So, I felt her crying deep down in my gut.

It’s not often that you feel sound. More often than not, you hear it. When you live in a small home filled with big personalities, you get used to the sound of the loud. As time passes you become more discerning as to what sounds you will attend to and those that you will let slip by. But yesterday, I didn’t hear her crying, I felt it. And when your gut feels a sound before your ears can discern what it is,

– you run towards it as fast as you can.

It took me less than a breath to get to my daughter. Even less to register what had transpired. My eldest wise one was outside on the porch. She was rocking forwards, rocking backwards. Her open mouth moaning with both hands on her foot. Her wild eyes were crunched closed – holding in her pain. It was her fear that I felt in my gut. It was to her that I ran through the moment. It was on her voice that I knew something big was wrong.

Standing inside the house was my middle red. She was frozen to the spot, too scared to move at all, a small trickle of blood pooling below her right knee. Her wild eyes were wide open – staring in disbelief. It was her confusion that I felt in my heart. It was in her stillness that I stopped. It was her in her shock that I knew something big was wrong.

In between my two girls was our front door.
With the glass panel smashed in at the bottom.
In the shape of my eldest wise one’s left foot.

I stood there for an eternity. Which was over in a moment. I said an inappropriate word. Maybe more. As I took the Lord’s name in vain it was not only because I could see the power that my 10 year old girl had inside of her. It was because I could see the way she had manifested this power to come out via her left foot.

And I knew I was up for over $200 in fucking glass.

My own shock morphed into fear. My anger began swelling to rage. As I found myself begin to tear between the blood-fear of one child and the shock-anger of another, I found myself in dialogue with my self. I told me to say something to make it better. I told me to do something to take their pain away. I told me to step up and be a Real parent. Someone who can gather these scattered energies of their instinctual reactions and draw them inwards together again to make them whole.

I turned to my howling eldest, whose shock I now held as my own, and I said to her:

“You will not be punished for your anger.
You will be punished by it.”

Think yin forward folds, seated twists and mediation.

There are two choices we have when we are presented with a situation. We can either chose to respond by keeping our connection to our higher Self (or our Truth). This can happen when we can step back from ourselves and see the situation for what it really is and presents for us. Beyond the thoughts of having to diffuse the drama, clean the crap up and pay for the co-lateral repairs.

Alternatively, we can react by identifying with our smaller self (or our ego). And if we believe ourselves to be continually a victim of our circumstance, we may unconsciously perpetuate this belief by manifesting emotions such as fear or anger or grief. These emotions can easily flare up whenever we feel stressed, confused or threatened. We tend to show them when we feel that we are not being seen or maybe not being heard. Or that our needs and desires aren’t being met. These darker shades of ourself can make us flare up and kick hard, feeling this will regain our power and make us feel like top-dog again. We can yell just as loud. We can smash the pane of glass above. While dishing out to anyone within earshot as to how we came about to raise such shitful smalls. When in fact, we just feel more shocked. More hurt.

And very, very small.

Yesterday, in thick silence, I unlocked the smashed door to our home. I put a cold compress on my middle red’s knee and began to sweep up the broken glass. I heard each crack of the broken pane deep in my gut where it mixed in with the cries of my child. With the shards of broken glass, I swept up her fear, her anger and her pain. Where I mixed it with a little bit of my own. Then I went to my daughter where she lay swollen and curled into herself on her bed. We spoke about our emotions. How they make us feel and – how if they run away from us – what they make us do. And I told her what she could do to help her learn.

Now, every night before bed, she sits on a cushion. She puts it on the floor, inside of our front door. Here she sits and she stares at the new pane of glass for 5 minutes. Remembering briefly her anger and her pain. While seeing that which was broken to be Whole.

And reminding herself of that place in her True Heart.

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