My 2016 involved solicitor battles, near homelessness and a terrible sense of powerlessness. But from powerlessness came empowerment.
Early in the year, my landlord’s wife died and after 13 years living in a very small open-plan flat with my best friend Mike, the inevitable happened. We were asked to leave.
At the time we didn’t have the funds to leave. Because of some legalities we were never able to receive help prior (even though we were legally entitled to it) and for a long time we both felt trapped in a catch 22 situation. We were damned if we did and damned if we didn’t. We felt caught in a trap of our own making and all areas of our lives felt stilted and blocked living at our previous home.
Judged – Sworn At – Slandered!
We were judged, sworn at, slandered to everyone including all of our neighbours and made out to be money-grabbing assholes. None of this was true. We were simply in a situation where we were unable to move.
Eventually after 6-8 months of the year in legal battles, no clue how we were going to move, (Landlord was reluctant to give a reference and our credit was not great), we were able to move due to a settlement based on the amount of work my best friend had carried out on the property (beyond the call of duty of a normal tenant).
We were legally told we had to leave on the 31st of October or eviction orders would be put in place.
The house we finally moved into was not somewhere we would have intentionally chosen had we had the time to browse. This was not like how most people look for homes they love. We had to take a home that was offered to us and make the best of a hard situation.
Everything slotted into place, but not everything was ideal.
Everything Came To A Grounding Halt
2016 was so stressful that everything else was put on hold. I felt like my writing hands had been chopped off, because I felt unable to write (my passion) and never started my third book. I also had started my editorial business, but I had to put that on hold until we moved. Everything was on hold. I didn’t even have the energy to check my emails so everything was backlogged until now.
It was so stressful that I found myself crying often. I had more headaches than I have ever had in my life so far, but I wouldn’t change a thing. This year made change happen, deeply desired change.
It felt like an uphill struggle. Nothing felt like it was flowing. It was like travelling through thick treacle for any of the needed changes to take place and this was even when both of us were dropping consciously into letting go and surrendering. The flow seemed to simply be very thick with obstacles and not because of resistance, just because this was the way.
In a sense, we were all in the last stages of the birthing canal, where the mother is ready and wants the baby out, but the baby was resisting coming through into the brand new world.
This was 2016 to me and listening to many others we were all riding the same wave of energy.
Pregnancy – We Were All Pregnant!
And as the end of the year came in, the baby was born.
And the baby cried and felt traumatised by the birth and the new world.
The baby was unnerved by all the new noises and change. No longer feeling the security of the mother’s womb.
The known was a comfort zone, but it was dead. Life needs to keep moving and 2016 for many people encouraged growth, transformation, release on many levels where resistance to life had set in.
Perhaps you were pushed to feeling feelings that had been pushed aside through an overly busy life?
Or your health became an issue because there were some beliefs and ideas about how to live that were no longer working for you and your body was crying out for slowing down and some long needed attention?
And maybe your finances were drained and you were too busy looking after other people’s needs that you forgot about your own and so life pushed you to the brink of financial implosion so you had to explode out of the old into the new?
Everything Has A Purpose
Everything that is happening has a purpose.
Everything that has happened had a purpose.
To initiate growth, release and readiness for your new life, your new world.
Sometimes we need to feel powerless, incredible powerlessness so we can experience the divine fruit of personal empowerment.
Sometimes we need to feel sick, incredible depth of ill health so we can appreciate the blessing of the body, the blessing of the life we have chosen, the breath that breathes us into being and to slow down and listen to what life is trying to show and reveal to us.
All of 2016 had a purpose.
The deaths, the highs, the extreme lows.
The roadblocks, the emotional meltdowns.
All have a meaning, all have a value.
So what can you take from a crappy 2016 into a new 2017?
A willingness to embrace the unknown.
- Be prepared to risk uncertainty.
- Don’t fix or attach to any outcome, but allow yourself the benefits of a life lived in the raw. A life lived with a calling, from the depth of your spiritual being.
- Set goals, have intentions and if you want to, lay out resolutions, but BE FLEXIBILE to change. Anything can and truly does happen.
- Death can happen, relationships can change, money can come, money can go, health can make or break us… we have a choice always in how we deal with the flux of this life.
Yes, 2016 was hard, but be prepared 2017 may ‘appear’ harder (but not in the same way), like huge changes are affecting this world we live in, but remember we are simply breaking through.
The time of the old is passing us by and the time of the new is being born inside each and every one of us.
Don’t resist your feelings.
Don’t hold yourself back anymore in an effort to make others more comfortable.
Risk controversy.
Risk self-expression.
Risk the positive and negative taking place in your world.
We simply can’t hold on anymore.
Be prepared for HUGE CHANGE.
So how was 2016 for you?
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Kelly Martin, author of ‘When Everyone Shines But You’ is a dedicated writer and blogger who fearlessly explores life’s deepest questions. Faced with a decade of profound anxiety and grief following the loss of her father and her best friend Michael, Kelly embarked on a transformative journey guided by mindfulness, and she hasn’t looked back since. Through her insightful writing, engaging podcasts, and inspiring You Tube channel Kelly empowers others to unearth the hidden treasures within their pain, embracing the profound truth that they are ‘enough’ exactly as they are.
