My Way Home
June 2025 Edition
Last night, around 2 a.m.,
I woke from a dream I can’t recall,
but I felt emotionally heavy.
Half-asleep,
I sensed darkness curling around me.
I felt into it—was it fear or shame—
and recognized the density of shame.
Too tired for its stories,
I drifted back to sleep,
and my dreams became its stage.
In the morning,
I didn’t want to rise—
even here in Costa Rica,
where I feel so happy and at home.
In shame, there is no home.
I knew it was likely hormonal—
there was no moment or memory to work through.
Still,
I watched my inner child fold into a ball
against the feeling
and drift aimlessly inside me.
So I did the one thing I’ve learned to do:
I got out of bed.
Shame loves a passive victim.
There was no narrative to untangle—
only energy to meet.
My house requires stepping outdoors
to reach the kitchen.
Warm, humid air greeted me,
thick with the scent
of the tiny white blooms of the Jaboncillo (Soapberry) tree.
The aroma brought tears to my eyes.
Coffee in hand,
I moved to the back patio
and faced the jungle.
Butterflies—
slate-grey with white freckles,
lemon-yellow,
tiger-striped,
orange with thick blacklined wings—
flitted over the compost;
bees and hummingbirds, too.
The sound of the ocean’s gentle grumble
echoed in the distance.
Giant leaves of various trees,
in hues of brilliant green,
new since last month’s rains,
hung all around me.
“Be with me,” I whispered.
The darkness bucked,
hurling invented stories
to prove I am worthless.
I stayed neutral—
it felt like walking through a fun house of distorted mirrors
and not believing any of the reflections.
I refused each one.
I remembered the woman I once was—how the dark lived inside me then, unrelenting.
How I unknowingly reinforced it.
How I mistook it for truth.
How I made a home in it, not knowing there was another way.
I thought about how I now spend my time tending to the light instead.
Abuse had made me accustomed to shame,
but devotion brought me into relationship with love.
This ongoing reminder:
I am not separate from anything.
I belong wherever I am,
as a child of both the Divine and the Earth.
I inhaled,
acknowledged my aching heart,
and faced the voice.
“I don’t believe you,” I said.
Energy crackled through my toes,
my crown—
earth and sky reverberating with my shift.
“I’ve heard all this before,” I added.
“Tell me something new.”
Shame laughed, hollow.
“I’ve got nothing.”
“Then piss off,” I whispered.
My mind went silent
as shame fell off its stool,
like an overserved patron at a bar.
I turned to my journal
and began to write.
Then I went to the ocean
and surfed
until my body released
any remnants of my morning visitor.
And the next morning,
I woke to shame again.
So I sat with the jungle once more,
a cup of coffee,
and my heart.
I grieved for the part of me
that still carries the belief
that she is bad.
And shame moved on.
This is why I return—
to my breath,
the waves,
the trees,
my journal,
and my body.
To my own heart.
Because the world will try to make you forget—
but life is full of ways to help you remember.
I share this with you
because we can’t afford to forget.
Everything depends
on remembering
that we are light.
Share the Love ❤️
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SOUL ECHOES
Is there a part of you that carries the belief that you are “bad” or unworthy? Can you sit with them gently and offer them loving presence?
What are ways you tend to your light?
What brings you closer to love when it feels far away?
This is an invitation to explore with curiosity.
Trust what comes.
The soul speaks speaks first, before the mind rushes in to make sense of it.
