As we awaken from isolation, there is a parting of the mind and heart from thoughts and patterns that we thought once made us whole.
We functioned in relationship in ways which we identified since early childhood.
The pandemic changed all that.
It ignited a sense of fragmentation that many of us had not experienced since coming out of the womb.
Reintegrating after a personal and collective trauma has its challenges.
Relationships are struggling through major shifts as we awaken.
Many do not recognize the glue that held those relationships intact, searching for remnants of who they were in that relationship and how to now identify the other.
Our containers for understanding the meaning of relationship have cracked, and we are being compelled to create new definitions.
This is leading to power struggles – some so intense that they are surprising people sharing their stories with me.
Who is this person they have shared their life with for so long?
Who have they themselves become?
We are being asked to create a new vessel.
A new vessel of understanding, compassion, and communication.
We do not have to figure all of this out now.
Most of us are actually trying to rush the process, trying to integrate the new realities so that life can get back to “normal”.
How can we when we are just entering this new world and relearning emotional and psychological patterns of being?
Bearing witness to self is a gentle and slow process. Bearing witness to another in relationship is even more complex and requires patience.
We are all functioning at different levels and our nervous systems are still adjusting and becoming reacquainted with survival mechanisms.
The person we are in relationship with is in the same space we are; integrating and awakening without yet recognizing all the tools at their disposal.
Fear and anger is triggered as we scramble to create an identity which makes us feel safe again.
The isolation challenged that notion of inner safety.
Power struggles with yourself and with those closest to us will not make us feel any safer nor help us find ourselves again.
Your inner safety will reveal itself in time.
Once it does, you will be offered new tools to be in relationship.
I just ask you to open your hearts and your minds to be more patient with yourself and those you love than you have ever been before.