Guest post by Caron Somers

We hear about miracles during Christmas time, people exclaim it out loud when they find a parking spot at a crowded mall or find a shorter check out line. Everyone talks about miracles joyfully and with even a little expectation – its fine to talk about miracles leading up to December 25th. We all laugh, think about buying lottery tickets and move on with their lives.

Until that moment when you need your miracle. When you need everything to align in perfect unison and you need that thing to happen, to work out and just to be ok.

I need that miracle, I need the body that I’ve ignored for years to suddenly sit up straight and pay attention to me and do exactly what I want it to do. And I want it done now. Please and thank you.

For the past 18 months I’ve needed my body to heal itself and I thought I was giving it everything it needed. Doctors, specialists, healers have been consulted and initial visits are filled with hope and expectations and gradually with averted eyes and lowered voices they admit their treatments didn’t work. So I gave up and thought I’d just have to live with this ‘thing’. Until a dear old lady told me her story and I thought it just might be time to try something new. So I made yet another appointment with yet another doctor and sat and waited. And this doctor was different, he taught me that not only can my body heal itself, it actually will.

But yesterday, after a first treatment didn’t hold and I was back for a second treatment, I sat in the ‘after care room’ relaxing on a comfortable chair, sitting alone in a quiet, dark room and started crying. Because I felt like my body didn’t want to heal itself and despite my willing for it to heal, why wasn’t it listening? And on the wall in front of me in giant letters was a quote that said healing isn’t an event, it’s a process. And I started thinking, ‘what if this treatment plan does help cure my body – am I ready for that’? And with stark honesty, I realized I wasn’t ready to be healed.

For 18 months I have carried this illness inside of me, convinced that it was my fault that all the other treatments didn’t work. All the green juices, vitamins, special diets, months of acupuncture did nothing, all because I wasn’t good enough. And scarier still, this illness has become comfortable for me now, its like wearing a heavy, wool coat in the rain – sure it’s heavy and it stinks like a wet dog – but its comfy, I am used to wearing it and I’ve grown to like it.

And its made me lazy, its become a crutch and the one thing I blame all the time. “Well, if I didn’t have this neuralgia I’d be able to hike more, eat better, write more, be a better friend” and on and on it goes. I have parked myself down on the recliner and given up on life thinking that this is as good as it gets. Expectations were lowered and hope was barely tolerated anymore. And that reality scared me, that I was settling and not reaching for the stars anymore. I was content to languish away into old age and let the young take centre stage. Figured my opinion didn’t matter anymore, nobody cared and I’d just keep walking in the cold, rain with my old wool coat all alone.

So writing about this and being transparent with you is one step in a better direction for me. And I am being more tender and kinder to myself, not feeling like I have to always be in control, or be the leader, or have the right answer. And throughout the day I keep telling myself that I am healing and slowly my depleted hope is starting to replenish, because there are still stars on my horizon that I want to reach for.

So wherever you are on your journey, remember that what we hope for and long for are often a process. Sometimes a slow, grueling, winding road kind of process. But if we rush it, we’ll miss meeting new friends and sharing our stories with each other. We’re in this together, we’re a community and let’s not give up but continue to keep taking the next step forward, no matter how small it is. And as I learned from the locals, walking the tiny country roads in Fiji so many years ago, Namaste dear friend, Namaste.