When your mother lies to you, about you

The most powerful part of you?

The most brilliant?

The most compelling?

The most talented?

Those are the parts your mother told you (and may still tell you) are the worst. The parts you need to hide, To be ashamed of.

And they are the exact parts you need to do whatever it is you came here to do.

~~~

Years ago, when I was in my 20s, a woman who was probably the age I am now said, "I wasn't truly free until my mother died."

And 10 years ago when my father died, I had the thought: the wrong parent died.

The other day, a woman whom I know and love, who's mother died the previous week, told me that a distant female relative whom she hadn't seen in 30 years showed up at the funeral for one reason: to tell her that she was finally free.

And it broke my heart because she didn't know she was free before. She didn't see what I and so many others see. Her power, her brilliance, her compelling-ness , her talent . That she is the best thing that ever happened to this world.

~~~

It's hard when your mother lies to you about you.

When you hold yourself back from the things you really want because your mother looks at you a certain way or says certain things in a certain tone of voice.

And it eats away at you until there's nothing left except what she couldn't consume and so she spit it out.

And then you beat yourself up because you think you should know better and be "over it."

Because you think you weren't strong enough to stand up to her.

Because it was "just" words and tones of voice and looks, right?

You are free now. Whether she's dead or alive.

Don't wait to claim it.

Much, much love,

Karen