Holiday Message of Hope From Me to You
by Lisa A. Romano
Almost 30 years ago, my life began imploding due to living my life below the veil of consciousness and through the lens of my forgotten, abandoned, and suffering inner child. I was married to my first husband, the mother of two small children, and only 28 years old. I was sitting on the couch with my ex when he said with utter conviction in his voice, "What you want doesn't exist, Lisa. Nobody has the type of relationship you keep clamoring about. Who do you know that is happy?" It would not be the last of this type of conversation until I finally accepted the stark reality of his words.
We had just finished another two-day bout of stonewalling and gaslighting. However, I didn't know that was what it was called back then, after I wanted to address an issue we were having regarding finding a way to connect with one another, rather than feeling like opponents in a boxing ring. I knew I was running out of steam, patience, and desire to keep making things work, but I had no idea it was codependency, a need for approval, or the fear of abandonment that was lighting the fire under my butt to keep throwing myself at the man I loved in the hopes that he would one day, 'hear me.'
This Christmas morning, I woke up thinking about my new life, the one I had no evidence would ever show up when I walked into the abyss of divorce and codependency recovery, the life my ex told me didn't exist.
When I think about my old life, I still feel the urge to weep for my infant self, toddler self, adolescent self, and young married self, who had no clue how her shadows, unhealed wounds, ego defenses, neurology, and subconscious programs were keeping her stuck feeling subordinate to those her heart could not help but long for.
And when I think about my courageous students and personal clients, who like me, grew up needing to abandon the self for the sake of survival, who, through no fault of their own and by way of default survival brain systems, found themselves shrouded in suffocating shame, who wake up every morning to fight another shadow they did not create, my heart swells with compassion, empathy, gratitude, and awe, for they are the ones pushing the consciousness of humans forward for all of us.
Every day, they choose to face the dragons of faulty thinking and to heal the scabs left over by adverse childhood experiences they did not inflict upon themselves.
Without personal, financial, mental, emotional, or spiritual challenges, there is no need for courage, tenacity, or resiliency. There would be no wisdom without a lack of knowledge. Nor would there be enlightenment without having first lived a life through shadows.
Although this sounds very profound and philosophical, still, on mornings like these, my heart aches for the wounded adult child who has yet to have that ultimate breakthrough, that tipping point of emotional sobriety where they know beyond a shadow of a doubt that they are worthy to receive the good in life and that if they NEVER GIVE UP, their dream life will one day begin manifesting for them. Knowing how difficult it is to believe in the unseen and to have complete faith in one's ability to draw to them the love they have always deserved and sought, all I can do is live by example, teach, and share what I know is possible when one decides to heal at the level of the subconscious, all the emotional boo-boos one was forced to suppress, repress, ignore, loathe, judge, blame, and run from as a child, who had no other choice but to abandon the self for the sake of survival.
I know it sounds hippie-dippie, and if someone had told my 28-year-old self that in order to change my life, I had first to change myself and then dedicate my life to correcting thoughts that sprung up into my mind so that they aligned with the essence of love that resided within me, I may have rolled my eyes and told them to go smoke another joint. That reasoning would not have made sense to me then. And besides that, I was the type of codependent that thought I was right...if people only listened to me, my life and theirs would be perfect...UGH...
There is no magic bullet, so Dear One, please don't waste your limited breath or time on people who suggest there is. Healing your life is a commitment to the self, to the mind, to the brain, to the body, and to the Spirit you are. Healing happens in one moment, one thought, one intention, one emotion, and one behavior at a time. Healing is about honoring a process that helps you shift your life over time, bit by bit, day by day, sometimes from one moment to the next. It's not an event that you reach, and then it's over. It truly is for life, especially considering the brain's default mode network is always standing by, ready to control your life through its auto-pilot capability.
Triggered? Annoyed? Bothered? Irritated? Judgmental? Critical? Angered? No problem. The amygdala and hippocampus will take over until you've developed enough metacognition to think, feel, and behave in alignment with your desired life.
This is only possible by way of processing emotions and thoughts through the prefrontal lobe and neocortex. To achieve this, one must learn to become the watcher of their inner mental faculties, and this, Dear One...is no easy task...That is why, rather than a quick fix, a process is necessary.
As it turns out, they were wrong...I was enough...I was born enough...I will always be enough...I never had anything to prove...Love was never anything I should have ever needed to beg for. Nor should I have ever felt responsible for not receiving the consistent, predictable, warm, protective love, respect, honor, understanding, forgiveness, and support every Dear Innocent Child deserves. Nor should I have longed and ached for those who were built to NOT hear, value, or see me...
Today, I am clearer than ever about who I am and who you are. To arrive here, I first had to understand who and what I was not. I am not my programming, my fears, thoughts, habits, worries, neurology, psychology, skin color, gender, career, labels, past, codependency, shame, doubt, or guilt.
I Am a shard of the Divine, born into a human body and a brain built for survival, and endowed with consciousness it was up to me to cultivate so as to pierce the veil of unknowing, so to come to the awareness of my divine essence...and to show others how to breakthrough the chains of the past so they too, can have the faith of a mustard seed and draw into their lives the equivalent of the love of their desires, because they are LOVE!
Never give up on the Divine Self, Dear Ones...
You; we are enough...
And to the ex who taught me so much, I hope you learned to believe in more than we had because life itself is the brilliance of the Creator of all that is that wishes to express its love for each of us through us...and in order to achieve this, we must use our free will to allow the love of Creator to flow through us...therefore, following your bliss and having faith are necessary...Courage and patience are also required. Suggesting that a beautiful, sacred life is not possible is suggesting that love does not exist. And that's just silly...
We got this.
BELIEVE in YOUR DIVINITY, for the LOVE of the CREATOR is in your DNA, as close as your breath, and you CANNOT be separated from it, except in consciousness.
All my love,
Lisa A. Romano
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