A long pause for finding my song

It is has been really long since I picked up my camera and went for shoot or typed out all the posts that I keep writing in my head every single day. Yeah, it is very unlike me. 

I have been experiencing a strange phase off lately! There are times when something within you compels you to be silent and stay still. Times when you naturally remain withdrawn and just witness the world around you and listen! I believe, when our heart leads us somewhere, it is always for a reason and when the inner core revolts for serious attention, we need to follow and find out the reason behind it.   

There is range of emotions I have experienced in last few months; from feeling irresolute, conflicted, discordant, uneasy, unmoved, uninspired and sometimes completely numbed, overwhelmed with the challenges life continues to pose incessantly. 

If you are a regular reader of this blog you would know my mother in law is fighting cancer. After two surgeries and a heart attack last year, there are signs of cancer being relapsed and some serious psychiatric issues are getting very complex to cope up with. Being the primary care taker of such patients is devastatingly difficult and it can devour your physical, mental and emotional stamina and at some point you wish to run away from it all because beyond a point, it becomes far too much to deal with. The realization of helplessness slowly sinks in and you learn that there is absolutely nothing more left in you to offer. 

Cancer not only kills its victims, it brings a paradigm shift within families, its equations and tests its strength each passing day. The experience breaks you piece by piece and your heart compels you to go on "silent mode". Usually this change brings us closer to who we really are, allowing us to discover our true self and to be more authentic. In the process, we heal not by fixing the broken but by rediscovering ourselves in those fragments and let the pain reveal some frightening mysteries of life and help us learn to accept the change we must surrender to, unconditionally.

 

Yeah, it is difficult to have faith in God sometimes in such situations but he keeps sending signals. Like yesterday, I received a beautiful mail from a very dear friend and he writes, "You are hurting. Start writing! Get out of house with that camera. Claim yourself back. You need to find your song back girl!" He shared the following story.

"Finding your song"

There is a beautiful tradition within the Ubuntu African tribe. When a woman knows she is pregnant, she goes into the jungle with other women and together they pray and meditate until they get the “song” of the child. Once they get it, it is a custom to teach the song to the rest of the tribe. When the child is born, the tribe comes together and sings the song over the child. It becomes a beautiful part of their identity.

The song continues to be sung over them as they grow. When they fall ill or get injured, disturbed or are not in their spirits they get picked up and someone sings their song back to them. It is about reminding them who they are and singing them back into their true identity. 

Isn't it lovely to have someone in your life who knows your song very well, cares to remind you and loves you truly to sing it back to you when you need to listen to it? I have journeyed through seasons when I have needed my ‘song’ sung back to me. 

I hope to get back my tune at the earliest.