There's a point in your journey when you look around and go, where is everyone? Where are all those people who populated your experience for six decades? It's like, you're running along your path and turn your head left and right and realize, almost no one else is there. Now, in some cases, you may have blessed people and moved on, and in some cases they dropped out of sight on their own, but heck, they are certainly not where they used to be.
This is where I am so thankful for the irreplaceable Martha Beck. Her metaphor for this phenomenon is "the empty elevator," as in, new passengers can only come in when the old ones get off at a lower floor. In Steering By Starlight, she suggests (page 104) that "people around you can't stay connected with both the New You and their old patterns of behavior," and for a time we may be nearly alone on the elevator. She also says, who can blame them, really; "...why in the name of all that's holy would any sane person follow you into the ring of fire?" Why, indeed?
Waves of tsunamis have recalibrated my own inner wave-length, the signal I am sending out, and that means that many wavelengths in my vicinity are simply no longer in synch. Another metaphor I find comfort in is that of actors on a stage in a play, coming and going as they are needed...and at this specific moment of rebirth (the beginning of Act 3?), they are simply not needed onstage. Several times recently, I've dreamt that I am walking alone through a narrow passageway, and let's face it, there isn't much room in the birth canal, the eye of the needle, or the hourglass. If you are fortunate, you may have a nurse or midwife and a solid connection to the Divine, but physically, being reborn is a solitary phenomenon.
We women value friendship and connection. We want to love. Looking around and seeing a nearly "empty elevator" is heartbreaking. It triggers lifelong fears and terrors of being left for dead. I can live with the fact that I haven't been on the wavelength of our culture's notions of financial success or career fulfillment. But it would be hard indeed at 62, with no husband, children, or grandchildren, to accept that my love and beauty (and I think I am a fountain of them) haven't been successfully communicated, expressed or received. It would be too easy to judge this empty moment as the measure of a lifetime.
It is taking almost superhuman effort right now to trust that I am actively being reborn into a "place" of more joy, fulfillment, thriving and love. And no matter what, there is no going back. In an "all Love" universe, the fact that I care means I must be moving forward in Love's direction, and that I will soon find the people and places on my updated wavelength. The elevator will start to fill up. My boat and I will be back on the river. And I will look back on this scary phenomenal moment with tenderness.
