I tapped on the physical pain I’ve been having and continue to have in my hip and when it first started. I found the belief that one little mistake will ruin everything and the fear behind that.  As I sit a day later, I now can also recognize the anger behind that belief and the state of being it led me to live in.  I was afraid of making mistakes when I was growing up because I was afraid that I would be the straw that broke my mothers back. I was afraid I’d be the one to f*%k everything up and that I would get blamed for it. I also found the pain in my hip connected to the fear of leaning on anyone; not trusting that anyone had the strength to hold me; not trusting anyone to be able to help; needing to take on everything so that I could control it; and only trusting myself to do it all.  I could feel the intense weight of all of it as I ran.  My refusal to be vulnerable because I didn’t trust anyone to hold me. I could feel the release several times as tears and surges of emotion came forward. As I continued to acknowledge and physically, emotionally and mentally release from the past, I then naturally shifted into acknowledging the grounded truth of the past and present. The truth of my mother’s strength. She was and is a warrior. That she survived so much and that although she may have bent, no one could break her.  In truth, a slip of mine out of perfection and into being human certainty would not have. That her strength is my strength and one I carry and one that’s been carried through our family line and is passed down to my daughters. We are all warriors. 

My mother acknowledged the other day that she held the same place of being the good one that never did anything wrong in her family, how scared she was of making mistakes, and the burden of this.  My Aunt on the other hand shared how at 16, when my Mom had already been to and from church with her mother (my nana) for early mass, my Aunt would proceed to tell her mom she was going to the later mass and instead go out to breakfast with their (at the time) 8 yo little brother and then give him driving lessons in a parking lot. My mother with regret shared her wish that she had misbehaved and been “bad” a little more and I wished it for her too.  Maybe my mother will learn to misbehave, maybe she won’t.  Maybe I’ll let go of the fear deeply and completely of making mistakes, maybe I won’t.  What I can assure you of is that I will do everything in my power to only pass down our legacy of strength to my daughters and not the need for perfection, the fear of making mistakes, or the belief that no one can support us or love us exactly as we are – imperfectly perfect. May my daughter’s make mistakes, “misbehave” to the degree necessary to live freely and powerfully, and may I have the clarity of vision, the strength of character, and the healing necessary to hold them through it all.