Now that both my parents and I are fully vaccinated, I’m heading to see them for the first time in almost a year and a half. My upcoming trip reminded me of a piece I originally posted in January of 2020, before the pandemic really took hold. The lessons I learned then have new things to teach me as we begin to move toward this post-coronavirus season. I hope they help you on your way to Becoming Yourself.
I traveled back to my Michigan hometown over the holidays to visit family. Slept in my childhood bedroom at my parents house. Watched the sun set behind the woods where I used to play. Drove past my old elementary school and the house where I was born. Had lunch with my best friend from high school whom I hadn’t seen in twenty-five years.
I’ve gone through a lot of changes since I moved away for good twenty-nine years ago. I’ve graduated college, gotten married, raised two kids, lived in three different cities in two other states, retired from one career and started another.
Going back to where I grew up always brings a strange mix of emotions, a sense of both deep familiarity yet utter foreignness at the same time. Nearly thirty years of life experiences have changed me. I’m not the same person anymore. I had the melancholy realization that in some sense, I truly can’t go home again.
I find that many things that used to serve me well there are no longer helpful. Certain relationships, rituals, and activities have run their course, completed their formative work. It’s time to let them go. To move on. There are people I no longer need to see, books I no longer need to read, places I no longer need to visit. In order to progress on my personal development journey, these are the parts of my past I need to release.
Other pieces of my past can still aid in my growth. Things I’ve forgotten or let drift away in the busyness of life. Like reconnecting with Gary, my high school best friend. After twenty-five years, I’m not sure what made me track down his contact info and invite him to lunch while I was in town, but I’m so glad I did. Reminiscing with him about all that we’d experienced together in those formative years and sharing the paths our adult lives had taken energized my soul. It reminded me of who I was then in a way that helped me understand who I am now and clarify who I want to become. This is a part of my past that I can reclaim.
So how about you? What parts of your past do you need to let go of? What relationships or habits or memories are dragging you down, serving only as unwanted anchors, unhealthy reminders of who you were? Release them. What parts of your past do you need to reconnect with, good aspects that you’ve forgotten, things that can deepen and strengthen and stabilize your present? Which relationships or habits or memories can serve as anchoring roots enabling you to grow higher and farther in the future? Reclaim them. If you do, you’ll find peace with your past and take another step toward Becoming Yourself.
I parked my dad’s van and started walking around the cemetery grounds. Stood at my grandparents’ grave marker. Lingered beneath the towering statue of Jesus that I used to gaze at in wonder. Strolled along the river where my best friend and I went canoeing. Wandered by the pond where my mom took me and my sisters to feed the ducks.
