A Walk In The Clouds
Her heart's journey had been fraught with many disappointments, the most damaging of which had led her to Toronto, leaving behind her past life in the North.
At the beginning of the last New Year, she sat in a sparsely decorated living room in an apartment on the outskirts of the city, waiting for her new furniture to arrive. She opened her laptop and wrote a few e-mails, some to her family and some to the friends she had left behind in her search for a new life.
She had often dreamed of living in a big city, but had never felt the need to escape her childhood home and surroundings, until now, in the aftermath of a painful marriage breakup that had left her heartbroken.
The combination of what had happened and the constant replaying of things that she perhaps could have - should have - done differently had left her emotionally exhausted. Although she had managed to secure a transfer in her position with The Ministry of Health and Welfare, in a downtown Toronto location, her faded self-esteem and purpose had greatly dampened her enthusiasm for a fresh start and socially she felt alone and isolated - she missed her home, family and friends.
All of this had created the perfect storm in her existence and it had taken it's toll on her, physically and emotionally. She couldn't eat, couldn't sleep, and was unable to concentrate and/or focus for any length of time, and she desperately hoped that she would be able to perform adequately in her job which was to begin on the following Monday. In her head and her heart, she gave herself a year before she would return home - a failure again - but each day, in the meantime, she was sentenced to think of that which she did not wish to think about, and kept hoping that maybe - just maybe - she would have a good day again - someday.
So, there she sat in a partially empty apartment, waiting, not just for new furniture, but for life. The furniture arrived later that day. Life, however, took longer.
Over the next few months, she made a few friends at her office, but still spent most of her evenings and weekends alone. She walked a lot and explored the city, but when she returned to her apartment she was met with an overwhelming loneliness. And that was her existence. But, in a large part, she needed that time to think, time to retreat, and time to seek some form of spiritual connection. This was her wilderness moment and she needed to find her path back. She needed to breath in new life - leave the old life behind her - and build a new future.
She began to read a lot - fiction, non-fiction and many self-help books. She enrolled in a book club at the local library and later signed up for an adult education course in dealing with life's disappointments. She learned that disappointments can hold within them a gift. Her discovery journey was painful, but as she moved through the clouds, she stretched herself, tried new things and received more than a few scrapes, bumps and bruises along the way. She began learning how to deal with the hazards yet still fulfill her purpose. She discovered that when dealing with her emotions she couldn't hide them away - they needed to be dealt with one way or another. So, she worked with them and uncovered the information and gifts that they offered her. She was able to slow down enough to pay attention to the messages her heart was giving her, she got to the core of her problems, and created some space to get a clear perspective on her life and what she had to offer herself and her world.
Near the end of her first year in Toronto, her new future took hold. The future, it turned out, was in the form of a gentleman whom she had met at one of the Life Seminars she had attended in the summer, and he had a smile that changed her forever. Life had again handed her a gift, but this time, as a result of her learning how to move past the moment and redefine her journey, she was ready to walk through the clouds and face her new world with her heart mended, her soul alive again, and her eyes wide open.
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