Righted: When the Soul Smiles

As with all sacred seasons, this one is ending. I fly home in a couple of days.

The old English teacher—now minister—in me wants to analyze it, summarize it, extract its meaning. But that reflex is precisely what this sabbatical came to undo. I did not come here to produce insight. I came to release the compulsion to justify my rest, my time, my worth.

And something far better than analysis happened.

I stopped running.

I arrived without agenda because agenda was the problem—the acculturated drive to measure, optimize, perform. For decades, those habits were my superpowers. They helped me survive. But survival is not the same as peace.

Here, I practiced something different: Presence.

No stacking my days like Tetris.
No multitasking.
No hustle disguised as holiness.

I practiced being fully with whatever arose—emotion, music, ocean, silence. I pared life down to essentials. I allowed myself to know myself more honestly, while expanding into a deeper sense of Self as me. I let Self lead instead of my well-trained survival parts.

The activities—walking, beach time, piano, crocheting, reading, making art—were not the point.

The allowing was.

And in that allowing, something tectonic shifted.

With unusual clarity, I finally saw my anger. I watched it widen—past my family of origin, past my former marriage, past myself, out toward the larger systems that strain us to the breaking point, even toward a God I once believed required suffering as tuition for wisdom.

The rage was real.

But spaciousness changes things.

In the quiet, forgiveness rose—not as denial, but as perspective. I began to see that what felt like punishment was actually redirection. What felt like loss was structural correction.

I was not wronged by life.

I was righted.

The storms had not destroyed me; they had redirected me. The old structure—built on anxiety and hypervigilance—had done its job. I had survival skills for making a pretty good life in a funhouse of eggshell flooring and subtle landmines, running faithfully on the treadmill of worth.

But that architecture could not support the life emerging.

So it collapsed.

Life jettisoned me out.

This sabbatical became deep foundation work. The survival architecture was dismantled. In its place: true peace, real love, and healing grace.

And I realized something important: my outer life does not require demolition. I already have meaningful work, a nourishing spiritual community, beloved relationships, and creative pastimes. What shifted were the inner conditions. My body, soul, and mind have recalibrated to a stronger, steadier foundation.

Peace.
Love.
Grace.

Around this time, a poem by Emory Hall crossed my feed again:

“Make peace
With all the women you once were.
Lay flowers at their feet.
Offer them incense and honey and
Forgiveness.
Honor them
And give them your silence.
Listen.
Bless them
And let them be.
For they are the bones of the temple you sit in now.
For they are the rivers of wisdom
leading you toward the sea.
–I have been a thousand different women.”

Yes.

Every version of me carried me here. None were mistakes. Each one was necessary scaffolding. Necessary storms. Necessary teachers.

“There is One Life, that Life is God, that Life is the only life there is, and that Life is my life now” — Ernest Holmes, 365 Science of Mind

This feels less like an empty platitude now and more like lived truth. I believe in Divine Right Order—not as passive resignation, but as trust that even disruption is directional.

Today marks the beginning of the Lunar New Year, moving from the shedding energy of the Snake into the forward motion of the Horse. It is also Mardi Gras! The symbolism is not lost on me. I feel the shift in my bones. The release, the forward movement, the celebration!

So now what?

Now I return home to New Mexico not enlightened, but integrated. The sabbatical lasted long enough—intentionally more than 21 days—that something rewired. The nervous system softened. The bracing eased. The constant scanning for what might go wrong began to quiet.

The running stopped.

And beneath the running, I found what had been waiting all along.

My joy.

Not the fragile kind dependent on circumstances.
Not the performative kind that convinces others I’m fine.
Deep, interior joy. The kind that hums quietly beneath everything.

And now I get to ask:

• What is it like to work, love, and lead from peace instead of adrenaline?

• What becomes possible when energy is no longer siphoned off by anxiety and drama?

• What grows when the running stops?

• What happens if Joy directs my sails?

I am about to find out.

I am not returning home as a mystical sage.

I am returning home—not righteous, but righted.

Solid in who I am.
Clear about how life works.
At peace without needing to control the unfolding.

The running has stopped.
The foundation is strong.
Joy is rising from within.

I am free.

And at long last, having come home to mySelf, there is only one true response—

My soul smiles.