Joy Harjo’s poem, appended in part below, really speaks to me at this stage of my life. I love the honesty and the readiness to take herself back in this poem. At the end of it, she captures the essence of why we hold onto things long after they’ve outlived their usefulness.
Fear is the language of ways in which we learned to cope earlier on, protective shields we developed. And when we are ready or shall I say, when I am ready to step into the me who is fearless and fully trusts herself what has held me back is that which is afraid of dying. This dying is abandoning what has contained me inside the illusion of safety.
All versions of ourselves already exist in this vast Universe, this is what Seth wrote of and the new quantum physics seems to support. So lately, I’m in conversation with the me who is fearful and the version of me who fully trusts herself. We are negotiating, you could say. What is there to lose except a life that constricts and confines, I ask the afraid me. Fearful me answers that it finds refuge in that very constriction.
Every day I continue the conversation, waiting for my willingness to abandon the old order in favor of the new. As yet, I’m not willing. Just for now, I’ll honor the one who is not yet willing. Ironically, I continue to boldly trust that I will be willing one day soon.
There’s a me who leaves no consciousness stone unturned. I shall not turn this stone over and then set it safely back down in its place and I shall not live with a heart that opens just enough. One day soon a new conversation will unfold: remember when you were so afraid? Yes, I remember when. It had its time, its reason and its story. I released her in favor of being the one who is wide open, boundless and free, she trusts herself and herself in the world. Where I was once so afraid of losing myself instead I found the fullness of who I Am.
* * *
I release you, fear, so you can no longer
keep me naked and frozen in the winter,
or smothered under blankets in the summer.
I release you
I release you
I release you
I release you
I am not afraid to be angry.
I am not afraid to rejoice.
I am not afraid to be black.
I am not afraid to be white.
I am not afraid to be hungry.
I am not afraid to be full.
I am not afraid to be hated.
I am not afraid to be loved.
To be loved, to be loved, fear.
Oh, you have choked me, but I gave you the leash.
You have gutted me but I gave you the knife.
You have devoured me, but I laid myself across the fire.
I take myself back, fear.
You are not my shadow any longer.
I won’t hold you in my hands.
You can’t live in my eyes, my ears, my voice
my belly, or in my heart my heart
my heart my heart
But come here, fear
I am alive and you are so afraid
of dying.
~Joy Harjo~
what have you lost?
Poems Selected by Naomi Shihab Nye
