On miracles and mothers

A miracle is an authentic switch from fear to love. When we speak from the ego, we will call up the ego in others. When we speak from Holy Spirit, we will call up their love.

In 1967, my whole family fell apart. Mommy, Daddy, baby sister and I all ended up at separate addresses. I spent the next eight years living with my maternal grandparents—seven of those years in Norway. I saw my mother every two years during this, and my father and sister not at all. No wonder my parents’ divorce left me in such turmoil. It wasn't the end of just a marriage; it was the end of an entire family. The harm done was lessened with the love from my maternal grandparents.

The problem with not growing up under the same roof as your parent(s) is that you end up not knowing them. Nor they you.

For over 40 years, my mother and I struggled with having the label mother and daughter, but not the relationship.

In metaphysical circles, we are told we get the parents we deserve because we planned it that way. Rich parents, abusive parents, no parents—we set it up before we were born.

Today, at the age of 51, I can finally see the wisdom of my spirit’s choice. Without my mother, my path would have been quite different. Because in the middle of the fights and the screams and the passive aggressiveness (we were becoming masters at that), there was also Science of Mind, pride in being an independent woman (my mother taught me how to check the oil on my car), make-up and fashion lessons, a love of puns, and Canasta. And she gave me my awesome name; I love my name! She also gave me a spiritually aware grandmother.

Every time I look in the mirror I see my mother’s eyes and mouth. I apply make-up using skills she taught me decades ago. And I wish I were ambidextrous like her because it would make applying mascara a bit easier.

For the first time in all the years I’ve been seeing her in me, I have not tried to shrug the feeling away; I have not brought up my old desire to be nothing like my mother. Now the features I’ve inherited from her are a welcome reminder of her.

It’s welcomed because of a miracle.

We all come into this life with some lesson to learn, some kink to work out. For those of us into reincarnation, we know that the people we have the most intense (good or bad) relationships with are also the people who love us enough to help us learn in this life.

In spite of knowing this, I have spent over 30 years constantly revisiting and protesting at the injustice of having a difficult mother, at times also claiming I am unloved and unwanted, and I can prove it! The thousands of miles between us have been a blessing, dammit!

The entire world is blessed by the presence of healed people. […] ‘When I am healed, I am not healed alone.’

Last year, I tripped over the word ho’oponopono, a Hawaiian word that means to make right. Ho’oponopono is a forgiveness method. In searching for more information about this method, I heard of the book “Disappearance of the Universe”, which led me to “A Course in Miracles”. That last is still a bit heady of a read, so I detoured via Marianne Williamson’s “A Return to Love” (from which all quotes in this blogpost are from).

Williamson’s book was what I was reading when I visited my friend Ann in California this past Christmas. Just after New Year my mother drove from Nevada for lunch with me. The morning of her visit, I found myself doing the ho’oponopono thing: Acknowledging my responsibility in the situation I was in.

As I thought about meeting my mother again for the first time in over four years, my head filled with Williamson’s description of what loving relationships are, I thought about my difficult mother—and said to myself to be nice to her. After all, she’s had a difficult daughter; I had done my share of keeping my distance over these years.

And with that, something shifted. A calm inner knowing that that acknowledgement was what I needed in order to move forward.

During my mom’s visit, she suddenly started talking about how disappointed she was that I hadn't offered to visit her while in the States, and I mentioned asking for her new street address but getting her P.O. box one. I added something about my turn in making an assumption I probably shouldn't have made. And from there, the conversation shifted to a full apology from my mother about not having been such a good mother to me. The most amazing thing to hear for me! The one thing any hurt daughter wants to hear from her mother.

I told her I loved her. To her face. Something I had been loathe to do before.

And then we hugged, a good, squishy, tight hug, and neither wanted to let go. I can't remember when—if ever—we'd hugged like that. We did it three times.

Decades of pain just … gone. A miracle.

Healing occurs in the present, not the past. We are not held back by the love we didn’t receive in the past, but by the love we’re not extending in the present.

A new pain crept in. Now it hurt to see her leave.

But that’s the one pain we are supposed to feel with our loved ones.

This is my mother (on right) and her formerly difficult daughter:

I am proud of my mother. I am proud of where she’s taken herself over the years, how she has always stayed strong, shouldered her mistakes and learned from each one. Now she’s passing that on to others, as a practitioner at her church. All that life experience bundled into one charming, elegant and witty woman. I genuinely like my mother, and I am happy to introduce her to you.

Mom, thank you for all the healing in this lifetime.

I love you so much.

Your daughter,
Keera Ann