Coming Home

It has been said  you can never go home once you leave; the rhythm is disrupted, out of sync, on a different road.  However, you can return, not physically, but emotionally, through the nether-land of memories and milestones that shaped who you are. Letting go of the physical is the hard part.

Remembering a hand, holding, or hitting, is physical, the feelings evoked is emotional. A walk in the woods or down a busy street brings back smells and sounds; physical senses. Feel what you felt then; wonder, fear, delight, excitement; emotions. A cry in the night heightens awareness. Is it a cry for help? Is it a cry in pain, or is it a soft cry of grief; a deep and guttural cry of despair? The sound is physical, what is felt, deep in the center of your being, is what you need to feel. It's what you need to go home.

Home... What is home?  Home is where you felt, just felt. Home is where you belonged, were a part of a whole. Home was the foundation that shapes who you are now, how you are, and where you are. Home might have been safe or home might have been a place from which you were desperate to escape; to leave and never return. Yet you do return. In the way you face adversity, the way you love, the way you hate. Home is from where your decisions are made. Home is the way you express emotions. Home is the direction, the weather vane that points you toward where you need to be. Where this is, may not be where you want to be. Be patient, wait for the shift in direction. Feel the shift, slight as it may be, but there nudging you quietly. Try a different path. Step out of the shadow. Duck under cover from the glare. Follow. Carve and create a direction of your own. Trust the emotions you feel, for now. Follow until the wind shifts again.

Finding home will take you back along the paths you chose or were chosen for you. This is where it gets tricky.  You'll come to crossroads and need to feel what you felt. Did you miss a turn, did you lose your way? Did you stride forward with purpose and conviction, only to come to a tangle of choices and turn back, missing the thread that might have brought you through?

Home...the first memories of who you are, where you are, how you belong is home. Home is a nurturing place where you fall asleep in loving arms. Home is where you know you will be great. Home is where you don't give up. Home is where you are heard. Home is where you can just... be. Home is your first direction.

Home...is not always the home of our dreams. Home cans also be a hurtful place, a place where there is little warmth. Home can be a place where there is confusion, fear, and despair. Home... a place you need to leave, and return to when you find the right path. Some find the way to change the direction their home placed them on, some do not. It is for those souls, wandering the short and narrow paths, that compassion and understanding need to take hold. The wounded soul that needs a resting place, too covered in armor to notice the gentle shift. Finding that road home is so very hard, often leading to dead ends, through thickets, thorny and tangled. But following your gut, will lead you to paths that were hidden to you as you forged blindly away from home. Listen to what you feel, follow your true North Star, it will lead the way. Believe.

They say you can't return home. You can return home. Home is within you. Home is where you are. Home is how you live, love and hate. You created home. Home is who you are. Welcome home.