Rebirth of Samhain

            Samhain, not surprisingly I suppose, has been the most magical experience I have had yet.  Also, one of the most difficult that I have had this year.  I started this journey somewhat out of desperation.  Somewhat out of finding and linking together parts of myself I had lost ages ago.  Samhain has stripped me raw and naked and said what are you going to do now.  It placed me at the bottom of the staircase and said you have no choice but go back and get in your prison cell or walk up the stairs just as you are walking into that light.  You know damn well everyone is up there waiting.  You will be seen.  Some of those people will root for you, some will worship your courage, some will beat you down and call you names for daring to enter this space naked.  Though you know you have no choice, you know that your soul is telling you to live free, you must take those steps to feel bliss, the staircase needs to be braved, and you must stand raw and real in that arena.  You don’t need to prove to anyone why! You don’t need to scream “you don’t understand I had no choice I was a victim down there.”  You weren’t you were down there because you told yourself a long time ago it’s where you were meant to be, all you were worthy of.  You didn’t have the beauty, the body, the wisdom, the intelligence, the social skills, the energy, the motivation, the confidence that you needed to have so much vulnerability to stand in that arena and truly shine.   

            Samhain is an ancient Celtic festival that gave origin to modern Halloween and Day of the Dead.   The festival occurs on October 31 – November 1.  The celts believed that the realm between the living and the dead would cross and that demons and spirits could be free to roam the earth on this night.  Samhain was a liminal or threshold festival much like Beltane. Samhain is pronounced _” sow- in “and comes from the Gaelic word meaning summers end as it marks the end of summer and start of winter.  In tradition the holiday is celebrated by creating an altar with symbols of fallen loved ones to create communion with their ancestral spirits.  A feast is had to honor and celebrate the halfway point between the fall and winter equinox.  Fire was a great symbol of the holiday used to burn away aspects that would not serve in the new year.  Samhain is often referred to as the witch’s new year and the start of the next year cycle where it is more potent for starting new things and rebirthing new aspects of yourself.  The veil being so thin currently gives way to the concept of death and rebirth.  Death meaning the tearing/ burning away of the old behaviors, patterns, and habits that no longer serve as you enter the brand-new cycle and can be reborn into a wiser and more aligned version of oneself.

            During this time, I took a trip with my mother to the NKOTB cruise, and it would change things drastically for me in my mind.  A trip I almost didn’t go on.  I felt so much guilt for taking this trip.  Money and finances weren’t in the best place maybe I shouldn’t have, but it would turn out to be a crucial point in my healing journey.  On that boat I was confident, felt alive, felt like life had been restored and I was just able to breathe and live for a moment. Not to survive but truly live.  I met a woman at the sail away party just so social and friendly.  She spoke as though she had known me for a lifetime.  We took a selfie and lived side by side in that moment.  This woman would tragically go on to lose her life on this cruise.  I couldn’t shake this feeling.  The feeling of how short life truly is.  The feeling that tomorrow could be it.  You never truly know.  You hear this on every cheesy affirmation card in existence.  Seize the day! live each moment like it’s your last!  There comes a time in life though where the message of that truly sinks in.  It doesn’t sound so cheesy anymore, suddenly it’s a realization and the brain start to think what am I?  Who am I?  What do I want my life to look like?  If today was truly my last, what would I think about how I chose to spend my days? So started the theme of the last month for me of Death and Rebirth.  I was determined to birth the version of me that I wanted to be.  I was feeling renewed and inspired like the world was at my fingertips.   I finally felt like I had everything I needed for success.  I don’t have everything I’d ever want in life but that’s okay because I truly feel I have everything I need.  I was on fire with creativity, finding my voice and confidence.  Even though it absolutely terrified me I was putting myself out there for the world to see.  I felt truly proud and ready to say I think I can be something amazing if I choose to be and I choose to believe I have everything I need to do so.  Next thing you know my habits were changing and different things were popping up for me.  I started a new diet plan and workout plan.  I knew I had to quit smoking because my breathing is very important for my thoughts and intuition to flow to me.  I knew that I had to start looking at why my body felt so fatigued and low energy.  I had to look at what thoughts, emotions, behaviors, and patterns were holding me back.  For the first time though I didn’t feel like this was a punishment for something.  I didn’t feel this was unfair or unbearable.  I did it because I wanted to.  I didn’t when I didn’t.  I let myself rest when I needed to.  The parts I didn’t love about me needed to die so that I could be reborn to who I was meant to be.  The version of me that I love and appreciate.  I wanted to take back control of my life and my narrative. This didn’t even feel scary to me. I thought I was so ready for all of this I can feel that it is my time that I’m in alignment and I’m not afraid anymore I am ready!  Isn’t that just so love and light?  Well yeah but light never comes without the dark especially during the eclipse.

