Heart Work: Part Two

You’ve mapped out the part of your heart that sits in the sun-warmed lands:  the people you care about, the activities and things you enjoy doing.  (See the last blog post if you have not begun your heart map yet.)  Now it’s time for us to explore the Shadowlands.

What lies in the Shadowlands of your heart?  Stuff that you don’t like to bring into the light. Painful memories or experiences that have stayed with you.  Things that you have done or said that you are not proud of.  Secrets.

You don’t have to put them on your heart map if you don’t want to.  But this is a good time to look at them in private.  It’s good to know where the treacherous terrain lies when you embark upon a journey.

On my heart map, I’ve represented a lot of my Shadowlands with pictures and symbols.  A large tear represents my sad memories, which are mostly connected to loved ones I have lost.  There is a bandaid for hurt feelings, a tall building for my fear of heights, and an ant for a strange phobia I have of dead ants.  I didn’t even want to draw a dead ant on my heart map.  Shudder!  That’s why the ant in my picture is alive and looking up.

There is a padlock near the ant and the tall building.  That’s for the secret memories that are locked in my heart.  Now that I am older, there aren’t as many secret memories in there.  I’ve learned that it helps to share them with someone you love and trust very, very much. 

Some of the things that were locked in my heart were things I thought were unforgivable about myself.  I’ve learned to forgive myself for a lot of them, so I’ll share one of them with you.

It’s the way I got my “dead ant” phobia.

We used to get a lot of ants in our house every summer.  We had some big old black ants that used to march all over the kitchen, and my mom kept a can of RAID! insecticide in the cupboard to spray around the doorframe every night.

One evening, I saw a big ol’ ant crawling around on the kitchen table.  I was mad at that ant for being in our space, and I decided that I’d teach it a lesson.  I grabbed the can of RAID! and sprayed the ant right there in front of me.

Now, I’m getting the creeps just writing about this. I can feel my insides just tightening right up, and I’ve got a yucky feeling in the back of my throat.  Because I remember watching that ant die. 

It was a horrible thing to see, and I realized that I had caused a living creature to feel pain and to stop living and going about its normal business of just being an ant, doing what ants do.  And I’ve felt guilty about that for the rest of my life.

But guilt is like a coin that has a good side and the bad side.  On the bad side, my guilt over torturing that ant has given me a life-long phobia of dead ants.  Something inside me wants to scream and run from the scene every time I see a dead ant—I can’t help it, that’s my gut reaction.  I’ve been fighting the urge to throw my laptop on the floor and shriek and run away from it, just because I keep seeing the words “dead ant” on the screen.  AAAAAAGH!!!  (That feels just a little better now.  Sorry!)

But the guilt I’ve felt about hurting that ant has also done something good.  It’s made me a more compassionate person.  I try hard to respect all living things.  I might go to some extremes, but I don’t mind carrying any insects that come into our house outside again to freedom—even the wasps that seem to find their way in every spring.  I realize that every living thing wants to keep living, and I try my best to help and not harm.  I try to remember that when I deal with people, too.  Everyone has feelings, even if they can’t express them. I try to look at everyone as an individual when I see them, and not just as another face. So, guilt can help you to become a better person.

You may have some feelings of guilt that have something to do with your brother’s or sister’s special needs.  That’s normal.  As a matter of fact, all brothers and sisters have complicated feelings towards each other, whether one is disabled or not.  But sometimes having a sib with a disability makes things seem just a little more complicated at times.

We’ll touch on some of those complicated feelings in other blog posts.  (I may even share some of my complicated feelings about my brother and sister.) But for now, making your map is a chance for you to look at EVERYTHING that’s in your heart—and a lot of that will have nothing to do with anyone else but you.  That’s good! --because you are a whole person, made up of lots of different feelings and experiences, likes and dislikes, which are a combination of what you do with your family, with other people, and by yourself. 

You are you, and your heart is your own.  Everyone has bright sunny places in their heart, and everyone has Shadowlands.  Knowing what’s in your own heart makes it easier to appreciate the wonderful person that you are.   Draw your map, and keep it in a safe place.  You’ll be pulling it out from time to time as you continue on your own special journey. 

In my next post, we’ll talk a little more about the journey.  See you soon!

Heart Work: Part One

As promised in the last blog, our first activity involves making a journey to an unknown place.  Unknown, that is, to everyone except you.  And even you might be surprised by what is hidden in this ever-changing territory--so full of sunshine, so full of shadows. It’s the territory of your own heart.

If you are going to go on a journey, it helps to know the terrain.  Is it mountainous and cold?  Better grab your hiking boots. Tropical and beachy?  Don’t forget your sunscreen.  And your flip-flops, too.  Wherever you're going, you might want to consult a map as you plan your trip.

You don’t have a map, you say?

Then this activity is for you.  It’s time to make a map of your own heart*.  You’ll have to do some traveling around in there to make it, but that’s part of the fun.  It’s time to focus on YOU, so this heart work is important.

How you choose to make this map is up to you.  I’m going to give you some suggestions, some ways you might want to approach making your map—but since it’s your heart, only you will know what’s right for you.

