Happy Anniversary - Part I

Four years ago this month, I did what some might think was impossible. I left my 14 year insurance and financial services career and opened a Reiki practice. In my 40's I dared to set off on to a path that I'm sure most thought I was nuts for doing. The reasoning?

The voices in my head told me to do it.

Early 2018, my friend who happened to be a Reiki teacher called me up one day and asked me if I wanted to get Reiki I certified. I didn't really have the money for it but she said she would gift it to me. The Universe had called her to offer the training to me as a gift.

It was free and what did I have to lose? So I said yes to her not knowing I was saying yes to something so much bigger. There was a plan being hatched and executed by the Universe and my spiritual team. 

At this point of my spiritual journey, I hadn't really been living a "spiritual" life. I wasn't all woo woo or metaphysically crunchy. I had a card reader down the Jersey shore I went to once in a while when I was desperate for control or direction over my crazy life. I kept a handful of crystals I would use occasionally in meditation to try and create my most inspired life. The Reiki I had received from my friend only a couple of times, I hadn’t had any significant A-HA groundbreaking moments because of it.

So I took the 4 hour certification class and got a piece of paper symbolizing I could flow this beautiful healing life force energy to all people, places, and things anywhere in the world. It was so impactful that I took the piece of paper and threw it in a folder and filed it away.

Did you get the sarcasm there? LOL.

I honestly can't recall how I felt about the class at the time and why I just threw the certification in a folder and never thought twice about it for the next 5 months.

That's not true. I was still very agnostic at the time. I believed there was something bigger out there but wasn't sure what it was. I'm a skeptic by nature and old Renee wasn't sure about this woo woo Reiki stuff.

All I know is that there was a bigger picture and strategic plan being laid out by my spiritual peeps that I wasn't supposed to be privy too. There was more unbeknownst to me that I was supposed to learn before my Reiki ride was to really take off at full blast.

The end of July 2018, I was at a networking lunch and my phone rang. It was my ex husband who at the time I didn't have a chummy relationship with. I answered it because it was unlike him to call me out of the blue on a Tuesday afternoon. A good friend of ours had gone missing and by the end of the day she had been found.

She had taken her own life. 

One of the underlying themes in my life has centered around mental health. I have had my struggles with suicidal ideation in my past and I have also lost too many to the horrible disease, depression. This was a huge part of the reason that I had started dabbling in cards, crystals, and energy healing. I was looking for purpose and direction surrounding all the crappy things that had happened to myself and others. Why suffering exists in the world.

There had to be a reason.

At this specific point in my life, I was in a really good place but for some reason, a deep sadness and anxiety started to creep up on me. One I had not felt for a really long time. 

I traveled out to her resting place to say goodbye and to pay my respects and the day I was leaving to head back home, I opened up Facebook and discovered that it happened again. 

I was heavy in mommy mental health advocacy at the time and ran an online community called Yin and Yang Mom. The group was made up of local moms from the Bergen County, NJ area. We supported each other in the motherhood journey on and offline through FB and in-person events which I created and organized.

One of our moms husbands had taken his own life.

Like, what the actual... Back to back. I couldn't believe it.

That sent me into a deep rabbit hole. I was depressed. I was anxious. I would find myself crying unexpectedly out of the blue. I didn't feel well. I also had survivor's guilt. I actually wrote a piece on it on 11/18 on medium.com called 'Hold On' (click to read).

I just couldn't find the reason why I had survived and they had not.

To be continued...