            My love relationship has been challenged during this time with me truly wondering if it has come to an end and is no longer serving me. I have honestly been battling these feelings essentially since we got back together in 2021. I couldn’t have predicted the difficulty it would take to move past the situation we faced.  I didn’t understand the amount of insecurity I would face raising a baby alongside the woman he left me for.  I didn’t understand that I would struggle to feel loved and appreciated for the remainder of our time together.  I didn’t understand that I would constantly wonder if he truly loved me or if he loved her.  I would always wonder if he felt like he made the wrong choice.  Me constantly wondering if I made the wrong choice.  Were we never truly meant to be together did I let my desire to rebuild my family, get married, and live happily ever after convince me to play a role in a life that isn’t meant for me.  I truly do value him.  I truly do believe he helped heal me in ways I wouldn’t have been able to without him.  I truly am grateful he is the father of my children as he is an amazing dad.  He plays with his kids and takes care of them not out of obligation but because he truly enjoys being their father.  He is a patient man who rarely gets upset and complains.  He works hard every day so that I can stay home and take care of our children.  He is everything a woman could ever want down on paper. I do genuinely believe he tries everyday to make me happy, but I also genuinely believe that perhaps I will never believe that he loves me.  I will always wonder if he loved me then how did he leave me like he did.  How did he see me in my darkest point and not want to help.  How did he decide that someone else had the key to what he was looking for.  How could he hear me crying and not want to ease my discomfort. Why did he promise to propose to me only to cancel it twice before finally agreeing because I threatened to leave?  Did he not truly want to marry me even though he promises he does?  Why doesn’t he want to plan our wedding? Why did I truly feel like he barely knew me like he doesn’t listen to me or understand me or even want to?   When I ask myself what I want in a partner it feels as though I mean the world to that person.  They truly love listening to me talk about the moon and ramble on about how it is impacting me.  I want them to watch my silly Tik Toks because they love to see my creativity.   I want to never have to ask if they want to get married because they know they wanted to spend their life with me.  I want someone who when I am feeling depressed and sad, lays with me and just lets me cry on their shoulder.  I want a partner who travels with me and jokes with me, I want a partner who makes me feel confident and that I can achieve all my goals and they will help me anyway they can.  The same things I’ve wanted in all my relationships that never felt like were possible maybe that’s just it.  Maybe I will never feel truly loved.  Maybe I am giving up the best thing to ever happened to me and missing out on a great guy for the possibility that someone out there will understand me better on a mental and emotional level and that just isn’t true. Maybe it is a problem with me, and I truly won’t ever find true fulfillment.

            I spent most of my time on Samhain yesterday wondering what to do.  Should I leave this relationship has it truly come to a physical end.  This would disrupt my whole life.  My children would be forced to adjust.  I would be forced to adjust.  Right now, I am comfortable, life is comfortable and sometimes for a survivor of trauma comfort can feel like a cage in and of itself.  Perhaps these feelings are stirring as a reminder of the past. However, it’s undeniable that things have not gone as planned.  I have wondered for a long time if it is right for me as something right for me shouldn’t feel so difficult. I struggled to write this all day because I knew to honestly write my review of the experiences working with the energies of Samhain I was going to have to embrace what I have tried to avoid for so long now.  My relationship.  I knew it was being called to experience an ending, a death.  I have had so many readings showing it.  My intuition knew it but was it a physical death like we truly give up and walk away from the relationship or is it more metaphorical?   Is it simply that the relationship as it has been coming to an end and it too will be reborn.  I struggled to write this because I felt like I had to know the answer first.  I felt as though I had to let it die to fully experience the rebirth. I did yoga today instead of writing because I wrote it up three times now and couldn’t find the correct words. During my yoga I looked up and saw the stove read 222 and was reminded that the other day I found the dice that I had used to make an empress reading on tik Tok and it was on 2 when I found it.  I decided to go back to the Edgar Allen Poe deck of tarot and look up 2 the high priestess, hoping it would find me the answers I was looking for and did it ever.  In a magical way that is beyond explanation.  The story attached to the card is a poem called Ulalame.  The poem depicts the narrator walking through the forest having a conversation about death and loss with his subconscious with his soul and inner knowing.  He sees a light and decides to follow it believing it is a sign of what is next.  His psych or his subconscious tries to warn him about following the light feeling that it has mal intent. The narrator does not believe it ironically the stars that they are following are of the constellation of the lion.  Me and my partner both being Leos.  The narrator decides to follow the light despite the warnings and stumbles upon the grave of his lover.  The lover that he buried in this very spot on the very day a year prior.  The narrator stated that he didn’t even realize it was the same place or that it was the month of October.  He was overrun with feelings of devastation wondering if it was a demon that had led him there knowing that he couldn’t handle to be here and feeling this way. I think this was a reminder of just how difficult it can be to follow our intuition. It may lead us to pain and suffering if we are not careful.  The narrator believed he was haunted by the memories of the past without being aware of it.  I sat there and wondered if this was a memory of the past leading me to have these feelings as it was three years ago to this day that he left me and went to her, and she fell pregnant.  Is this my subconscious mind bringing up the past feelings? Was I led to the metaphorical grave?  Or is my psych trying to tell me that if I continue to follow what I think is the light that I will end up in the same place as the original suffering and that he will once again return to her. 

