No victims & no villains

Previously posted on TinyLetter

Because a few of you reached out – with genuine curiosity – here is what my brain and fingers composed at 30,000 feet high. A reflection of sorts to comb out the tangles that felt tangible over the past few days…

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Would it be too dramatic to label this feeling as leper-like? Don’t touch. Don’t make eye contact. Is this a projection or deep insecurity? I guess I didn’t quite know how I would feel. So, I walked in a spirit of confidence and head held straight but not high. I recognized quickly that, in fact, no, the tide has shifted. The sands were not going to hold my footing, even if I tried.

But still, I tried. I drank and smiled to quiet the insecurities that wanted to override the confidence I arrived with. I connected the dots of reality and I began to swallow. I swallowed that my decade-long friendships are not what they used to be. That what I would have hoped to be a honey-sweet reunion is not that. Not honey but silence like stone was met by some. Painful, awkward, weird, silence. I pushed on.

Look, here’s what I know: Perhaps the perception, for them, is that I did a bad thing to them personally. A bad thing makes a bad person. But what I know is on the other side of that coin, I unleashed this very unsaid thing that many people felt suffocated by. There are some of us who needed that freedom and processing. Some still do. And I guess I was willing to be the one to light the match and burn the bridges to these friendships.

So maybe I shouldn’t be so gut-punched shocked that it felt so alienating. No victims and no villains but a disruptor. Hand up in confession: always been one. I guess with time, that hole I helped create was much more of a chasm or wound than I imagined it would be. Call it naivety.

What do I do? Mourn that part of my life? Wish it well, finalize the chapter, and close the book? Because here’s the deal … I won’t receive the closure I would hope for. While I would hope for conversations and understandings, that theoretical ship has sailed. I’ve come to my own little fork in the road that calls for a choice to move forward without expectation.

I told my therapist the other day that it is really hard and stupid to be self-aware. It means I have to act. The things said in and with knowing conviction still did not stop the bridges from burning. And I have needed to be at peace with that. However painful it was and felt this past weekend.

There is this Buddhist prayer that has guided me recently. It is a meditation called Lovingkindness. This particular little prayer/meditation can be used toward yourself and others. So, I will use these words as my grieving step stones as I move on, without expectation, but with gratitude toward what was:

“May you feel safe. May you feel content. May you feel strong. May you live with ease.”

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xo bre