Your full potential, and the possibilities that it creates, lie within you right now – always did, always will. I think back to my late high school friend Carolyn Alexander, someone who struggled with her mental health, and advocated to support others in their journey.
There is still too much silence and ignorance around the need for mental health awareness. Earlier this month was #WorldMentalHealthDay (on the 10th of October). When I thought about Carolyn, this morning, I wanted to show support for her message by sharing this with you. Carolyn was fond of saying: “The present moment, infinitely rich in resource and blessing is accessible to me now, and always; the sign reads simply, ‘Inquire Within’. “And I have chosen to share excerpts from Carolyn’s story and her wisdom, in her own words:
Pencil to Paper
by Carolyn Alexander
“With mechanical pencil in hand, many blank sheets of paper on my clipboard and propped up on my bed, I began a personal odyssey to bring the inside of me out.
I was forty-four years old in 1998, when I was diagnosed with adult-onset bipolar mood disorder. In the writing of this one sentence, I was swept into an unforeseen and splendid collaboration with life, leading me to personal empowerment that I wouldn’t trade for a thing.
Even though I was certain that writing this story was my soul’s work, it has taken courage to tell of my experience with mental illness. Could I endure the shame I felt? Could I push through the embarrassment of it? Could I rejoice in myself, despite several of those close to me wishing me to be silent and to pretend it never happened? Would they withdraw themselves from me? Could I overcome deep fear? Should I reveal intimate details, knowing that the more personal a story, the more universal its appeal?
How faithful life was on New Year’s Day, inspiring me to trust its guidance. Just when I would find myself wondering whether I really should continue telling my truth or not, I’d hear a song on the radio or come across a poem or read a magazine article that seemed to be written just for me. Wanting to put down my pencil one day, for fear of what others might think of me, I happened to watch a courtroom drama in which one of the characters was named Carolyn, and another’s last name was Alexander. Not long after I began writing, I heard a woman say to her friend, ‘He is from Belgium.’ I was born in Belgium. And so it has gone with coincidences, each one telling me to ‘Keep going!’.
Encouraged by a friend with whom I shared each new piece, not only did I write every day, after tucking myself into bed at night I read and re-read my story, often falling asleep with its pages lying on my heart. Yielding to that which wanted to come forward in me, and owning it more all the time, I came face to face with supreme joy; I fell in love with myself; the whole of myself. I don’t know how better to say it.
And as it happens, today is November 2nd – my 60th birthday – and I have now completed writing the second story that I’d wanted to tell for many years, as well. I didn’t see this coming. 2013 has been a harbinger of tremendous blessing; I was able to write about my spiritual journey in ‘Pursuing the Mystery with my Hair on Fire’ because I had found courage to own the part bipolar mood disorder has played in my life.
Putting pencil to paper resulted not only in me telling my stories, I have now gone public with them; I’ve published them on blogs for anyone to read who wishes to. Sharing them this way is my final act of ownership, shouting to the listening universe, I love my life!
Such is the power of storytelling to transform; to guide each of us toward an understanding that we have stories to tell which are vital, not only for our own enrichment, but for that of the global community to which we belong. I wonder if you, my reader, have a story just waiting to be told. Please receive what I have shared as my personal invitation to put ‘pencil to paper’ and to tell what only you can: your story!”
I invite you to have a read of her story. ‘Pursuing the Mystery With my Hair on Fire’ can be found at http://pursuingquestions.blogspot.com”
I invite you to consider your story? Can honoring this story support you? Can sharing it, possibly, support another?
