Going Home
I wrote this soon after I came to North Carolina a year and a half ago and I am revisiting this theme with something that just happened to me this weekend. I took on a new contracting position as a therapist a couple of weeks ago and was asked to do some psychological assessments, which I agreed to do, but which is not my soul work, by any means. I had planned to go to an art workshop at a new gallery I was excited to visit this past Saturday. It had been on my calendar for several weeks, and I was truly looking forward to it, and it would definitely feed my soul. I had a deadline of Sunday night to write the two assessments I did on Thursday. I only had Saturday to get it done and I pushed myself to try to complete the work before my class that evening.
You can probably guess what happened. I pushed myself to the wire and left for the art class in a hurry and feeling completely uncentered and stressed out to try and make it to the 7 o’clock class. As I drove there, I checked my appointment book and saw that I had written down that it started at 6 o’clock. Realizing I had blown it and would be an hour late, I turned around and went home. The tears that I had not shed for so long now came. I had let myself down. I had put something first that didn’t matter that much to me, that didn’t feed me; I had put it before the manna that I so needed and looked forward to devouring deliciously. The trickster element came in when I got home and started to write an email to the instructor of the art class telling her why I didn’t make it to the class and saw that her last email to me said, “See you at 7:00.” I had been right. I had written it in my book wrong. I should have kept going, even if I thought I was going to be late. I was even more devastated. When I wrote to her the next day she told me that they had posted two times, which explained why I was confused, why I had one time in my head and one from my book based on their incorrect posting. Anyway, I didn’t follow my intuition and that wily coyote trickster was at work and it gave me a much needed lesson, of reminding me that I need to pay attention to what my soul needs and not allow myself to get parched and dry trying to meet the needs of others, or doing work that doesn’t serve me…
which leads me to the story of the selkie, also told as “Sealskin, Soulskin” in Women Who Run With the Wolves. Here is what I wrote when I came to North Carolina… Leave a comment about how you may have lost your soulskin at times and what it means for you to go home and one lucky winner will be chosen to come to the Create Your Vision 2010 Playshop in Raleigh this Sunday, January 31, on scholarship. Or leave a comment just because…
One of my favorite movies is a magical fairy tale set in Ireland called The Secret of Roan Inish, directed by John Sayles. This mythic story tells of a selkie, a woman who is part seal, who comes to shore one day, and takes off her pelt, only to have it stolen by a mortal man who is enchanted by her.
In the traditional tale, the man is so captivated by her beauty and her wildness that he only agrees to give the pelt back to her after seven years of marriage to him. She has no choice but to agree to this if she wishes to return to her home beneath the sea. And so she lives with him and bears him a child and lives as a landlocked mortal for seven years. But she does not forget her pelt or her home. In fact, she longs for them with every fiber of her being. As the years pass, she becomes parched and dry, her energy begins to wane, her spirit to dissipate. She searches for the skin, but does not find it because her husband has hidden it well. He doesn’t want to lose his wife to the sea after all, but she cannot forget her home because it is a part of her — her essence.
It is her watchful child — born of a selkie mother and a mortal father — who discovers the pelt and brings it to her, thus restoring her to her skin, her true self. She dons the pelt and takes her boy with her back to her watery home and shows him off to her mother and father and the other wild creatures of the sea. The boy gets to experience this part of his mother that he has not known before but has gleaned from the stories she quietly whispered to him at night while his father slept. He gets to see his mother come alive in a way he has never seen but only imagined when she gazed dreamily out to the great, misty ocean that lapped at the edges of the emerald isle like a persistent mother cat bathing her young.
As Clarissa Pinkola Estes describes in her book, Women Who Run With the Wolves, it is when we lose our pelt, our soulskin, that we must return home. This is what began to happen to me during the past few years in California–I felt I was slowly drying out–from the parched drought-ridden mountain climes we lived in to the physical drying out of my hair and skin, partly due to a thyroid condition, and partly due to my own inattention to what mattered most to me. For, on a deep level, I had lost contact with my wild nature, my soul, that as a child knew what to do to replenish itself–laugh, dance, play, paint, sing, color, bake a cake, read a book, climb a tree, or just lie on the ground and watch the clouds circle lazily overhead. I only began to reclaim my pelt when I joined my pack of wild women and started running with them, reclaiming my lost self, my soulskin.
