Moving On

Woke up this morning thinking of an old friend.

Marie Claire was born in Paris shortly after WWII. She and her mother lived in abject poverty. She never knew her father. Marie Claire's mother told her many times that she had not wanted her, had tried unsuccessfully to abort her. In some ways this knowledge haunted Marie Claire and shaped a great deal of her life. 

Marie Claire and I were born on the same day, a decade apart. At the age I am now, she died of cancer. When I went to see her in the hospital she told me, “Here I am having to go through this alone as I have done with everything.”

I didn’t know what to say. In fact, Marie Claire had a loving husband she’d been with for decades- a chef who ran his own restaurant and brought her tasty meals daily during her stay in the hospital- and two grown daughters who came to see her regularly while caring for young children themselves. And I was there.

But the truth was, Marie Claire always felt as if she was scrambling to survive, was unsupported and on her own. That’s the experience she lived. When I’d gently point out that the reality of her life did not match this assumption she would cringe and agree, but I knew it changed nothing.

And it wasn’t only that Marie Claire was unable to receive from those around her. She also could not give to herself. She had a small successful skin-care business and dreamed of creating a healing spa for women, a place where spirit was tended even as the body was pampered. She told me once that she had the money to fulfil her dream, but she couldn’t do it- was afraid to spend the money, sure that it was too late or too early or not the right economic climate or the right place. . . . Honestly, I don’t think she ever really considered acting on her vision. In her own mind, she was still the unwanted daughter, the girl living on the street, barely surviving.

I remember once sitting with Marie Claire and feeling my own frustration at her inability to receive and enjoy the life she now had. I wanted to tell her to “let the past go,” to “move on.” I didn’t- because I knew these words don’t free someone from the past and can stir deep shame- and that never helps.

And, I knew something else: where we want to say, “Move past this!” to another, we are speaking from our inability to be with the other where they are. (And yes, sometimes we may need to take a break so we don’t start saying unhelpful things.)

And. . . . where we are feeling judgemental and frustrated about another’s failure to “move on,” we may well be feeling stuck ourselves, identified with or limited by something that has happened in our past and frustrated by our own inability to “let it go.”

We are wanting someone else to do something that we have not found a way to do.

Maybe we want them to show us it can be done.

So, as I woke up this morning filled with memories about Marie Claire I wondered: Where am I feeling caught in the past? Where am I missing the opportunity to lay down a burden and walk on with more freedom? Where am I refusing healing, afraid to be free, not allowing myself to receive fully what is offered to me now?  

And I offer a prayer for my old friend, grateful for what is stirred by remembering her, wishing her spirit deep peace and freedom.

Oriah House (c) 2014