A friend invited me to something called “Soul Collage” for writers. I was feeling a bit down, and I hadn’t seen her for a while, so I figured I’d go. I had no idea what I really was walking into.
The room held only a handful of us: one woman a multi-Olympic medal winner; one man an award-winning screenwriter; a few others and me. No rhyme or reason as to what brought us all together. The leader asked us to move to a part of the room where on the floor and in boxes were hundreds if not thousands of pictures. Some photographs, some works of art, some images torn out of magazines and books. Some were landscapes, some inanimate objects, some human, some animals. Some gave no hint to what they were, other than abstract. We were told to choose ten or so images that jumped out at us and called our name. No need to think much. Just act on instinct.
Once we had our images, we returned to our work tables and layed them out. A frame captured them into one view. And then we were asked to tell everyone in the room what our “soul collage” had to say about us…
THAT is when we all struggled to find our voices. Not because we couldn’t, but because we were struck a bit speechless at what our true selves had to say. My “soul collage” revealed to me something I always have felt deep inside: that I’m unique, different, special…and that I defy gravity and was meant to rise to a greater purpose.
We each were to have our say, outloud. Here’s what came out of me:
“I am the one who is power. I am the one who is weak. I am the one who everyone sees the exterior stone. But I am the one who inside feels all alone. I am the one who tells herself how unworthy she is. I am the one who used to have a protector, and that protector used to be me. I am the one who now allows others to tell me how unworthy I am. I am the one who finds myself in the middle of a circus. I am the one who doesn’t even know who she is anymore. I am the one who struggles to allow both sides to co-exist.
What I have to say to you is both sides of you are worthy. Both the vulnerable and the bitch. What I have to say to you is that you are power, not just when you’re swinging a hammer, but even when you’re at your most vulnerable.”
I visited my long-time shrink in Chicago and shared my “soul collage” with her. She immediately focused on the little girl front and center, asking me, “So what do you think she’s saying to you?”
I wasn’t sure.
My shrink said, “She’s tapping her foot and telling you ‘come on already’!”
As usual, my shrink was right.
I feel something changing. I always have. I’ve always fought it for one reason or another. Maybe for one excuse or another. The power I’ve always believed to be inside me. And it’s trying to get me to where I believe I’m supposed to be.
