Learn to Dance in the Rain - episode 154
Laura Wakefield is yet another woman who chooses to live fully. She even coined the word “joyfulicity” to express the way she approaches life. She believes what her dad taught her - approach life with childlike curiosity, be excited about it, and look for the good. Laura is all about it.
While life didn’t go exactly as she planned, this single mother of nine has learned the value of a good pivot. It means changing course just a bit and continuing onward. As Laura shares in her favorite quote “Life isn’t about waiting for the storm to pass but learning to dance in the rain.” (Vivian Greene)
Curious. Creative. Relationship-based.
— Laura Wakefield
The Tall Order
Thoughts from Learn to Dance in the Rain
“Pain is a big attention getter,” Laura shared during our conversation. Of course she is right. There are so many kinds of pain. There is the physical type which can be chronic, and debilitating, or minor and temporary, and everything in between. Then there is the pain of the heart. Not in the cardiac sense but in the love-and-lost kind. I think this is the kind Laura was referring to. Who has not had their heart broken? It seems to be something we all end up going through eventually.
There is heartbreak in loss. Loss of a relationship or loss of a person who passes on. The pain is real and you feel it in your body through sadness, malaise, tears, a sense of dread, big emotions, sleeplessness, a need to talk about it, a penchant to relive it, the compulsion to listen to sad songs that you are sure were written for you for just this occasion. Take a look at songs, movies, plays and books and you will see how much we all have in common when it comes to loss.
Ok, so you’ve been feeling the feelings, processing the experience, wishing it were different and slowly realizing it isn’t going to be. That person is likely not coming back especially if they now reside in heaven. Or if it’s a relationship you’ve lost, it’s possible it may not be over, but it might be, and you need to get to a place of acceptance.
I think the antidote is the same for any kind of loss. Once you’ve fully grieved it’s time to move on, live your best life, be your best self. It’s a tall order I know. Yet it’s really the only way. It’s healthy for starters. And do you really think your loved one who has passed wants you to stop living, to be bitter, to suffer beyond what is reasonable? It is certainly not for their benefit, and it is not for yours. How about you honor the love you had for that person by being all that you can be. They would want that for you, and if they didn’t that speaks perhaps to an unhealthy state of mind.
When it comes to the loss due to a major change in the status of a relationship, the remedy is still the same. I imagine you’ve met people as I have who have hit that fork in the road where they have a choice to make. Typically it’s a choice that someone slides into without really thinking about it, but it’s a choice just the same. Will you take the road to the left and stay stuck in what was, become bitter by what cannot be. These people are unwilling or unable to process and progress. It’s sad. It’s disappointing. It’s a waste. A waste of your life, of the passions you could be sharing with purpose, sharing them out in the world. Punishing yourself will not change your relationship status. It will only keep you in one place.
What if you took the road to the right? The road that says, yes, I’ve had this heartbreaking experience and I’m not fully over it yet. I want to keep going to honor the love that was lost and to honor myself. That means I will start with giving myself permission to live a full life and all that that entails. I will not cheat myself out of joy, and I will laugh again. I will learn. I will have adventures. I will show up in my life as me.
I have walked this road before a few different times. The betrayal in a romantic relationship, the letting go of an unhealthy friendship, the release of a dysfunctional family member, and lastly the death of a child. I felt all the feels, I processed, I survived. And then I thrived. I did it for him. I did it for me.
I will not cheat myself out of joy.
— RCN