We women must take care not to lose our pelt, or if we do, to be sure we make time to reclaim it. It is something we can do over and over again and must, so that we don’t dry out and lose our energy, our essence. It is what leads to depression, an overriding but unexplainable sadness that many women carry when they don’t follow their hearts, their instinctual nature, their feelings. It is so easy for us to get caught up in what we are required to do, should do, have to do, instead of doing what we long to do, what we must do, what we need to do for ourselves.
What does it mean to lose our pelt? We can lose it in so many ways by saying yes to something we really don’t want to do, by staying in a job too long that has sucked the life out of us, by sacrificing too much of ourselves for others without any return or without taking the time to fill ourselves up before we give more, by allowing others to dictate what our lives will be, by following someone or something that doesn’t resonate with us, by staying in a relationship too long when it’s time to go, by giving up our dreams to make a living that doesn’t serve us, by silencing our voices when it’s time to speak, by pleasing others so they will like us, by giving in instead of fighting the good fight.
What does it mean to go home? We can go home again and again in our lives — on a daily basis, if need be — by noticing when we feel tired, listless, frustrated, lifeless, hurt, discontent, lonely, disappointed, sick, useless, scared, helpless, and hopeless. Has this become a pattern connected to our choices? Have we sacrificed too much of ourselves for others? Have we lost connection to our deepest self? Have we given up on our dreams? Have we stopped creating? If we have, we must find our way home.
This motif is prevalent in many fairy tales and so often it is a little girl who must find her way out of the big, dark woods to grandmother’s house, or from the witch’s cottage, or from the tower in which she has been imprisoned. We can find our way home by doing simple things like sitting on our porch with a cup of tea, by reading a good book, by asking for help, by calling a friend we haven’t spoken to for a long time, by cooking a delicious meal, by writing a poem, painting a picture, taking a walk in nature, making a collage, playing a game, riding a bike, or taking a vacation–alone or with a dear friend.
Our homing instinct is strong. Within our own psyches, it is paramount to our survival, to our ability to thrive and to flourish and to be fully alive. By moving to North Carolina where I can literally feel the difference and drink the wetness into my skin and being, I have also reclaimed my pelt and gone home. By doing the work that I really want to do, by starting over with a sense of staying close to what my soul needs and even craves, I have reclaimed my pelt. By staying connected to myself and to other women — we who carry life and bring healing to the planet — I reclaim my pelt. By sharing our lives, our stories, our pain and our passion, we reclaim our pelts. We must gently remind each other when we’ve lost our pelt, by creating together, by sharing our dreams, and by standing next to each other as we reclaim our true nature and find our way home.
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that looks awesome stephanie! been out straight with marketing bear today — still have a few more press releases to do…my goal is 20 sign-ups by the 20th!
You know how much I love this story, sister. I truly feel like it was my little empathic, watchful baby boy who restored me to my pelt, as well. Everything changed with that child. Somehow, the road back home rolled open in front of me. Not without the occasional rock on the path, but certainly MORE CLEAR.
Thank you so much for this, mama. What would I do without you on my path, too? Just on the other side of that tricky Coyote….
Beautiful! !! I love this story and Clarisa Pinloa Estes, and the ability of parable to draw us back to what matters. As women, too often, and over and over, we forget what matters. We forget that we matter, that we have needs and desires and that they need to be met. We even forget how to meet them. We forsake ourselves in the name of niceness and we think that our well will be filled if we smile and nod, if we give till we’re empty, if we follow someone else’s rules. We want, so badly, to be loved and nourished and valued. We give what we hope to receive and don’t understand why the return is fleeting.
On my journey of searching for wholeness, I’ve come to learn that giving can fill your heart, but I’ve had to edit quite a bit along the way. I’ve always given too much and too long and too hard and have always been left wanting something to quench my soul. It wasn’t until I learned to give back to myself, to love myself the way that I loved my children, that I began to feel whole again. Loving myself put the color back into my life. Loving myself enough to know that I didn’t have to carry all of my burdens alone, and that I could give them up, that I could surrender, has been my saving grace. Giving in service to others, as a mission, as a purpose, as a driving force has aloud me to embrace my essence and give of it; to give for no other reason than love; to give, not out of need for love, but out of need to spread it. And it is through my essence and my desire to spread this love that I reach out to those that I can help to discover their own magic. Old ways die hard though, and I still find myself back there again, learning the hard lesson, scrambling for a voice that was lost a long time ago, searching for the source of the plug that’s been pulled, and at my breaking point because I forgot to take a break. I let the lessons teach me and allow myself the grace to grow from them, hoping to get it better the next time, praying that I’ll absorb the wisdom, and offering myself compassion for falling once again.
