is another chance to practice this return. Every rupture is a reminder. Every time you feel that old wound flare up - I'm not enough, who could love me - that's not failure.
That's the invitation.
Come back to yourself first.
And from there, love becomes something different. Not salvation. Not completion. Not the thing that finally makes you enough.
Just two people, each in their own rapture, choosing to share it.
What are you abandoning yourself for right now? Where did you forget to return?
Ish
P.S. I have 1 final spot with work with a man or woman for the rest of this year. If you have followed my work for a while, I invite you to go to my page and take a look and see if there's something that resonates.
Do you want to show up more authentically?
Do you want to love and be deeper more openly?
Do you want to learn how to lean into life deeper?
If you give me six months, I can help you.
But only if you are ready to help yourself.
