It’s three am in the morning. I cannot sleep. Something wants to come out, and I let myself follow the urge, the need, to sit down with my computer, to let it out.
It’s the rediscovery of the Self. Of my Self.
Slowly, bits and pieces of me, left by the roadside, by myself, for one reason or another, are rediscovered. Like long lost friends, meeting up again after ten years, twenty, thirty… possibly even forty. I am that old. Forty three. Physical years. And there are bits and pieces of my Self, that I’ve left behind. Thinking I had to. Believing they were not ok. Not desired. Or desirable. Not wanted. By anyone.
Oh. My precious Self.
How misguided of me, to ever believe that any part of me, of my Self, didn’t have a place in my life.
Misguided. Innocently misguided. No judgement. Stating fact.
Holding no harshness within, as I rediscover my Self, piece by piece.
Tenderly, I hold myself, while reflecting on my Self. It’s the process of self-reflection.
Rediscovering my Self, while journeying within, inviting insights and discoveries.
Welcoming any and all. Welcoming back.
My long lost Self.
How precious you are.
And how my experience of life widens, expands, as I meet the world a fuller me. More whole.
Not because I was ever broken.
I do not believe human beings are ever broken. We just get lost underneath the trappings of shoulds, musts, wants. Huge parts of my Self got lost along the way. As the expectations of my surroundings – of my self, of what I should be, must be, would be – grew, the less of me shone through. Misguidedly thinking something else, something different, needs to come on top of that which is me, my Self.
And as I built the image of myself, slowly crafting a persona, parts of my Self got hidden, deep inside.
The process is like the rediscovery of a trunk full of photographs from generations passed, up in the attic. Dusty. Coated in spider-web. With that parched feeling to it, not having been replenished by the moisture and oil off the human skin, of hands gently caressing and passing photos along, to browse, to reflect, to revive, for eons. Always there. But forgotten, hidden away, not out of spite, but simply because box after box of stuff was put up in the attic. Making that precious trunk recede further and further into the background. A faded memory, like a photo slowly degrading from exposure to the sun…. fading, dissolving, disappearing.
A rediscovery of my Self.
Gently peeling away those externally or internally mandated layers, diminishing the light that is me. The light of the specific wavelength constituting my Self. Being expressed in the world distortedly. Through a filter. Many filters. Years of adding one filter upon another, fooling even myself into thinking what came out was my true wavelength. Thinking that’s the way I radiate in the world.
And now. Something completely different. As filter after filter is removed, the wavelength of my inner light shines a path ahead, guiding me towards more rediscovery of the Self. The Self that’s always been there. Waiting for me to reconnect. Oh, the joy of seeing the light radiate from within me, my inner light, my Self.
My long lost Self.
Welcome home.
I have missed you, and promise to take better care of you this time around. You are too precious to me ever to get lost again.
Having rediscovered how rich life is, meeting the world a fuller me, I look forward to explore and discover, to expand into that which is – as yet – unknown to me.
First published on my blog on January 9th, 2016: https://helenaroth.com/a-rediscovery-of-my-self/
Søren Lassen Andreasen – audio production
Olof Jennfors – soundtrack
Anders Roos – photography