Thank you so much for your beautiful story and reminder of who we are as women. And thank you for the chance to share.
yes! (sigh) yes!
beautiful truth.
Hello Stephanie,
First off I’d like to tell you how much meaning your stories bring to me. Each one seem to touch my soul speaking directly to the present circumstances, and they seem to always reach me at the most raw and tender moments.
Today, this mornings first gifts was the reading of ‘going home,’
Awakening to a sense of loneliness and a bunch of soulless urgent business on the to do list, I started reading and resonating with your words, wisdom and observations.
Being that they reach me at the moment of feeling again, and yet again, the place of being lost in my own life. The continued rollercoster ride of mustering compassion and acceptance of my life and the yearning for more. Watching myself being diligent walking forward and continuously being sidetracked sometimes by the trickster (actually, a lot of times) others by pure necessity.
Anyhow, the analogy of loosing my soulskin and going back has been a constant in my journey, and seems more urgent now then ever.
I feel I live in a place that does not feed my soul. Now, I have been there for such a long time, I wonder if what I feel is actually still true. Of course I will not find out without moving. Family obligation and economics are holding me in a snug place.
It has been a good lesson, for I have learned over the years to find ways to feed my soul with what is present and to reach out to others.
I so enjoyed meeting you and love that you are actually reachable without traveling across the globe.
So, my wish is for me to win a place for this Sundays workshop, either by being choses by you or by God/Dess sending me the extra means. Your workshop sounds great and something I need to feed my soul.
Thank you so much for sharing. It is a gift of balm for my soul.
Sincerely, Andrea
. . . i am stunned at the synchronicity. Unless you’ve been eavesdropping in my head, then OH! OK. This all makes sense.
I have so much to say in response, but I will have to keep it to this for now: the part of the “story” in wwrwtw was the medial woman, or the child. Because I can breathe under water.
Oh, I need to read through all of your posts, I believe.
I just this past week heard this same parable from another country about a beautiful swan who is captured by a hunter and taken home to be his wife. He hides her feathered cloak beneath the floorboards of their house. In her female form, she falls in love with him, takes care of him and bears his children. But one day, she finds the missing cloak, dons it and escapes. For me, I went through this in leaving my last relationship. I literally came home by moving back to N Carolina. But it has taken a few years to re-grow my pelt and it has come back in a different way, just as you hear happens to people after a surgery or treatment where they lose their hair. For me, my pelt embodies my new creative directions and power. Thanks for sharing this myth in light of your own life, Stephanie.
What a beautiful post and interesting story.
I’ve grown up not knowing why people “miss home”, become “homesick”, feel some pull to “home” – as my adopted family never provided much of a home for me to miss. I spent most of my twenties wandering, gaining and losing friends, moving from place to place, a lost soul in a very dark place. My first marriage at the age of thirty brought me grief and pain for five full years. I sacrificed my spirit to stay in a place that people told me should have been home, but was a nightmare of abuse and heartache. My ex-husband called me “weird” on a daily basis and the more my creative soul tried to peek out, the more it was crushed. That is why it is only now that my creative spirit is growing – a bit of a late bloomer. Thankfully he left me and I was finally free. Free to do what? Where was my “home” now? This is the point one could say I found my pelt, if I felt I ever had one to lose.
Fortunately after my separation I met an incredible woman who became my therapist, healer and mentor. She encouraged me to let my heart and soul soar, be proud of who I am, dive into my creative curiosities. With her help I spent the next few years finally starting my journey to “home”. I grew stronger than I ever imagined I’d be. I started to unfold wings that had never seen the light of grandfather sun or experienced the love of grandmother moon. I started to know myself as a woman (again the late bloomer thing) and what a wonderful light I had inside.
