Reconciling With My Covert Healer Self

[October 9, 2023]

At the beginning of the year, I called my friend Onur and shared with him the sorrow I was in. There was no apparent reason behind my sadness except maybe for the dark days of the Dutch winter. And he simply advised me to let myself feel it. He said he’s been familiar with this emotion for quite some time and that forcing yourself to smile when your heart is in distress really is the worst. Let yourself cry if you feel like crying, he said. What has worked for him over the years is to isolate himself with books during those not-so-fun days until the clouds clear up. Then, he goes back to the world to be his wild social self. This is part of the waves of life, to move through its many shapes and textures and colours with as little resistance as possible. I remember how comforting it felt to hear his words. It was the warmest of embraces because I knew he understood exactly what I was going through.

I think about this exchange to remind myself of the power of connection and what a safe space truly feels like.

Because I have (and still) struggled to offer and receive with so much generosity and openness. With no judgment.

But recently, with the determination of another friend, Thor, who is currently going through a profound transformation, I have been forced to see the shadow corners of my ways of showing support to loved ones. How utterly self-centred and driven by fear they were. How judgmental and disrespectful of their soul journey I was. My energy was oriented to fixing their problem fast so I could finally be okay with myself and breathe. I was focusing on fixing their problems so I could become the hero of their story. I was showing up in a cowardly way to make sure that my smartness, skills, and ability to make the world go round were obvious even to the blinds. “What a great healer I am!”- my behaviour was imposingly screaming. Showing support to my friends became a way of showcasing the superiority of my knowledge and talents and self. Rather than creating bridges to connect, I created distance in every way possible. 

I was othering others, myself included because I was unable to truly receive what they were sharing with me. Because giving is not so much about doing or saying anything. It is simply about being present, receiving, and allowing the experience to fuel you.

Which is what I am currently learning to do with that friend, Thor. The honesty of our recent conversations has brought me so much peace, however apocalyptic the topics on the table were. In these exchanges there was no dissociation between the receiver and the giver, we were both, because we were present with one another, because we felt understood by one another.

Every conversation I am now understanding is an invitation to look inward and discover new layers of my being. But instead of accepting those opportunities, I used to judge them, sizing them up and down with the hidden agenda of my covert healer self on the forefront, seeking approval. And I believe this is what happens when you don’t own yet your destiny, you secretly practice who you want to be, no matter the needs of the person beside you. That’s why we get envious and insecure and jump on paths that are not ours.

 “I need my friend, not a guru!” These words were thrown at me by my beautiful friend a few years ago, and I now understand their weight. Because I was treating him, without his consent,  as my audience and patient, a guinea pig on whom I could secretly test new tools.

Learning to move inward, sitting with and accepting whichever version of myself I am in the moment is also teaching me to share more openly, with no fear of judgment. Indeed, locking myself up in the guru seat was making it difficult to accept my fallible humanness. This explains why I was asking for help, like a pretend doctor attempting to self-diagnose in front of an audience. The Miss Independent that I was, was too full of herself to admit that she needed others. I was too full of myself to own my truth.

 But new days are rising and I am learning that giving and receiving are two sides of the same coin. That, when sitting in love with a friend, moving at their pace and respecting their path, there is no part of ourselves that is ever betrayed or left behind. If anything really, exchanges of such depth are spaces where our souls reveal themselves to us. 

I am learning to float in the warm embrace of life and move as gracefully as I can through its waves.