Retrieving Parts of Myself

I am studying and practicing Shamanism. It kind of goes along with my Meditation practices so it works for me. Finding and working with my Power Animal has been a great..wait..more than a great experience. I can't really put how I feel about this into words. Except maybe Magickal comes to mind.

The Soul Retrieval part..took me aback a bit. I am a firm believer that my soul is always intact. However, I will admit that along the way of this particular lifespan..I believe I have lost a few bits of me here and there along the way.

I think it was the word, "soul," that got me. Ok, fair enough. Labels are a part of the human condition. I am wise enough to know that when we label something it takes on a subjective life of its own. I won't go there now. I didn't when I decided to do the "soul retrieval" with my own labeling. Finding bits and parts of me.

It is interesting that when I began..I found myself reliving the time when my sister became ill. She was 7 and I was 10. She began throwing up, stumbling, screaming with head pain. Back in the 60's they did not have the diagnostic tools they have now..but what they had..was used on my sister. Nothing was spared.

After months of this..the night before her 8th birthday and when she was almost spent. They finally diagnosed her with a large brain tumor. And did surgery immediately. She was actually too weak and physically debilitated at this time but they, the doctors and my parents, had no choice. It was possible death if they removed it..eminent death if they did not.

I won't go into the details. I will just say it was a time that changed the course of all of our lives.
Nothing was ever the same again. My sister did survive with severe brain damage. My mom, my dad and I brought her home and taught her to walk, talk, eat and go to the bathroom all over again. I shoved so much of this down I cannot believe how painful this was. The years following were extremely difficult. But I survived it. While doing the "parts retrieval" and reliving this with my Power Animal I found a part of me that went by the wayside. I really didn't know what to do except to reassure this part of me that I was ok now..we were ok. and to urge her to come along and merge once again with the totality. It feels different..I feel different so I think it happened.

The next part of me I find is part of me a few years later. My poor parents were overrun and overwhelmed. My dad had just been diagnosed with Hodgkin;s Disease. My sister was stronger but still extremely debilitated physically, emotionally and mentally. She needed a lot of care. My father was valiantly working two jobs and my mother struggling to keep things going with my help. At that age..lacking the maturity to see past my own discomfort I was overwhelmed with pain for them, fear and a feeling of displacement in the family. I was 15..and felt that nothing I could do would ever cause them to pay attention to me over and beyond what I needed to do to keep my sister going.

OH can I see and understand this now. But then I couldn't. I found another piece of me that felt like nothing I ever did mattered to anyone. That I was invisible and scared all the time. I, once again, without words..attempted to reassure this part of me..that we were ok..we made it though this. And urged this part of me to come along. Again I felt a difference.

My Inner Guidance urged me to stop there. Even though I had a feeling there were way more pieces of me laying around in my life.


In retrospect, I am amazed that I am standing here now at my age..so very pleased and happy with myself. So grateful for all of my blessings. Wow. And also in retrospect I now believe that the part of me that kept me going no matter what was the part of me that was so unsettling to everyone else around me., including my family. Well except for my paternal grandparents. They were the ones that made me see that some people have abilities that go beyond the normal scheme of human sight and awareness. I was able to accept this because they were so accepting of it.

My psychic ability, the things I saw and heard that weren't of this world, while unsettling to me were actually giving me support to get through the pain. I am so grateful. To my Guidance and my Grandparents. These things were the basis of my spirituality and survival. Wow, I never really saw this in quite this way. I knew I suppose somewhere..but never acknowledged it in words before.