Goodbye
It’s time to say goodbye. Too many of those. To the point where it’s hard to care. It would be very easy to brush it aside but something inside tells me that this one could be a golden opportunity to notice something.
What is there to notice? So many things: our connection, what a difference she has made to me and to the rest of us with her creativity, her bursting energy and her bubbly presence, what a wonderful community we were able to build together, how she’s helped me attract other beautiful free spirits like herself, how much love and openness we get to offer each other, how meaningful and different is the reality that we get to create every week.
It seems that I made a big difference to her as well. She says “how am I going to be able to go on without this” and I’m so overwhelmed by how potently I’m experiencing the same kind of feeling: “will I be able to go on with class without her?
I think that as much as it seems impossible at the moment to imagine, we both know that we will go on. We have to. Nonetheless, we can use the fact that these questions feel almost too dramatic as a way into feeling how connected we are.
It catches me by surprise that I’m so saddened but when I stop to think about it, it makes sense that I’m surprised. Our society does not place a high value on connection and by losing touch with how connected we are we loose touch with our humaneness so it’s as if I’m surprised that I’m so human. It implies therefore that every time we stop to notice how connected we are, we get to reclaim a part of ourself and it is a triumph to the human spirit.
The lesson is that you matter! You don’t know how much you make a difference to people. You think that if you don’t show up nobody will notice but this is not true. Your presence makes a difference. Without you things are just not the same, That’s not because what you do, that’s because who you are. I want you to remember that (I certainly need a reminder). I want us to stop right now and take that in. Just take a moment to breathe, get into your body and say the words: “I matter”.
Every goodbye, every loss is an opportunity to notice what we’ve built with someone, We can stop and make room in our bodies to grieve this loss and know that things will never be the same without their physical presence. On the other hand, if you really think of it, all we really have of anyone is our perception of them and that is something that can never be taken away from us. In a way we get to keep each other forever.