Out of the Ashes

As part of the looking back and looking forward that so many of us engage in at the beginning of a calendar year, I have been thinking of changes I wanted to make last year. And since I have been trending glass-half-empty of late, I am especially noticing those that didn't happen.


A year ago on this date, I wrote about having recently taken part in a ritual dubbed a Fire Communion by many Unitarian churches.  In my congregation's interpretation, each participant fed into the fire a written phrase emblematic of a story we wanted to let go of. I wrote, and relinquished to the flames, "the wind beneath everyone else's wings."


With that action, I intended 

. . . to claim more of my energy for my own.  I have been immersed in nurturing others for more than three decades, and it feels like time to shift the balance. . . .I have depleted myself too much in all this caretaking, caregiving, and just plain caring.  I have allowed my nurturing self to devour equally important parts of my identity.  And I need to let go of the idea that any or all of these beings and causes will plummet to earth without my constant attention.  I can, and have to, begin to live more in my own life.

People close to me would make the case that I haven't moved far off that mark. 

So did the ritual fail?


My husband and I have frequent conversations about "spirituality," which I own up to, and he insists is not part of his life.  Wikipedia introduces the concept in this way:

Spirituality can refer to an ultimate or immaterial reality; an inner path enabling a person to discover the essence of their being; or the “deepest values and meanings by which people live.”

It is hard for me to imagine anyone not experiencing this aspect of human existence, even if only subconsciously.  But at any rate, as an agnostic, I don't hold too strongly to many of the views and practices which claim my attention.  Nor do I feel certain that they aren't of value. But at least at the level of intention, my disposing of what pop pathologizers would label "codependency" was authentic.  But damn if it didn't rise again from the fiery cauldron that claimed it.


And you know that scene in Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix, where Fawkes the Phoenix bursts into flames, and is reborn as a chick?  And how moved we all were at his regenesis?  Well, trust me, I feel no such redemption in the stubborn clinging to life of this self-limiting trait of mine.  When I threw it into the fire, I meant for it to disintegrate, and to stay that way.


What I take from this failure, I guess, is that magic alone is not going to be enough to rid me of this characteristic.  It will probably take vigilance, and effort, and forgiveness of my slow-changing self.  


Or maybe the resilience of my overnurturance, in the face of actions to destroy it, signifies some value in all my other-directed feelings and actions, and a need to tame rather than torch them.  


Perhaps I can learn something from this rite and the limits of its alchemy.  Something to shape my expectations with respect to the "sadness and anger" that I tossed into a solstice night fire last month.

Burning Off: Communing in Flame

Fire has been presenting itself to me as metaphor, solution and ritual of late.  This past Sunday, I attended a “Fire Communion” at my Unitarian church.  Having been born into Catholicism, I’m a sucker for communions of all sorts, and this denomination of religious refugees provides several—flower communion, water communion, bread communion.  This was my first fire communion.

The artfully organized service contained several elements that provoked, quieted and inspired me.  But the centerpiece was the opportunity to write words on a small piece of flash paper representing a story I wished to let go of, and to add this story to those of others being released into the fire.

I have been moving into a time of sorting, assessing, reclaiming, and discarding over the last few months.  I’m not sure where this is coming from, but I suspect that my impending empty nest, the significant birthday this year will bring, and the continuing process of trying to come to terms with the death of someone I loved all my life are acting together to fuel this consuming process.  So I was more than ready to consign any one of several outgrown stories to the flames.  But I had been told to use one piece of paper.  Being generally compliant—see Catholic background reference above—I didn’t think of violating this instruction.  And even if I had, it was hard enough to scribble a few words on one square of what turned out to be quite fragile paper in the time allowed.  I was forced, therefore, to settle on one story to relinquish.

I was taking this exercise seriously, and felt the compunction to identify the most important story to leave behind.  Or the story that subsumed the others.  The ultimate old story.  My ultimate old story, at this moment. 

As I moved to the front of our sanctuary to claim my piece of paper, I considered my choice, and struggled with language.  When I gripped my pencil, the words came to me.  I wrote “the wind beneath everyone else’s wings,” with no little difficulty, primarily because of the tendency of the sharp lead to puncture the paper fragment, but also because I wanted the words to be perfect—perfectionism another story I might have chosen to incinerate.

What did these words mean?  What story did they stand in for?  And what will it mean to move on from it?  What story will take its place?

Despite the cheesy Bette Midler throwback, I meant to convey my readiness to claim more of my energy for my own.  I have been immersed in nurturing others for more than three decades, and it feels like time to shift the balance.  My children, who have been the chief “beneficiaries” of my absorption, my husband, my aging mother, and my sister who has the major responsibility for Mom’s on-site support, hold the largest liens on my life.  And I am not planning to abandon any of them.  I intend to continue as the main caregiver for my two-year-old grandchild, nurse practitioner for my much-loved dog, underpaid nonprofit employee, and social justice activist in my church and other contexts. 

But I have depleted myself too much in all this caretaking, caregiving, and just plain caring.  I have allowed my nurturing self to devour equally important parts of my identity.  And I need to let go of the idea that any or all of these beings and causes will plummet to earth without my constant attention.  I can, and have to, begin to live more in my own life.

When my turn came, I dropped my words into the makeshift cauldron, savored the satisfying pfffft as the fire caught, and returned to my seat, leaving behind the carbon residue of my tired narrative.  I am eager to see, as the smoke clears, what emerges.