After my last post (and essential meltdown), the words “healing” and “home” remained in my mind, heart and spirit. As I went to bed December 31, I felt them moving throughout my body and integrating into the deepest parts of me. I woke up New Year’s Day and they were still heavy on my mind. Why? Why those particular words? What did they mean? I’ve never been one to “pick a word” for the new year, as I know many do. When I try to even think of a word and sit with it my overwhelmed spirit won’t allow it to sit long or fester. It usually feels too uncomfortable and too daunting (to even engage any hard things outside of work) at the time. I knew I needed healing, on many levels, and I knew how important and how vast the meaning of home was beginning to feel. I woke up New Year’s Day hopeful yet feeling nothing… just numb and disappointed. However, around 4pm eastern time January 1, 2023, I woke again from a nap. From said nap, I woke up feeling a shift in my spirit. I remain baffled by this. I had hit a bottom that I honestly wasn’t sure I’d be able to get up from and up until this time I felt the same as I had ending 2022.
My need to end 2022 was greater than previous years. I was ending 2022 with anger, burn out, exhaustion, feeling numb, disillusioned and stunted. I had pulled out my computer the day before Christmas with the purpose of resigning from my job because I had had enough. I love my job as a chaplain, but it had become so much more than that: complicated, lonely, and lost. I resolved New Year’s Eve that this next year would be different. It had to be different. There was no other option. It began different because this was the first New Year’s Day I had not worked in years. My colleague picked up this shift and I was able to stay home and bring in the new year with my family. Amazing what one day can do. It was more than a specific day, even though I’m still in awe. The week into the new year I met with two of my colleagues and learned that the last week of Christmas break they had kept me from the string of madness happening at the hospital. I was on PTO and it was respected. They knew I needed this time away and they protected that for me. I’ve never felt more seen and more cared for within my department in a very long time. This was an amazing way to start the new year. I felt healing begin.
So, my words. Healing: I believe this is a year of healing for me- emotionally, mentally, and spiritually. Moving into a space of receptivity and desire to move forward from burn out, taking care of my whole self, is my focus this year. I believe this will transfer greatly in my professional and personal life, my identity as a chaplain, wife, mother, family member and friend. I have all the players in place to help me on this journey this year and now it’s time to engage whatever path may arise. Home: I picked the title of this blog years ago: The Journey Home. I believe I have been on a journey of coming home to my inner most being as I have worked through identity issues, spiritual and religious issues and interpersonal issues. I have been coming home to myself and this integrated whole, and I believe this is the year I come home to me, to my intimate relationships, and to a God that has always been there but I needed to get to know again. I also believe this is the year that I be home (in the literal sense) as opposed to always being at work. I am anxious and excited about what this year is going to look like. As Sue Heck created “The Year of Sue,” I hope this is a year where I can focus on me and what is means to engage healing and home.
The Journey Home 