regret Archives - Owl Medicine: Shamanic Healing

On My Walk Today – Photo: L. Weikel

Contemplating

I’ll admit it: I’m contemplating shamelessly exploiting more of my pets to avoid sitting with and exploring the unsettled feelings that are coming up for me. And that’s kind of a weird thing. Not shamelessly exploiting my pets, of course. If you’ve been reading my posts for any length of time, you know I do that with abandon. Indeed, whenever I’m at a loss for something to write about, I look to my four legged friends to bail me out.

No, what’s weird is the fact that I seem to be avoiding altogether the task of excavating and reflecting upon my feelings as I approach the completion of my 1111 Devotion. So I’m left with this creeping sense of dread that if I don’t look for the meaning, it will have meant nothing at all.

But even that feels disingenuous. I committed to this Act of Power to find some small way to honor the life and creativity of my son. I did it as an act of devotion to the relationship I lost when he died. I did it because I wanted to acknowledge the hole he left in my heart – in my life – and those of his father and brothers as well. And I know there are others out there who loved him – and miss him – as well.

Taken today, too – Photo: L. Weikel

Regret

There are days when I regret my failure to create something truly meaningful and enduring to remember Karl by. He was passionate about feeding people and caring for the un-housed. He had that uncommon generosity of sharing what little he had with those who had less. I’m keenly aware that I barely even wrote about these societal challenges, much less did anything to alleviate them.

Many families that lose a child seem to turn their tragedy into an instrument of good. Their efforts range from establishing foundations to counter the gun lobby, or raising money to research SIDS, or creating better systems to feed the food insecure or to bring tiny homes to communities.

I stand in awe of mothers who create legacies of this kind.

So, no. I don’t put a lot of stock in the fact that I stayed up late 1111 nights in a row to write about stuff. From what I saw on my walks in nature that day to my reactions to the slow-moving coup we call our daily lives (in the U.S. and world-wide, sadly), my missives covered some pretty mundane, albeit occasionally fanciful subjects. And what I’m realizing in this moment is that they were, for the most part, a pretty far cry from creative. So much for honoring Karl’s prodigious creativity and irreverence.

Don’t Get Me Wrong

Lest I leave you with the sense that I regret this effort, please, let me assure you, that’s not the case. I think I can safely say my skills at iPhone photography alone have benefited significantly. So right there is an artistic and creative aspect to this project that I didn’t foresee.

And beyond a shadow of a doubt, the most amazing aspect to this 1111 Devotion was the dedication displayed by so many of you. By making a point to read my posts each day (and sometimes having to go to Facebook to find the daily missive or search directly on my website), each of you engaged in an Act of Power yourselves.

I can’t thank you enough for being such steadfast companions on this journey.

(Hmmm. Well, this was a surprise. I guess I’ll exploit my pets tomorrow night instead. I still have three more posts to write!)

The sky was quite expressive – Photo: L. Weikel

(T-4)

Lucky 77

I don’t know…this seems like it should be a ‘lucky’ post, don’t you think? The seventy seventh one?

Not only is it a multiple of 11 (let’s hear it for the 1111 Devotion, folks, the reason we’re all here – or at least the reason I am), it’s also the year I graduated from high school. Which kind of jump-starts me to thinking about my birthday that’s coming up in a couple months.

For some weird reason, I’ve been thinking about it lately. I’ve found myself literally reminding myself that this birthday will be different. Not on the outside. Not with respect to anyone or anything outside of my little old self.

But the very fact of it is already different inside myself.

Approaching 60

It’s strange to think that I’ll be turning 60. Of course, everyone surely feels this way when they get here. And when they continue to be lucky enough to reach further societally-acknowledged milestones. I realize I’m not unique. Unless you count those who don’t reach this number. Or won’t. Ever.

It’s weird for me to think that I’ll be turning twice the age Karl was when he died. I’ve had twice the number of years to experience life, although I am quite confident that he encountered many situations and had a myriad of scares, adventures, and opportunities (for good and for ill) that I may never have (or would never seek out). And that’s true in spite of the fact that I’ve had more than the average bear’s chances to do some wild and crazy shit.

In fact, I sometimes wonder if my willingness to recount some of the adventures I had spurred him on to take some of the chances he did. Probably.

Was My Approach to Life a ‘Contributing Factor?’

And there have been moments, usually when writing in my journal and perhaps reflecting on how I see or perceive other people and how they react and respond to their kids, that I’ve asked myself if my parenting should or could have been a substantial contributing factor to his early death. (Not that I’m saying it was ‘my’ parenting. To be clear, it was (is?) mine and Karl’s – one thing we strive to always be unified on is our approach to raising our sons.)

What I mean by that ‘contributing factor’ musing is that in listening to others and how they respond to their kids’ dreams and ideas, I’m often genuinely surprised by how outlandish my instinctive responses seem to be in comparison.

I’m all about gathering experiences.

Which is probably why I am so attracted to living a shamanic approach to life – the essence of which is based in one’s own unique experiences.

There were at least a couple of moments in the eleven months that I was in Europe when I was 17-18 years old that I could easily have died. In a few, I could have been killed accidentally. In a couple of others, I was simply lucky that the glint in a few people’s eyes didn’t turn into something deadly. I even knew it in the moment of each occurrence.

Learning Through Experiencing

Knowing I’d been lucky in those times that I surely was, though, didn’t make me swear off adventure or unique opportunities. But I know that that knowing served to hone my instincts. I distinctly remember realizing that the little niggling edge to the wildness I’d seen in someone’s eyes might next time be a ticket to horror.

A couple of times I knew on some level I’d been given a lucky break. You can’t count on them happening every time. You can’t even count on them happening twice. But you can learn from them. You can reflect on what that situation taught you to avoid next time.

I honestly don’t know where my philosophy of life came from. But I’ve always known I wanted our sons to never say no to an experience simply out of fear. Out of intuitive caution? Yes. An assessment of risk that said in their head and heart, “That’d be dumb?” or “That’s a risk not worth taking?” Yes. But due to generalized fear as a result of other people thinking it was a crazy idea or it was something they wouldn’t do? No way.

I know Karl pushed his edge. I know he did things that pushed the edge of his fear, sometimes going too far and paying the consequences (or getting lucky) and other times because he had thought it through and considered the experience worth the risks. And I know he had stories he wanted to tell me – but was waiting until the ‘right time’ to tell. I regret I’ll never hear them; and I regret he never wrote them down the way I asked him, repeatedly, to do.

Regrets?

There’s the chance, I suppose, that Karl (husband) and I could have tempered Karl (son’s) ambition for adventure. No. That’s incorrect. We could have, possibly, attempted to temper his ambition for adventure. But I truly believe that if we’d spent our time trying to talk him out of things (or more likely, threatening, cajoling, or forbidding), we would have ended up either repulsing him right out the door without encouraging him to be smart when choosing risks, to use his brains and his instincts and his intuition, or we would have broken his spirit and condemned him to a life of mind-numbing (and illusory) safety.

So no, I guess I don’t regret the way we’ve encouraged our sons to approach and live their lives. And if the way we raised them resulted in Karl living the life he did in his 30 years and dying the way he did? I have to rest in my core belief that a life lived full on, as they say, is a life worth living.

Wow. How did I get to this by beginning with a comment about the number 77?

(T-1034)