The Strong One

After 40 years of helping people face themselves, a retired psychiatrist said something to me that I’m still sitting with:

“You taught me more about self-empathy this week than I learned in my career.”

That sentence flipped my world upside down these last few weeks. Because the truth underneath it was that I had only recently started looking at: I have been overgiving with my empathy. Especially the ones who hurt me in the most painful ways.

I have let go, forgiven, loved, and released the pain of each one of them because I can see their inner world — where the darkness eats them alive. I can see their childhood trauma, their selfishness, their desire to keep their behind-the-scenes hidden. I see through the anger, the lies, the betrayal, because I know it all so intimately.

But I had very rarely given that same empathy to myself.

"You're so brave."

For much of my life, I’ve been the strong one. Scared but doing it anyway. I’ve been told how brave I am, how courageously I must live, and how amazing it is that I’ve survived everything that’s happened.

A new friend told me recently she was blown away by how much darkness I’ve endured and how I don’t wear it that way. That she was surprised because I don’t use it for sympathy or leverage.

But there’s a cost to that kind of strength. I’ve lived much of my life being blamed for things I’ve never done, being rejected before I step into a room, and being told I am something other than myself. That's not to say I haven't done my fair share of hurting people. I'm the first to admit when I do… especially when someone is willing to share when I do it unconsciously. Yet a conscious conversation has never ended in defeat when both parties are willing to look at the truth.

My mind has been taking me back to my wholehelluvalotsness a lot lately — especially when yet another “friend” breaks up with me via text, saying they can’t share why and aren’t interested in a conversation about it. The discomfort of not knowing, while also knowing they would have just ghosted me if I hadn’t asked outright.

Consciousness comes with a price. Waking up to the reality you weren’t interested in facing takes guts. It’s much easier to stay in our little bubbles than to face the unconscious. And so few are willing to fully own that they have a side of the story that may not be reality.

“In the myths, the shadow is represented as the monster that has to be overcome, the dragon. It is the dark thing that comes up from the abyss and confronts you the minute you begin moving down into the unconscious. It is the thing that scares you so you don’t want to go back down there.” — Joseph Campbell, Pathways to Bliss

The Love Scene That Broke Me Open

I found myself at the Mythos retreat in Italy recently — a shadow work retreat led by Dominique Sire & Carlotta Mastrojanni where we were guided through the darkness into our whole selves. The assignment: perform a monologue or dialogue from a play or movie that would allow us to practice a part of ourselves that wasn’t our usual way of being.

The ensuing days showed us how to physically connect our shadows, embodying the darkness, and not being trapped by it. I was able to see where it was easy for me to sit in the darkness. It was easy for me to embody the shadow because I have been so intimate with it. The part that was the hardest: being gentle, soft, and tender… with myself.

My final piece was a love scene. The man tells me he doesn’t want to hurt me. And I have to tell him that he will hurt me. And I will hurt him. Because we’re human. And I’ll have to hold onto my love for him for when that happens. Because love cannot be destroyed or undone.

My heart broke giving that monologue. Because right before I gave it, the 11 people at the retreat cradled me in their collective arms, whispered their love for me, and then lifted me high in the air. It was nothing like I had ever experienced and broke down every wall I still had up.

As I did the scene, I pictured the love of my own life on the actor’s face –– a man I have shown more empathy than anyone else on the planet. And something bigger than I ever believed possible cracked open inside me.

I realized I had been giving empathy to everyone in my life — even the ones who had torn me apart — while withholding it from the one person who needed it most.

Me.