This month has been filled with lots of memories for me. In the month of June is the anniversary date of my marriage to Dean, there is Father’s Day shortly after that and on the 29th is Dean’s birthday. This year, however, it has been a beautiful month.

Last year during the month of June I did not fair so well. The kids understood what month it was an specifically asked to do certain things that reminded them of their Daddy. There had been some other readjustments in my life and a lot of new opportunities being presented which caused me to really struggle with where I was in the grief process of losing a husband. I mean, really, how does one honor the time and the memories and also take steps forward into living out ones own life path? The kids seemed to be doing just that. They wanted to go to places and play where they remembered their Daddy taking them during times that they remembered him the most.

Last year I was also put in the pathway of some very special teachers. In my effort to further my service to Spirit I enrolled in a class with Simon James and Brian Robertson. They understood exactly where I was at and were upfront with me that I had to allow for some of my own feelings to flow, be recognized and be healed if I was going to continue to be of service to anyone without hurting them or myself.  I will be ever grateful for their candor. I was blessed with an opportunity to learn from them again in May. This time they were able to show my how my experiences can and will always be a place of reference, but they do not have to overcome me and can be a strength when I am serving, and a touch stone of empathy for others.

We all go through some type of experiences in our lives that allow for choices of healing and growth. It is possible for memories of situations to be memories and not charged with emotion every time we are reminded of moments in our history. Our choices in how we deal with our histories help create a starting place for our selves when we wake every morning, but they are not our permanent labels.

I took a walk today down a pathway that Dean and I took on one of his last good walking days. That day I took a photo of a lotus blooming. This is the photo I took that day.

 I did not have the good camera with me today, but in the same place lotus were once again blooming.
Beautiful. On the walk today I also came across and very lovely snake, a Bunny, many birds and colors I was not expecting.
Are you able to see all the colors in this photo? Colors from what many would consider pond weeds. Yet beautiful. It is all in our perspective, all in what we are choosing to see and recognize.
I also saw this lovely gem, which I have been seeing a LOT of the past few days. I would constantly pick up packets of seeds with this type of flower and Dean would never let me plant them. He said that they were intrusive and would take over the other plants that had been so painstakingly placed around the yard. I always contended that I thought they were pretty, and he always contended that they were a weed. Since he was doing most of the yard work I never pushed much further, other than buying a packet of seeds each year to see if they would make the cut. 
So, on a pathway I very rarely take, and have not taken because of it being part of my past, I found today that it was a beautiful day of remembering and discovering of new colors. I found a little flower denied to me in the past showing itself fully in the sunlight. 
Fear kept me off that pathway for a very long time. I was afraid of the memories and what I may feel. I find more and more that fear, even though it keeps us humans from doing silly things sometimes, is a hindrance to all that we can learn and experience. It can also be a hindrance to what we allow ourselves to experience with others. 
This is a photo taken of my 4 boys this spring creek hiking in the same spot Dean started taking the older boys when they were 5 and 7 years of age. The first time he took the little ones was before either one of them could walk. New and beautiful memories can be made through the experiences that have come before. The ‘trick’ is allowing yourself to feel what it is you are feeling without taking on the identity of those emotions. John White teaches people all the time that you ‘have emotions, you do not have to be the emotions.’ Recognize, release and heal if need. There is no shame in healing and in receiving help from others in your own healing process. (I am so grateful for the friends that have helped me along the way) There is no need to fear what we may feel. We are human, feeling is a bit of the process. In fact, it is a beautiful part of the process, once we understand what we are feeling we can choose to be in that place or not. We have the ability to move ourselves into opportunities to share Spirit’s Love and Healing and know what love feels like. 
If I love myself,
I love you.
If I love you, 
I love myself.

~ Rumi

Pondering on a Pathway Less Traveled