There Is No Period at the End of the Sentence

And oh, how I wish it weren’t so.

I have done so much deep personal growth work for a gazillion years. As a therapist and then a life coach, I have always placed huge value on “walking my talk.” Knowing that I can only lead people to where I myself have gone.

My mission has always been to be a way-shower. To be authentic. To be a leader. And, above all, to spread love. To embody love.

I have played in so many different types of waters in the name of experimentation in the healing realms.

Just these past few years, I have worked with some very unique energy workers. One sprinkled rose petals on the white clothes I was instructed to wear while gently brushing me with baby’s breath. At the end of our session, I released the rose petals into a local river. All the while, the practitioner chanted healing mantras (I hope!) in a language I had never heard before, but that sounded so beautiful to my untrained ear.

I have received acupuncture that led to huge bruises on my back. I have held stones in my hands. I have buried needles that were used on me, believing they carried a ghost that had taken up residence, uninvited, in my energy field.

I have sat with therapists and coaches and priests and doctors. I have sat in the rooms of Al-Anon.

I have lived in the woods. Gone to a clothing-optional healing center (Esalen!). Meditated on retreats where I sat with Bhantes. Taken yoga with a man from India who was over 100 years old (and who yelled at me the entire class!). Taken endless courses on shame.

The list goes on and on.

I studied psychology and social work, with an emphasis on drug and alcohol addiction. I completed an 18-month postgraduate program at the Gestalt Institute of Cleveland. I completed coaching training and certification, as well as a ten-month leadership training program.

And yet, here I am. Again.

Sitting with my wounds wide open these past two days, with my therapist so poignantly saying this morning that I have these “trauma landmines” that visit me so powerfully and unexpectedly.

I love this metaphor. In these “landmine” moments, I just want to scream.

To attack. To spit out venom. And yet I have learned not to do that. To sit. To be. To marinate. To feel all these horribly painful, uncomfortable feels.

I just want the landmines to go away. I want that period at the end of a sentence. I want the work to be done. I want there to be a finish line. I want to be less weary and leery.

And yet, here we are. Here I am.

I was traumatized as a child. It all looked so perfect on the outside, and yet was so terrifically painful and shameful on the inside.

I did escape at the ripe age of 14 through alcohol. And then pot. And then relationships. And then a combo of all three.

And somehow, I survived. And at moments, I thrived. And I did learn healthy alternatives for how to grieve.

But trauma doesn’t go away. It shapes us.

I can intellectualize it. Spiritualize it. And yet the truth is, it’s there.

Rearing its head when it needs tending to. Beckoning for a pause. Extra doses of love. And rest.

I believe the real invitation is allowing acceptance to reign.

Coming to the conclusion that my landmine field may never be completely clear. That I will step on these mines from time to time. Especially when I am feeling tired and vulnerable.

And that it’s okay. The ongoing sentence has become simpler over the years. And it does quiet down much more quickly now, often after a day or so.

The sentences aren’t as loud. The work I have done has been fruitful. But I believe the landmines will lose their intensity, despite still being there, when I allow another layer of acceptance to reign.

Maybe there is no period at the end of the sentence. Maybe there is simply a comma. A pause. A breath. And then another sentence.

And perhaps this is what I am learning.

What if the places in us that still hurt aren’t evidence that we have failed at healing? What if they aren’t proof that we haven’t done enough work? What if, instead, they are simply the places that still need our tenderness?

Maybe you have your own trauma landmines. Maybe you know exactly where they are. Maybe you thought you had dealt with them years ago, only to unexpectedly step on one again. Maybe something happened this week, yesterday, or even this morning that sent you right back to a place you thought you had outgrown.

I know that feeling. And maybe what I’m learning is that I don’t have to figure it all out today. I don’t have to turn it into a lesson. I don’t have to spiritualize it or intellectualize it or make it okay. I can simply notice.

Pause. Breathe. Feel.

And perhaps offer myself the very thing I have spent so many years offering others: Love.

Maybe healing isn’t about getting to the place where there are no more landmines. Maybe healing is learning how to walk through the field with a little more awareness, a little more compassion, and a whole lot more love for the person who is walking it.

There may never be a period at the end of the sentence. And maybe that’s okay.

Maybe the comma is enough.