Emancipation

Emancipation

noun

• the fact or process of being set free from legal, social, or political restrictions; liberation

–   the freeing of someone from slavery

For years; moreover, maybe decades I have been enslaved.  To being the obedient daughter. The obliging wife. The diligent employee.  The ever-reliable friend. The perfect mother. Whether these demands were placed on me by others, or whether I did so to myself in an attempt to achieve perfection and the perceived goals set down by society; I am uncertain. What I do know for sure, is that the simple act of watching a little girl skip out of an airport terminal, is all it took to free the final chains that bound me.

There is a saying that goes, “Sometimes it takes an overwhelming breakdown to have an undeniable breakthrough.”  In the journey I undertook after my ex-husband walked out, I found myself in the situation of ‘my circle’ getting smaller.  Not only did I lose my husband; but in the year or so that followed I also found myself ‘divorced’ from my best friend, my mother, and many other family and friends who it turns out must have been merely extras in the screenplay of my life.  Whilst the process felt like my whole world was ‘falling apart’, I found that this end started off for me an entirely ‘new beginning’.  Not only did acquaintances step up and become integral to my new life, but new people emerged who provided me with fresh perspective and a chance to escape the past, and who I ‘THOUGHT’ I was.

From spending time with these people, and a LOT of time spent on my own… thinking, reading, growing, evolving and learning… I found parts of myself that I had forgotten existed.  There was also the seemingly ‘NEW’ parts that I discovered that I now think were always there, but just hadn’t been given the right environment to show themselves.  So as my life seemed to break down: with the loss and subsequent grieving of numerous significant relationships; financial, social, residential and lifestyle changes; and exhausting legal battles (all whilst trying to keep ‘LIFE’ going for my little people), it really did provide the perfect environment for me to breakthrough and start again.

I found that in the process of experiencing and feeling the breakdown, one starts to question what one really had.  One looks at every single one of those relationships in detail, and questions what they really were based upon.  The ‘broken down one’ knows now that all that glitters is not gold, and that its not always a case of people changing but rather them simply looking out for number one.  And I was not their number one; they were their own number ONE.   In the end, every one of those people is going to look out for themselves and protect their own interests.  Its simply human nature. So what I had to do was shift the focus from what had been done to me; to realising what these people had done FOR me.  And that was by them leaving, they had done me the ultimate favour.  I did not have to take out the trash.  They did that for me.  All I had to do now was to focus on me, because it was time to start FRESH.

This involved change… soooo much change. The way I work, the way I eat, the way I exercise, the way I parent, the way I think.  Life is not just about checking boxes.  Its not about being what you think is expected of you.  Its not about others controlling you, and forcing their opinions on you.  Its about being true to yourself. True to your beliefs and values. And most of all its about believing in yourself.  For so long, I had listened to the negatives. To the criticisms. To the opinions of those around me, who told me what I should do and how I ought to live my life.  And I now realise, my question to all of them should have been: What gives you the right to have an opinion on MY LIFE? Because you know what, as simple as it now sounds … their opinion should never have mattered.

The only should’s and ought’s that matter are the ones we make for ourselves. I should be content. I ought to do things that make me happy. I should have dance parties in the kitchen at breakfast time with my little people.  I ought to go out with my friends and laugh whenever I want.  I should do a job that I love. I ought to take holidays where and when I want to take holidays.  And this is where the little girl skipping helped me achieve my final bit of freedom.

DO YOU KNOW WHAT I HAVE ACHIEVED? I have negotiated the skirmishes of the legal battlefield, I have renovated, sold and bought properties, I have found a job that is professionally fulfilling, I have discovered my creative passion, I have set goals and I have fallen in love again.  And in the process, I have become a stronger, happier, and more positive human.  My approach to parenting has changed. My attitude is different.  And I came to realise, that ultimately this is not just my life; but there are two other little people who have been affected in all of this.  They did not ask for this. They did not choose this.  And in my home… they have choices.  I am not a dictator.  There are boundaries, but there is also discussion.

So, even when I set my personal goal to take my children on an overseas holiday at least every second year, it also came with choices.  “Little people, would you like to go back to Bali for some sun and shopping, or to New Zealand for the snow”.  These were both options that I was happy with and also both destinations we had previously travelled to as a family of FOUR.  The resounding response was SNOW!!!! New Zealand was a place I had vowed for a very long time, that I would never return to.  Because it was only days after our return from the ‘Land of the long white cloud’  that my world started to fall apart.  It had not been the best holiday, as it became increasingly clear that he had already ‘checked out’ of our marriage and family, and into another.  But through the process of change I had navigated…. I knew I was ready. It was time to re-write history. It was time to replace those memories. It was time to be free of the past.

And as my eleven year old smiled, spun around and pointed out the snow capped mountains as the chilly air hit us on the tarmac, I felt good.  I felt proud. I had made this holiday happen for us all.  But when the six year old skipped out of the terminal on the way to the hire car, it hit me.  I am FREE. I did this. I made it. My breakdown did not BREAK me.  I have broken THROUGH to the other side.  My emancipation was COMPLETE.  The three of us had come full circle. The past did not define us.  The memories of the last trip were not who we are.  This is who we are.  Undeniably amazingly strong females re-writing the past. And I can tell you, LIBERATION is indeed sweet.