Loss
I've just come back from a week long shamanic retreat. That will be the subject of a separate post, but today I wanted to talk to you about loss.
As you know, I've recently been blogging about spirit guides and the like and many of you know of my spirit guide, Laughing Bull, the Native American Indian guide. For me, I had kind of ignored him for a long time (knowing that he was there), and one of the purposes of doing the retreat was to connect with him more fully.
Well, the Universe had other plans. On Saturday we did a soul retrieval ceremony. During the entire ceremony I couldn't really see anything via my third eye - I could feel parts of me coming back but didn't necessarily know what the underlying traumatic event was to make them go away from me. At the close of that session, I finally got to see Laughing Bull - he had an animal coat on of some kind and had his back to me. He turned and look at me and disappeared - a part of me consciously knew that his time was up with me, and that him finally showing me who he was was part of his way of saying goodbye.
After that I went up and spoke to my facilitator/teacher who said that it was normal to have a guide leave you at the right time because they had fulfilled their purpose and it was time to move on. My teacher looked at me and asked me if I felt sad and the tears started running down my face - I felt like I had lost someone.. which for my brain was difficult to deal with because it wasn't someone I had consciously had that much of a relationship with but it felt like some part of me had died (I'm still shedding tears whilst writing this btw). I walked away from that conversation trying to process things and later had another chat with my teacher about it and he could still see that I was upset about it because it felt like I have been abandoned (which apparently is connected to a past life of mine but we'll talk about past lives in a later post). My teacher tried to connect in with my guides who basically told him that another guide will come forward to take Laughing Bull's place and when he inquired who it was, he started laughing and said that my guides were saying "It's a surprise!" - so I'll find out when the time is right (which slightly annoyed me because I wanted to know right now lol).
Anyway, he said something important to me - when we lose someone, it's important to actually take the time to grieve. Feel the emotion and sit with it until the time was right to move on. I was told that it might be good for me to have a ceremony to mark the end of our time together, and that I would intuitively figure out what that ceremony would be when the time was right. I feel that once I've done that then the book will be closed and that a new one will begin.
So if you have been connecting with your guides, know that some guides will come and go and it's got nothing to do with you. As my teacher put it, your guide has done what they have agreed to do and the next guide will come in to assist you with your ascension. Time to graduate from a high school teacher to a university teacher - see it as a good thing - it's a sign of growth and spiritual development!
So here's to you Laughing Bull - thank you so much for being with me throughout all those years, even the years when I consciously was not aware of your presence. Thank you for constantly whispering in my ear to get certain things on and steering me down the right path. I understand that the shamanic retreat was an initiation into a new phase of my life and the ending of my current phase and that your purpose was to guide me to that retreat. Thank you so much for being that unconditionally loving guide who has supported me. I will forever be grateful for what you have taught me and whilst our paths may part ways now, you will always be in my heart. I wish you the best on your next spiritual assignment.
As you know, I've recently been blogging about spirit guides and the like and many of you know of my spirit guide, Laughing Bull, the Native American Indian guide. For me, I had kind of ignored him for a long time (knowing that he was there), and one of the purposes of doing the retreat was to connect with him more fully.
Well, the Universe had other plans. On Saturday we did a soul retrieval ceremony. During the entire ceremony I couldn't really see anything via my third eye - I could feel parts of me coming back but didn't necessarily know what the underlying traumatic event was to make them go away from me. At the close of that session, I finally got to see Laughing Bull - he had an animal coat on of some kind and had his back to me. He turned and look at me and disappeared - a part of me consciously knew that his time was up with me, and that him finally showing me who he was was part of his way of saying goodbye.
After that I went up and spoke to my facilitator/teacher who said that it was normal to have a guide leave you at the right time because they had fulfilled their purpose and it was time to move on. My teacher looked at me and asked me if I felt sad and the tears started running down my face - I felt like I had lost someone.. which for my brain was difficult to deal with because it wasn't someone I had consciously had that much of a relationship with but it felt like some part of me had died (I'm still shedding tears whilst writing this btw). I walked away from that conversation trying to process things and later had another chat with my teacher about it and he could still see that I was upset about it because it felt like I have been abandoned (which apparently is connected to a past life of mine but we'll talk about past lives in a later post). My teacher tried to connect in with my guides who basically told him that another guide will come forward to take Laughing Bull's place and when he inquired who it was, he started laughing and said that my guides were saying "It's a surprise!" - so I'll find out when the time is right (which slightly annoyed me because I wanted to know right now lol).
Anyway, he said something important to me - when we lose someone, it's important to actually take the time to grieve. Feel the emotion and sit with it until the time was right to move on. I was told that it might be good for me to have a ceremony to mark the end of our time together, and that I would intuitively figure out what that ceremony would be when the time was right. I feel that once I've done that then the book will be closed and that a new one will begin.
So if you have been connecting with your guides, know that some guides will come and go and it's got nothing to do with you. As my teacher put it, your guide has done what they have agreed to do and the next guide will come in to assist you with your ascension. Time to graduate from a high school teacher to a university teacher - see it as a good thing - it's a sign of growth and spiritual development!
So here's to you Laughing Bull - thank you so much for being with me throughout all those years, even the years when I consciously was not aware of your presence. Thank you for constantly whispering in my ear to get certain things on and steering me down the right path. I understand that the shamanic retreat was an initiation into a new phase of my life and the ending of my current phase and that your purpose was to guide me to that retreat. Thank you so much for being that unconditionally loving guide who has supported me. I will forever be grateful for what you have taught me and whilst our paths may part ways now, you will always be in my heart. I wish you the best on your next spiritual assignment.