Lisa Ray Instagram – A.F.T.E.R.M.A.T.H. . I feel it’s essential, every now and then, to zoom out and gain perspective on my so called healing journey. When I was in the weeds of my cancer treatment, I experienced a strange phenomenon. Presence. It was like all the whirling thoughts couldn’t disturb my pure appreciation of say, the piano concert in the atrium of my cancer hospital, or the bending of the light on slow walks by the lake in late afternoon, or the fatty taste of a particularly plump polish sausage on my tongue. I was so alert to the world and it’s gifts. When you are in recovery, which in my case was a long, arduous road, you hold onto these epiphanies of how much grace there is in a simple and elegantly led life. You bargain and negotiate. You tell yourself you will never sweat the small stuff again. You throw off layers of old beliefs and relationships that stifle or don’t serve who you are becoming. You give away your expensive heels and only regret it for a week. You give your time and energy to projects that are meaningful until your heart is just a little sprained and you need insoles. It all feels like you have touched some sort of an awakening that will make life sweeter than you ever thought possible. it’s a delusion. Has my life been transformed for the better, hell yes. But I still stumble, I forget to express gratitude, I forget I am an apprentice of second chances and I should be conducting myself with celestial integrity. Because I don’t. That’s the truth. I can be cranky, unreasonable, petty, and selfish. Should I go on, or do you get the gist? So I post this image, not to identify with that version of me – I am of course more than my disease- but to find a way to abide through the Aftermath. Aren’t we all living in the aftermath of something? (COVID will be in our rear view mirror) And how wonderful that it gives us the chance to embrace the entire spectrum of messy humanness. The aftermath edges us in the direction of living without self judgment and without remorse to accept a life of uncharted dissonance. Which can be very very interesting, to say the least. Healing begins where you are.