There comes a time in every woman’s life when we stop long enough to breathe, see and hear, to feel. We open our eyes wide and gaze across our surroundings, we listen to the deep pitches and tones of the day, we hard lean into each minute like a prized possession. In that very moment is when knowing happens. Maybe that’s why we stay so busy with every thing else, maybe that’s why life keeps us on the wheel of pursuit, the calendar full and in cycles or circles; because once you know a thing, you can’t undo a thing. You can’t undo what you know. You’re now forced with two options; to remain the same or do something with what you now know, like evolving into something/ someone that you’ve never known before; but perhaps have maybe always wanted to become.
Knowing unravels truths, it doesn’t protect agendas, it incites bravery and courage, real knowing doesn’t hide the facts or ignore the signals that you’re going in the wrong direction. Knowing beats against the blinders; it whispers, nudges, pushes and is sometimes downright disrespectful, hollering in your face… “There’s so much more than this. YOU are so much more than this and YOU KNOW IT.”
I remember the exact moment I abandoned my “knowing”, for crouching, for hiding and for numbing, ignoring for not really being free; not being me, really. That story you will have an opportunity to read. The disclaimer will say “Ha, I wish I would have known that sooner!”
Even more powerful than abandoning my “knowing” is when I collided with “knowing” once more, again. I was sitting on the front row of the church, at my mother’s funeral. She didn’t want a formal eulogy or a program so the preacher was kind to stand and speak a few words about her character. As he spoke, my mind drifted to the reality that every role I had lived for 40 years were taught, molded, expected and by some, demanded. Every bit of who I was, was attached to everything she was and now that was gone. In the still moment I began to swallow the reality of knowing my life would never be the same, and who I was no longer existed.
“She couldn’t be tamed”, the preacher said. These four words snatched me from the pieces of my identity that were going to be buried with her. “Untamed”, Holy spirit said, “if you could build a life that you love, what would that life look like?”, I replied, “Untamed, Holy Spirit, untamed.”
So, I built it. A life. An untamed life. I healed before I built. I stayed still for a year to breathe, see, hear, feel. I opened my eyes wide, I gazed across my surroundings and listened to the deep pitches and tones of my heart’s desires, my spirit’s needs and I leaned hard into each moment to discovery what being Untamed really meant for me; whole intentionally, happy unapologetically, present authentically and so much more. Once you know a thing, you can unknow, but you can learn to know something new. That new for me, was Me, a Woman Untamed.
