Naturally, this was thrilling.  We wanted to hear more, so we wrote back,

…If there are specific issues that beset you, let us know; we love to blog about them and help others as well. Thank you again for writing.

She obliged us by writing a detailed reply:

well I just lost my bf to domestic violence. It’s been ongoing but I thought I could heal both of us at the same time. Luckily I am in therapy…so to speak…my dr doesn’t believe in mental illness labels and coaches us to recognize our triggers and act in healthy ways. I’ve been doing this work for years but at 41 it’s finally making an impact on my inner personal life. For the first time in years I’ve managed to have more positive days than not. However I’m moving backwards down the healthy outlet road. Too many things are happening at once and none of them positive. I’m closer to discovering the financial blocks that are keeping me from living my best life now but it’s so difficult. I need to stay focused for the long haul but more than a few weeks is next to impossible with 2 young children not quite in grade school… next year and 2 adult children who’re struggling with issues from my bad parenting. Everyday could be a struggle just to smile but I do and keep on keeping on but I get discouraged. I have maybe $2 left for the rest of this month. I’m on a fixed income where the money trickles in between the 1st and the 6th and after bills and my daughters I have really nothing left. I haven’t washed clothes in 2 months. I don’t have the money lol I’ve got to make sure the kids clothes are washed and this month I helped my older daughter with some financial stuff. She’s having a hard time getting motivated to find work and she’s wants to be model so she’s doing that and discovering she’s going to need so much. I’d like to be a life coach helping woman men teens families like myself who’ve been beaten up/down by life and don’t know how to make a go at it. I’ve learned so much but I’m unable to turn it into something. Like Mike Klingler talks about in coaching cognition I need to discover a way to turn my core values into a marketable asset. Everyday for the past 3yrs this has been my focus but I can’t see it. With my struggles I don’t see how anyone will listen to me. Well as you can guess there’s a lot. I feel on the one hand pretty positive about what I have-in my heart and mind-but on the other hand experience is tellling me it’s not going to happen. I write and sing as well and that’s going nowhere fast. I feel like a happy failure which makes me sad beyond belief. I simply keep drudging along lol I won’t give up!!!

And so we wrote this post, which we do hope will be helpful to others who feel like our new colleague does:

“We tell ourselves stories in order to live” (Joan Didion, The White Album).  All our stories are true until we stop telling them.  What works, in my experience, is seeing and telling ourselves over and over a much larger story that includes all the facts of the case of a story that has been bothering us–but plays them out on a much larger and much more beautiful stage. This larger story just is True, because in Truth, it is the story of each soul’s journey, always the journey to greater Oneness.

An important RAISING CLARITY practice is storytelling. Check out the following book at the library–remembering that a local library will help you get books from any other library in-state and often out of state, through interlibrary loan: Viktor Frankl’s book, Man’s Search for Meaning. Here is a link that contains external links to online excerpts.  What made the difference between life and death to Frankl and those he knew in a WWII concentration camp was the stories they were telling themselves. This storytelling thing is no small matter or frivolous trick. The absolute firm, foundational trust I own because of this book is that the largest story we are telling ourselves is of literally life-giving importance.

Leave the “happy failure” story aside rather than fighting it or trying to change it. Know you are an intricate part of a much larger story you thrive within. All your experiences make sense within this much larger story. You can see some of this larger story now. If you will set aside time, you will continue to see more of this story and you will begin to trust it. It will become the foundation on which you walk a different path. Let Love tell you Your story.

One of the greatest free resources online to nourish this gift of seeing your new, larger story is Robert Moss’s blog where you can search on any keyword you like (“healing” is one of my favorites), and subscribe. You might also enjoy Robert’s Facebook posts (look up both Robert Moss, and Robert Moss Dreams, they are different by the same person). I love Robert’s work.

We’d love to know how this works for you in a month or so of practicing, and anything else that arises before that.