Breaking Patterns
Whenever I think about breaking patterns; I think about this poem:
“Autobiography in Five Short Chapters
Chapter I
I walk down the street.
There is a deep hole in the sidewalk
I fall in
I am lost…I am helpless
It isn’t my fault.
It takes forever to find a way out.
Chapter II
I walk down the same street,
There is a deep hole in the sidewalk.
I pretend I don’t see it.
I fall in again.
I can’t believe I am in the same place
but it isn’t my fault
It still takes a long time to get out
Chapter III
I walk down the same street.
There is a deep hole in the sidewalk.
I see it is there.
I still fall in…it’s a habit.
My eyes are open.
I know where I am
It is my fault
I get out immediately.
Chapter IV
I walk down the same street.
There is a deep hole in the sidewalk.
I walk around it.
Chapter V
I walk down another street”
It is so easy to hold judgment towards ourselves when we fall back into a pattern we thought we were done with.
We thought we had outgrown.
We judge and criticize ourselves for a moment we took years to learn.
Sometimes, just sometimes, I take another road.
Instead of the shame spiral of “why didn’t I know better?”
‘why did I do that?’
‘I am bad’
‘I am worthless’
I think about all the ways I have outgrown other patterns
and how I am progressively different each time I do fall into the pattern ‘hole’
The Spiral Staircase
I was taught that we were all born with certain propensities towards shadow aspects of ourselves that we are meant to work through in this life.
Whether this shadows in the realm of money, sex, relationships…
They all come with patterns that have our own unique ‘shade’ to them.
We could be working through our lack mindset and have the compulsive urge to steal or take from those we think ‘owe’ us something.
Or have a pattern of being codependent in a very specific way towards someone with a very specific ‘shade’ to them.
Whatever dynamic your pattern plays out with or as…
These are things we all have choice over
We just forget sometimes
These patterns we picked up from a very early age and oftentimes, took many years to learn
So why do we expect to un-learn them with a snap of a finger?
Yes, awareness of the pattern is the first (very important) step…
But it is not the only one.
This is where the spiral staircase theory is a beautiful one
It proposes that with each flight of stairs, we get wiser
We are never the same
Constantly shifting and growing as time passes and we walk up the staircase
However, we are still on a spiral staircase after all…
We are looking at the same things, the same patterns..
Working through them and ‘circling’ them
But each time.. We are seeing them from a higher perspective.
A different vantage point.
With different dimensions, shades, and textures
Each time it gets clearer and more refined.
We are never the same person that looked down on the pattern the last time
We have gained some wisdom, some resource, and some more insight
The pattern may change and morph, but it will have the same essence to it
And it is our role as humans (if we choose to accept it) to meet it
And meet it
And meet it again
We are never fully healed
But we do have choice as to how we respond to what is put in front of us
And sometimes, that can be as simple as slowing down, taking a breath, and choosing a different street.
