Dear mom,

I’m not actually going to send this to my mother.

But I woke up to a text from her the other day saying the thing I feel like I’ve waited most of my life to hear her say:

“I’ve decided I’m open to healing, and I’m planning to start seeing someone.”

So now that there’s the possibility of an opening where before there wasn’t, I’m thinking about the types of things I’d like to be able to have conversations with my mother about…

Taking about the past is hard

It’s hard to look back, especially when we made mistakes, and feel like we let people down who we loved, and who trusted us.

Looking back can bring up feelings of unworthiness, and while it seems like there’s no point in looking back because there’s nothing we can do now, it’s actually one of the best things we can do, because what we learn by looking back turns us into who we’re meant to become.

Pain is a teacher

I quit my first “real job” as an ad-agency art director in my 20’s and got on a 1-way flight to Thailand.

After a year of busses, slow boats, farm vehicles, mopeds, tuk-tuks, carriages, elephants, and long mountain trails, I made it to India.

And I lucked into an invitation to the Dalai Lama’s house.

I was backpacking through the Himalayan village where he continues to live with the Tibetan people in exile, when a monk approached me to say that His Holiness would be providing a public address at his residence, unannounced so as not to draw attention.

I stood with His Holiness in silence as he summoned…

I was trying to come up with a majestic way of describing it.

But the truth is, I was just a checked-out backpacker.

Running away from my pain.

As he blessed me, I stared at him, thinking:

“Is that really him?”

Uncomfortable, but playing it cool as he spoke in ancient languages I didn’t understand, moving energy with his hands and breath as his handlers watched—attuned to the powerful transmission that was taking place in his mountaintop sanctuary.

Maybe what His Holiness conveyed to me is the importance of looking back.

Because I think that all the suffering in the world comes from our collective inability to do so.

My travels and what I learned

I spent months exploring remote parts of the Himalayas—monasteries and mountain trails—eating curry with monks and other travelers, being chased by monkeys, playing music in monasteries on ancient Tibetan instruments, and absorbed the lesson that embracing all of who we are—including our pain—leads us to properly understand ourselves.

And when you understand yourself, then your life makes sense.

It’s clear what you’re meant to do.

Which, I think for most of us, is to help the world heal by fully healing ourselves.

When we heal, the path ahead becomes clear.

Partly, because we forgive ourselves for our inability to be anyone other than who we really are.

And then—even if you previously thought your best years were behind you—you realize you’re only just getting started.

That’s what my mother should have taken from her mother, who reinvented herself after losing her husband in her 50’s.

My mother, at 72, can still take lessons from her own mother and should.

But it requires looking back.

I’m glad she’s finally open to having difficult conversations about the past, and I hope to get the chance to have conversations with my mother about some of the things I’ve shared here.

I’ll keep you posted.

-M