Stone in Hand..

I practiced this little exercise that I had found at the end of one of the chapters in a book I am reading, "The Book of Forgiving," by Desmond Tutu & Mpho Tutu. The task was to find a stone to hold in your palm for 6 hours of your day starting in the morning. Pick a stone, any stone, I picked one of my crystals, the rose quartz one to be exact, so I could be filled with some love for this exercise. When I read what I was supposed to do I thought to myself well this is a little ridiculous, I'm going to hold a stone in my hand for 6 hours while I am working and I'm not supposed to let go of it for that entire time? So, I lasted the 6 hours, through typing, writing, attending meetings, and still in training..here I am with a crystal in my hand. I later got home to sit down and do the accompanying journal questions that followed this exercise and just wow!

So, imagine yourself doing this exercise and think of how this would feel for you? While I was doing this for the 6 hours I kept thinking to myself, there's gotta be a lesson in this, I'm going to learn something from this because I can feel that it's supposed to be similar to something to do with forgiving and forgiveness, hence the book title. The questions were along the lines of "What did you notice about carrying the stone? When did you notice it the most? Did it hinder any activities? Was it useful?" Then the next question came and I said Holy Shit, here's the lesson I knew that was coming. It read, "In what ways was carrying the stone like carrying an unforgiven hurt?" SOB! My answers to the previous questions were along the lines of yes it affected me needing to type, but it also was like a good fidget tool to have in my hand, it kept me more present and mindful of making sure I had the crystal at all times and in a sense it kept me occupied. The main thing for me was that it kept me present and very in the moment to everything around me and how I felt during all of this. And then the question of the comparison to carrying unforgiven hurt around, there was my answer and I couldn't run from answering that. I thought to myself, damn I found it hindering to be holding a crystal in my hand and affecting my work day, yet carrying around the bullshit in our thoughts 24/7 is okay? Our pain and hurt hold us back in the past of our every day lives in so many ways, yet we still choose to carry it around? Please tell me how dumb that sounds?

I couldn't believe it, I found the lesson in it and knew it would be life changing. We continuously choose to hold ourselves back because of the things that we can't seem to forgive from our past, yet we are only hurting ourselves and suffering internally, how fucking bananas does that sound now? Like a great idea right? Let's sign everyone up for that... no thank-you. Come to terms with your past, whether it's something you have done or was done to you. Face that shit, head on and let it hurt you all over again, come to terms with it and lay the egg already.

A good exercise that you can do for yourself, which my Mom randomly came up with, make a few lists for yourself. Write out a list of people who have hurt you in some way or another and really let it out to them on paper, whether it's how they made you feel or what they did to you. Then make another list of what good it is to be holding onto that bullshit and another list writing all of your good qualities about yourself and things that you love about you. Read the lists over and over a few times. Keep the list about yourself and light the other ones on fire, believe me it will feel amazing. No routinely reflect on the list about you, learn to love you again.

Try carrying a stone around for 6 hours and see how that sits with you afterwards and compare that experience to how you feel about carrying your pain and trauma still all day every day. Let me know how that works out for you, because it was another awakening for myself.

Be kind. Be authentic. Always choose love.