And the Background Is ... Gone

This past week, I was focused on grief.  I know and respect that many people have a lot of grief right now – but my dance with it was not about the death of a person, but rather a different kind of goodbye: to my life as I knew it.

I’m taking a seminar on rebuilding after a love relationship ends – and last week was about grief. Our assignment was to write a “Goodbye Letter,” in which we say goodbye to the relationship we had with our person – but also to think about the other things that will now be only in our past. For many, that is a home, an intact family, holiday traditions.

I cried as I wrote my letter and cried again as I read it aloud to my group.  I woke up the next morning with tears on my face. The energy of my marriage, the quirks, the joys and comforts, the routines, systems and tasks – all of that is no longer, and it’s worthy of some grieving.

As I considered the sheer volume of the parts and pieces of the life I had that aren’t my life any more, I got this image of someone taking the illustrated book of my life and erasing away the entire background: the familiar spaces, the meals, the palette of colors, the original cast of characters. No more background. Now it’s just me, standing on a blank white page.

And for the first time I really acknowledged for myself how big and giant and enormous is this transition. Have I been kind enough to myself in the face of it all? Can I trust and encourage myself to know that the new, beautiful drawings will get filled in? And maybe I’ll say no thank you to light, polite colored pencils and reach instead for gooey and thick colorful paint. Or I’ll choose a calm charcoal background with some pops of color.

But first I get to – no, I must – acknowledge the blank and over-bright sometimes squint-worthy white that is my page right now.  And then, a deep breath. And perhaps the little puckers where my tears spilled onto the page will become the center of a flower or a new tea pot that greets me every morning.

Want help and inspiration coloring in the pages for the book of your life? Reach out for support and coaching.