This is where I leave you, she said

The transformation that happened while I was at Ignite 2015 didn’t start the day I walked in the door. It started more than a year ago when I was here in Utah for a retreat. I received a Shamanic healing from a wonderful woman and released the energy of my mother.

Sidebar: my mom and I had a very contentious relationship. She loved me more than life itself and I ran away from that smothering love as fast as I could. I think I represented all that she felt she could not achieve in this life and so often (I felt) lived through me. Releasing her energy meant that I could be more of myself and less swayed by energies and thought forms from her life.

It has taken me one year to process releasing that energy and finding my way to just Lisa.

Doing that work involved returning to ye old corporate place of employ, realizing that I could no longer be caged (literally or figuratively) and that I had to be the one to stand up and say “I have to go.”

It involved losing a friendship (or what I thought was a friendship) and claiming that I wanted people to care about me in the way I care about them. It involved so many tears, I can’t even begin to tell you.

Through all of that, I learned who I am, underneath the layers of pretense and fears of being unloved.

So, when I entered the doors of Ignite, a transformational experience and so much more, I had a sense of something brewing.

The first day we did a guided meditation led by the wonderful woman who helped me release my mother’s energy last year.

In mine, I was ice skating (a thing I’ve never really done in my life) at a hockey rink. It was small and darkish.

But I was on skates, just gliding around on my own. In the vision, I skated over and took Duty’s hand and pulled him onto the ice with me. We skated together in this interesting way, bent over at the waist, facing forward and skating as fast as we could together, him holding me so so so tight as if to say “I’ve got you. Let’s go faster!”

We skated back to the edge and then I saw my cousin’s 3 sons who skated out and danced all around me.

Skated back to the edge and there was my sweet sweet Lauren who came out to meet me on the ice as we danced and twirled together in a golden light. As I took her back to the edge, I saw my mom and dad, grandmom and grandpa and Aunt Janet all waving to me from the sidelines.

Finally, I skated back to the middle of the ice and danced alone, in the spotlight.
This was such a profound vision to me that I found myself in a puddle of tears, head down on the table, soaking the tablecloth with them.

I know what this means (it’s hella obvious, amirite?) but it was made so clear to me on night #2.

As I sat at the table waiting for the event to begin for the evening, I felt a sharp edge on my finger. It was my mom’s ring that I’ve worn for much of my adult life. This ring, given to her by her parents when she was 16 (so it’s about 70 years old at this point) is one of my treasures. And this ring had broken apart, a separation on the left side of the band.

The symbolism of that was not at all lost on me.

Here in Utah, where just last year my mom’s energy was separated out from mine, it became real.

When I went back to my room, my mom’s spirit came to me and said exactly this:
“I’ve carried you this far, for better or worse. You’re on your own now. This is where I leave you.”

And it was said with so much love, as if she knew it was time.

I know (and she reassured me) that she’s not going anywhere – she is right where she’s always been – in my heart. And yet, it was clear that her energy truly separated out from mine in this place.

In another small meditation on the final day of the event, I saw the ice skating rink. This time, it was huge. Like Olympic sized and there were bright lights and big space. I skated out and alone on that big ice, so happy to be there. So happy to hear the music and skate to it on my own.

A powerful drum circle closed out the energy of the event. As I beat that drum with 60 other women in a room full of high vibration and grounded energy, I realized, this is who I am. Authentically me.

I am here. Finally.

The work I’ve done over the past year has gotten me here. More work will show up (as it does) to take me where I’m going.

I open the door and say Welcome.