Back in 2020, when I attended Modern Elder Academy, I had the honor of spending some time with Saul Kup, a local Shaman who has a relationship with MEA. Saul seems to be an amazing being of beliefs and high spirituality with a gift for seeing. As someone who is in the midst of remembering that I too have these gifts, I’ve come to appreciate the significance of some of the things he shared with me. For this writing, I’m reflecting on him “seeing” my daughter. He said, he liked her. Today, I know he was seeing the her through the eyes of our relationship. Through my filters if you will. Funny, irreverent, and easy with big smiles and laughs.
He also touched my left ankle and asked what happened to her there. She had two significant injuries to the same ankle several years apart. I still don’t see the first one as anything meaningful yet, but the second one was from a bike accident where she dodged one threat in the form of a guy with headphones on who stepped off the sidewalk in front of her and got hit by a car from the other side. A bigger threat, if you will. This feels far more significant to me – dodging one only to get hit by another bigger threat.
Since then, I have become aware of injuries on my left side, and have run into several people who have experienced the same. As an observer of pattern recognition and perhaps the most curious person I know, I have to wonder if there is meaning to this.
The last person I spoke with was recently on a hiking trip in Patagonia. This trip was a repeat for her. She was attempting to reclaim the trip as her own this time since ending a relationship with the partner who made the trip with her last time. On the fourth day of this new week-long excursion, she wrecked her left ankle. In a move of bravery and toughness, she finished that “damned day” on her own., but it marked the end of her vacation. She thought, as many of us do, about the meaning of this vacation. She actually thought this was a sign that she made a mistake leaving him even though she is fully aware of his red flags.
Sometimes it’s hard to remember we are here to grow, so if we’re the type of people who are looking for signs, they should always be in our favor. Every once in a while we get a correction, but it should never show up in the form of getting back together with someone whose flags you know well and were deal breakers the first time.
I was able to help her see how independent and tough she was. Which is where she is. Bravely out here discovering who she is alone. That’s a big deal. She couldn’t do that tied to a partner. I don’t think it’s possible to develop strength in independence while tied to another person. We need to know who we are alone before we can serve as a partner. Strong people attract strong people. Put that in your pipe and smoke it.
I have another arthritic injury to my left pinky finger. My aura energy is pinkish-orangish, and I now understand this to be an attack on the energy of my existence -both who and what I am. I also think it being the pinky matters. I love cartoons, and for this example, the obvious choice is Pinky and the Brain – “What are we going to do tonight, Brain? Try and take over the World.” That’s what this dark energy is here for and why the response from me had to be a hard “no”.
Another cartoon comes to mind with the injury of my left great toe, which happened jumping off of giant boulders into a Honduran river. This injury is the one that left me contemplating the challenge vs the results. Some of you might recall the Big Toe episode of Courage the Cowardly Dog, where Eustace’s big toe got a demon infection who kept saying a la Edward G Robinson, “I’m the big toe, see?” I believe this former (because he’s now dead) big toe to be one of the five lead demons that came after me. I’m curious if the injury will heal now that I have proven that he is not, in fact, the big toe. I am. We’ll keep you informed.
The best part of all of this is that my journey of growth is served up in terms I can appreciate. Thank you Cartoon Network for a lifetime of metaphoric references.