Let’s start by thinking of some of the things we keep in our hearts.  Some of the stuff that really matters—stuff that stays with us because it’s important to us.

Loved ones?  Pets? Special places?  Those are things that exist in our hearts.  Some of them may not even be with us anymore, but they still can be found in the territory of our hearts.  My pet rabbit, Pippin, will always be in my heart, even though he died fifteen years ago. 

What about things we love to do?  Special memories and experiences that we never want to forget? Those are part of the landscape of our hearts, as well.

Get a piece of paper and some colored pens or pencils.  Draw a heart on a piece of paper.  Sure, it can be as realistic as you want it to be (chambers and valves and aortas and veins. . .)—or as simple as you’d like.  (Think “Valentine heart”. ) Start considering how you’d like to represent those things that can be found in your heart on paper.  Will you draw them in?  Write about them?  Use a combination of words and pictures?  You could even use magazine pictures to make a collage. It’s up to you!

Here’s a picture of some of the things that are part of my heart’s landscape.  You’ll see that I’ve chosen to put my loved ones in the very center of my heart, all together.  But you may choose to give each of your loved ones a special portion of your heart, all their own.  Maybe you need to make a special heart for each one of your loved ones.  There’s no rule that says you can’t have separate maps for as many portions of your heart as you’d like!

I’ve included things I love to do, trips I’ll never forget, and a general region for my friends, old and new.  But there is a lot of blank space—be sure to leave some in your heart map, as well.  Those are for some of the darker things that exist in your heart.  We’ll add those in soon—in the next blog post. 

Keep your heart map nearby—it will help guide you through many of the activities we do here.  You may keep adding to it over time, or redraw it—because our heart’s boundaries are always changing. 

I’m even thinking of re-mapping my heart sometime so that I have “warm climates” and “cold climates” to visit.  Some of the things I put in the warm climates may also be found in the cold climates.  My cat, Perry, might go in both places.  I love how he’s such a cuddlebug, and how he’s sure that he’s “people” so he puts his two cents into everything that happens in the family.  But I hate the fact that he keeps destroying things in our house—he knocks small things off shelves and counters on purpose to get our attention, and he rips and chews up our belongings if he likes their texture, so he makes me want to scream!  I’d put “Cuddlebug Perry” in the warm climate of my heart, and “Perry the Destroyer” in the cold climate if I decide to re-map my heart that way.

Or maybe I’ll have beaches, swamps, and deserts.  The swamps would be for all of the things that I have “complicated” feelings about.  (I like swamps, but I prefer to explore them from those trails with the wooden walkways instead of mucking around in them too much.  I’ve lost too many boots that way. . . Some of my memories are complicated like that—they only feel safe if I don't think about them too much, because they are both happy and painful at the same time.  Some people are that way in my heart, too.) The beaches would be for all the stuff that makes me happy.  And the deserts would be for the stuff that's really hard to think about much at all.  Like some of the stuff that I’ll talk about in the next blog.

                                                                                                             

So, get started on your heart map—it’s a one-of-a-kind!  Just like you!  We’ll finish it up with the next blog post.  And then we’ll use it to do some more exploring.  Because if you’ve got a map, you really ought to use it!

 *inspiration for this idea comes from the book Awakening the Heart: Exploring Poetry in Elementary and Middle School by Georgia Heard, copyright 1998, Heinemann Publishing

http://georgiaheard.com

You Come Too--a Wayfarer's Guide

Think of this blog as a travel guide--a handy, friendly resource to help you on a one-of-a-kind journey . . . a journey that you've already begun . . . a journey through life with a sibling who has special needs.  It's a journey full of mountains and valleys and wide, open plains.  Like all journeys, there are parts that are more fun than others, parts that are a little meh, and parts that aren't any fun at all.  Hopefully, this travel guide will highlight lots of fun stuff, while still showing you around some of the more difficult terrains.

Travel guides don't TELL you where to go.  They don't scream, "You MUST visit the world's largest ball of dryer lint! You MUST take that road through the mosquito-infested swamp!"  But they do give suggestions.  You might like some of those suggestions.  You might like all of them. (Hey, some people happen to like traveling through mosquito-infested swamps!) Or you might decide that you're just not that interested in some of the things I present.  But no one's going to force you to do every activity that you read about in these posts.  You really don't have to check out that giant lint ball if you don't want to.


This blog will highlight points of interest that may appeal to you:  good books, websites, and other resources to inform and entertain you.

It will offer activities for you to try.

It will describe some of the places you may want to explore along the way--places that can only be found by looking within yourself, in the hidden territory of your own heart.

We'll look at ways the journey changes us.  Sometimes we really do have to travel through that mosquito-infested swamp, because all the other roads are closed.  This blog will help you find ways to make that road a little less . . . swampy.

The most important things to pack for your journey?  Nope, not bug spray.  (Although that's not a bad idea.) Paper and pencil.  They are some of the most versatile tools you'll ever possess.   For our first excursion, you may want some colored pencils or markers, too.  Keep your eyes open for the next blog post . . . we'll be heading for a place that no one knows better than you.

Hope you're ready to start exploring!