release, part 2

A further word on the "holding on" stuff from the other day.

My eye has been twitching. At lunch after bible study last week I asked two of my companions, both with medical training, if they knew of anything I could do to relieve the twitching of my eye. I attributed its origin to stress. My medical intuitive friend stopped what she was doing and focused her concentration on my energy. Her read was that I was holding on to something that had to do with someone else's concerns, and her counsel was that I detach myself from the outcome of the scenario in question.

I've known about medical intuition for several years. I learned of it through the work of Carolyn Myss (pronounced mace, for those of you that wonder) while I was in seminary and became fascinated by the notion of reading intuitively a person's energy to discern something of their health and physical well being. According to Myss our biography becomes our biology: what happens to us is stored in our bodies at a cellular level and affects our physiology. The examples she uses to illustrate this are fascinating, and the art/science of this make sense to me. When I learned that one of my bible study participants was a medical intuitive I felt like I had received a double blessing from God. I now had the opportunity to look at life through this different lens.

There are multiple things at work here. When Medical Intuitive friend told me that at issue was someone else's difficultly, I immediately thought of a family situation that reared its head recently. The matter affects Ken very directly, but since what affects him also affects me there is complexity in this. I also have relationships through him, so I am affected by this on several levels: one is my concern for how this impacts and plays out for Ken, one is how the effect of this on him affects our relationship, and one is how my relationship with the person(s) in question is affected.

In terms of the former, I can advise and counsel, but the action is up to Ken. Although I understand the idea of detaching myself from the outcome, especially since it is not "my" outcome, this is truly a challenge, since the outcome will have considerable consequences on our life one way or the other. Yet Medical Intuitive friend suggested that though this matter was involved in what I was "holding" physically, there were other things, too. Things that are not mine. And trust is involved.

This is where it gets dicey for me. The idea of holding someone else's stuff makes sense, and yet is unconscious. I get it, intuitively, but the specifics are not available to me at present. Accessing those specifics is the critical first part. Doing the work of releasing them will involve some intense work of changing my behavior, and in so doing, impacting Ken's behavior. I was totally unaware that I was holding his stuff, but simultaneously it makes sense that this is true. Without betraying the tangled wounds that are Ken's story, my compassion for him and what he has experienced is bound up in the unspoken contract of my commitment to him. And the trust part? The foundation of my relationship with him is my experience of his trustworthiness.

So I have stuff to unpack in the "let's isolate the parts and deal with each one" sense, as well as the shedding of what I have been holding--someone else's baggage--sense. It's intricate and tender and in need of healing. But this is the journey before me, before us. Prayers are coveted, and support desired. It's going to be an interesting road to travel.