It was when my heart found love for myself that I found love for another. He is a gorgeous, sexy, loving man who adores me. He puts me on a pedestal, encourages me to break my hermit habits, pushes me to grow creatively, and adds glue to my confidence when needed. He has allowed me to finally spread my wings out fully to greet the wind. I fly high on a current that I’ve never experienced before. I love him so dearly and now call him and my animals, “home”.
I know I have a much different view of “home” than most. My “home” is a place in my heart. A place I go to daily, where I feel safe, loved and confident. It is where I found and can always find my pelt. My “home” goes with me wherever I go. It is where I gain my wisdom, it is love from the Universe and Great Spirit, it is love from my husband. It is my path.
I love everyone’s comments as this story seems to resonate with women on so many levels. I think home really is within us and the place we call home on the outside is but a reflection of our inner hearth.
I, too am pulled into your story with Spirit tugging at me. I feel in my heart that this is healing medicine for the place I am in, a place of peaceful acceptance after torrents of chaos and unrest.
My bodyworker shared that yesterday while she was working on my head and neck, the vision of me as a child penetrated her being. It was me as a joyful bright eyed little girl. I recall a tickling feeling above my head and a giggle that felt like pure giddiness, pure joy and this contentment like no other. The wounded child, the victim, is transformed into the wonder child, the magical love of the Sacred Mother entering and honoring this little girl and it is me!
The journey has been long. It was in my 40s that I lost my mojo. Autoimmune problems, untreatable, no name…Doctors said menopause, old age, arthritis, GET used to it.
Overweight, depressed, isolation, loss of my acting career, chronic skin rashes, constant itching and scratching and bleeding shinbones,no girlfriends, big baggy tomboy clothes, Marriage hurting, body hurting, frozen shoulders, Frozen spirit.
You get the picture.
All the therapy, 12 step, support groups, yoga, loving husband, changing my diet,
prayer, and love of nature helped. But the grayness was stuck. My joyful energy, my powerful spirit was sucked away. I still thought I had value only if it came from external means. Without my career, without friends, without some THING or Some Body telling me I am worthy, I have value, I have worth…I exist.
And then, an angel named Angela Shelton came to town. She gave me a bat on a stage in Raleigh and asked me to tell my story of abuse and hit a big ole chair.
Then I went to a Shamanic workshop and there a Gorilla told me to dance.
Two weeks later my friend Jennifer called from New York and told me about Nia.
A bright light came into me and I said” I am going to be a Nia teacher”. I started taking classes the next day and trained to be a teacher 3 months later. I have been dancing ever since!
And I came Home, Into my skin, and slowly my body came alive, my joints healed, my heart became joyful again, I finally was grateful and ecstatic to be a WOMAN. I loved my vagina, I forgave myself for not having children, I honored my roundness, my juicyness.
I became strong in deeper ways than I ever experienced. My relationship with my husband leapt to new levels of intimacy and trust and Joy. I began loving relationships with women. I let go of fear and competition and comparisons. And this all began at age 50, the age a woman’s acting career is generally over.
I finally have my Soulskin. I never knew the soulskin story Stephanie. And now I know that is why I live in gratitude every day. This is the journey. I am living it. I am dancing through life~~~~~~~~~~~~
Wow, what a story, Kate. You truly did transform. You came home to yourself and now dance the dance of life and teach all of us to love our bodies and appreciate our soulskin through the gift of NIA. Thank you for sharing your story.
I would like to be considered for the scholarship to your workshop, which I found out
about through the women’s center.
Thank you all for your heartfelt comments. We had the drawing and Kate won the scholarship. Congratulations, Kate! However, due to the snow and ice predicted and Lauri coming from Asheville, we have decided to postpone the playshop until next Sunday, February 7. It will be at the same time, and right now, the same place. So if you’re still interested or thinking you want to come, please email me and let me know so we can send you the short list of what to bring and confirm that it will be at Peace Tree Village (my home in Carrboro is a back-up in case PTV is not available).
stephanie. I am just now finding this and sobbing so much it was difficult to read. I’ve loved that movie, but only recognized it as a children’s story my daughter very much enjoys to watch over and over. I am returning home this spring, physically and spiritually and feeling all of these details so much. Thank you for this post and what you share. I have been drawn to you ever since you unlocked my confusion over the great mystery that is the ego in SouLodge. Bright blessings to you for all that you are.