Finding Peace

Tuesday, June 21, 2011 was day of Summer Solstice. My best friend invited me to join her at a temezcal in Los Lunas. I wasn't really sure what it was but it sounded interesting and given my current spiritual state I figured it had to help.

Here is the temezcal. It is a sweat lodge made from volcanic rock and cement with a cedar burning fire on the outside that heats the inside, kind of like a sauna. I learned there that it is for healing and cleansing of your mind, body, and spirit. During the temezcal the four directions are honored and the symbols of each direction. It was very spiritual and very relaxing with a great, warm, generous, and loving energy. The people that were in attendance and the healers and the leaders and cudanderismo students were all wonderful.

During my experience at this ceremony I felt a huge release. I cried, a lot. Quite recently I lost someone very special and very close to my heart. He passed away just a month ago. May 18th to be exact. I have been having a difficult time dealing with this loss. It is unfathomable to me that he is gone. My intentions during this temezcal were to ask the universe for help to heal my heart and find a way to ease this pain. I truly felt that my friend came to help me that night. I felt him there. I felt him hold my hand. And I felt he heard me say that I love him but I have to let him go. I have to let this pain go because it will bring destruction to my life. I can already see that. After last night I have already felt more at peace with his passing. I am trying to accept his passing into spirit and know that he is still here. He will always be with us even if I cannot touch him or talk to him or see his beautiful smile in person, in the flesh. He is always here in spirit.
At temezcal they said the greatest gift you can give the Universe, or the Holy Spirit, is your heavy burdens. Let the Universe carry them for you. It is too heavy and too painful to keep here in life so release it to Holy Spirit to take for you. And I felt a piece of my burden go last night. I felt a little lighter. I am working on giving it all up. I think I feel guilty. If I give it up then it feels like not caring enough, not loving him, not showing my heartache and turmoil over this loss and that seems wrong. It seems like the best way to show how much I loved him is in how devastating and painful and depressed I am over it. And I think I know that I can be devastated. I am depressed and I am in pain. But I can give it up. I can release it and cry and feel and then give it up to the Holy Spirit to take from me so I can keep living. And I know Ryan (my lost friend, a true love of mine, a piece of my heart), I know he would want me to keep living and to be happy and to know that he is always here.
I am thankful my best friend took me to temezcal. I will be going back whenever they have it again. It is the place where I feel most connected to my heart, the earth, the universe, and spirit. I am happy I have found this place. I am feeling peace.