Finding Serenity

I arrived too early into this world. Patience was something that I had never had, not even for my birth. I was born at the Saint John General Hospital in the fall of 1980 and weighed only 5 lbs 5oz. I have very few details surrounding the day of my birth. Anyone I have to ask now was either not present at the time or was too young to remember the details thoroughly. What I do have are some photos from that time. I looked content in these pictures, and my mom and dad seemed happy to have me. I would stare at these pictures for long periods of time, wondering if they had been glad to have me. I would not feel like others wanted me at all for much of my earlier years. It didn’t matter how hard anyone tried to show me or tell me they did. I seemed to have an existential feeling of loneliness and emptiness from the time I was born. It was a loneliness and emptiness that I unknowingly would have to learn how to fill from within. My greatest lesson is learning that happiness comes from a place within instead of outside ourselves. It is one I’m still working on assimilating deep into my mind and releasing my false beliefs. I wish that I could tell you that I have many happy memories as a child. I have a few memories that I’m ambivalent about, a couple that I could consider satisfying and many more that I would consider to be devastatingly painful and traumatic. I tried my best for the past forty + years to move on, overcome the trauma and not let these hurtful events impact me or hold me back. For the most part, I’ve succeeded. But not entirely. At least not in the traditional sense of the word. I found that what I once considered success has changed dramatically over the years and no longer matches the conventional sense of the word. Now, success looks like being absorbed into the pleasant and intoxicating freshness and delight of the present moment, regardless of our circumstances and surroundings. My very first memories are from a time in my life when my mom was married to a very kind man. My mom and dad had never married. My dad told me that they had been together for about four years off and on after I was born. Unfortunately, I do not have one memory from this time, though I desperately wish I did. When we were with my stepdad after, we had a dog and lived in a proper house, and he bought me toys and took us on trips. I remember being happy, but my picket fence story was very short-lived. Towards the end of their marriage, I remember sensing that something was about to shift in my life before anyone told me anything was wrong. I knew when I was a child that I was different from others. I could pick up on other people’s emotions, reactions and sometimes intentions before words or actions made them clear. It would not be until much later in life that I would realize that this sensitivity to my surroundings was a trait of the empath. I believe that all children are intuitive in the beginning. It is said that they still remember their purpose, god (spirit/universe/or whomever and whatever you call this divine force) and who they are at their core. I believe this to be true.