Dear Madame,
I don’t know how to trust again.
My husband left me two years ago. It happened out of the blue.
He was lying about a bunch of things, mostly where he was going on weeknights. He said he was going to the office after we ate dinner, but I learned later that he was going to a woman’s house.
I followed him once.
Okay, I followed him on several occasions.
She had a large white house, these two pillars in the front. A few hanging baskets of plants. I would drive behind him from a safe distance, and park on a nearby street, and peek as he walked under the overhead porch light and let himself in.
For a while I told myself stories. Maybe an accountant lived there. Maybe the owner of the house was helping him with investment portfolios. I didn’t know if it was a woman, and if I our marriage was becoming a terrible cliche. But one afternoon, I drove to the house and sat in my car and watched until someone came out. And I saw that it was a woman, and she got into her car. She was driving a Mazda. Some white sort of Mazda.
When my husband finally came clean to me one night on our back deck, he said, “I’m doing this for the both of us.”
Madame, I don’t know how to move on. I don’t know how to date using those stupid swiping apps, and let someone into my heart and my body and my world again, when it’s so clear that something is wrong with me. How do I know a new man won’t just give up on me one day and find a Mazda-driving woman he likes better??
Can you help?
Sincerely,
Nancy Chuckles.
Dear Ms. Chuckles,
Listen.
All of the above sounds perfectly normal, ordinary, and typical except this one thing you said: “It’s so clear that something is wrong with me.”
Nancy, nothing is wrong with you.
You just married a guy who lied to you, and many people lie, and the most we can do in this life is our own inner work so that we make wise decisions about relationships so we don’t end up with people who lie.
It’s as easy as that.
And also not easy!
So here is what I want you to know:
The Divine made you to be radiant.
AND
There is definitely nothing wrong with you.
You are perfectly capable of loving again, and finding someone who can love you and act with integrity, as your ex-husband could not.
First and foremost in this life, we need to overcome this stupid ideology we’re fed from an early age that there is the “ONE, PERFECT person” out there for us. Foundationally, instead, you must cultivate a love for who you are, how you are made, and then you will know how to love others, and those you attract as intimate partners will be able to love you.
Spend time with the divine each day, my dear. Turn to it, seek, explore, ask questions. Seek out other people who are asking the same questions. Not cult people, or religious dogmatists or fanatics. Ewww. I’m talking about true, genuine, honest people, who have also experienced pain and loss. Those are your people. People who have overcome fears and shadows and engage in good daily life practices.
(Not people who watch a ton of TV. You hear that?)
Do you know that you can feel in your body whether someone is trustworthy? You can feel in your body whether you are in capable hands. This is your body’s wisdom, and knowing, and it is precious gold, but many of us are cut off entirely from our bodies and living in a world invented by our messed-up heads.
So dear, get to know that body of yours, and go on some dates, or meet some people for coffee, or explore the wilderness, and take an adventurous attitude to learning about your own inner wisdom.
Sense in to people, to experiences. Don’t be some disconnected head bobbling around.
And when you do that, when you know yourself really well, and you know how to listen to your signals, and not let your head’s ideas and ideology dominate your life (which leads to repression, violence of many sorts, and just plain misery), then you can experience the knowing, the growing, the in-tune-ness and aliveness we’re all meant for in this existence. (For many, it takes several lifetimes, or a few dozen before they get there).
When you listen to this part of yourself, and you trust yourself, then you’ll know how to trust someone else. Because trust isn’t putting yourself entirely in someone’s hands, like you’re a baby and that person is God. Trust is trusting that you know what you know when you know it, and you will handle what comes and shrug off whatever is not meant for you. So when you feel good and right in a particular moment, with a particular person, go with it.
Also, this trust-thing makes for amazing sex!
Don’t be afraid of getting hurt, darling. So many people who are wounded, or have suffered betrayal, put walls up in their heart because of fear. And then they don’t live much. They die, and there is all this regret, and it’s just an ugly way to go.
And they develop a lot of wrinkles, and their skin is all pasty and stuff.
Best of luck to you. Keep swiping…or not. Those apps are really killing our brains.
Hugs,
Madame Rose
Photo by Peter Broomfield on Unsplash