            I wish I could say I ever truly discovered the answer are we meant to be together do we keep fighting to heal beside each other or do we except that perhaps we were led to believe that we could, but we will always end up at the same conclusion.  I don’t know if my relationship will continue to grow and evolve, or this is the end.  What I do know is I feel okay either way.  I feel no rush to know that answer.  I feel okay being in the in between.  I trust that in divine timing I will have the answers I need for my soul.  I trust that every day I have the chance to wake up and be the absolute best version of myself.  I have a chance to truly live and love the life I am creating for myself.  I have the choice to believe that all the answers will come to me.  If we are meant to be it will fall into place and if we aren’t it will come to a natural end so that we both can find a partnership that feels fulfilling on all levels. I don’t need to know all the answers, I simply need to learn to trust my intuition to understand myself and my own needs and know that I have all the tools to create the life I am looking for.  I don’t know at this point what life will look like for me at this time next year, but I know that I will do everything in my power to be sure that it feels like it’s in alignment with the new me. Healing is not meant to feel pleasant and comfortable.  If it’s easy you are doing it wrong.  It’s meant to challenge you to believe something outside what is familiar.  It’s to analyze all the broken parts to plan the course of action for putting them back together, I don’t want to be a spiritual coach because I have all the answers. I don’t have some magic super powered intuition that knows all the right steps and follow these 10 steps and you will manifest the life of your dreams.  I want to be a life coach because I have struggled my whole life to feel fulfilled, I have begged for a solution for someone to guide me to my happiness.  I have cried countless hours on the bathroom floor begging to feel like I know my place in the world.  It wasn’t until I truly could understand that my place in the world was never in the arms of the perfect man who gave me all the feelings I imagined when I thought of love but rather it was a world where I truly felt that I had everything that I needed.  That I felt like I had a voice.  That the world truly could see who I was and that I left a mark on it somehow.  I want to show up in my most authentic form and tell the truth of my story in all its vulnerable glory. The world isn’t puppies and rainbows, bad things happen to good people everyday without the bad we couldn’t see the good.  Without the good we won’t survive the bad. Nothing is all one or the other; we must figure out both how to win with a losing hand and how to lose with a winning hand. Samhain was the perfect balance a time of true bliss and rebirth of truly finding my inspiration to thrive and be in my feminine power to take back the reigns of my life and hit the ground running on my goals and aspirations, it was also a deep dive into my soul and psyche to see what in my life doesn’t serve me anymore.  My relationship is out of the ordinary and I knew it would be difficult and honestly, I’m not sure if it is right.  I’m not sure if perhaps I should’ve loved myself enough to say no when it came back around.  Right now, I know he is a good man and a good dad.  Life is genuinely easier to be together than apart. Being a single struggling mom of 3 in this economy doesn’t feel in alignment with me right now.  I feel I must focus on building my career and the life that I want.  It doesn’t feel like he truly loves me.  I don’t feel like he can’t wait to marry me.  I don’t feel he enjoys listening to me talk about the moon and finds my dancing mediations charming.  I don’t think he truly sees the beauty that is my realest self. I also don’t know, however, that that is his fault.  Perhaps until I truly allow myself to exist fully in it and love myself for all those strange and unusual parts perhaps nobody will. All I know is I don’t have to have all the answers I will in time. #incaseyougiveashit this is the witches’ new year, and this is going to be my best most authentic year yet!