I got this from a friend named Barbara Hall who is facing the battle of her life this week.  A battle for her life, which could very well be the last battle she fights in Earth School.

She sent it to all of the people who love her today.  And I'm passing it on to you, because it's the perfect poem for a year just beginning.  It teaches a wonderful lesson about pain and suffering and how to "use" those experiences as portals to new adventures...new revelations.

So...this is for all of you who, like me, have survived something BIG.  Something you didn't see coming, or something you wished you couldn't see coming. 

Or something you knew was long overdue but hoped would never come...

Something that knocked you flat and had you wondering whether you'd ever get up again...

Something that shook your foundation so hard that you were pretty sure something was broken...

Hemingway says we're all broken, but that some of us are "strong at the broken places."

Amen, brutha.

Clarissa Pinkola Estes says it this way--rub this one all over your soul today and be healed:

Open The Door

Goddess is a mother

Do you remember that dark red room where you grew?

That was Goddess

And remember the warm hands that received you into the world?

That was God

And you remember your fathers hands that held your face as if it was some kind of jewel ? That was God!

Oh the world that is young and has loved so deeply….

And been betrayed.

Whose skin hangs like rags,

And whose Arms have no muscle

And whose Eyes have lost luster

Open the door of your heartaches

And step through the door of your betrayal.

Pass through the hole that is left in your heart

Pass through because it’s a door

Pass through because its a gate

Open the door!

Do you Remember that your legs are the ring

That circles the lover

Your legs make a door

Pass through the door

Pass the bolt through

Open the door, The most sacred of doors

The trail through your belly and the road up your spine

Remember fire is a door

And song is a door

A scar is a door

Open the door!

And the forest on fire is a door

And the ocean ruined is a door

Anything that needs us or calls us to Spirit is a door

Pass through the gate

Open the door!

Anything that hurts us

Anything that needs us

Opens the door

Pass through the gate

Open the door!

All of these years of seeming of indestructibility

The grandfather of your world dies

And his heart explodes

And yours breaks into a thousand pieces

These are doors

Open the doors

Pass through these gates

Pass through these doors

The world is a tribe of one breasted women

Walk through the door of the scars on their chest

Open the door!

Over the edge of the world you go into the abyss!

You march in time

And put the best medicine in the worst of the wounds

Pass through the gate

Open the door!

The lake in which you almost drown

That is a door

The slap in the face that made you kiss the floor

That is a door

Or the betrayal that sent you straight to the edge

That is a door

Pass through the gate

Open the door!

The same old story ,

All strong souls first go to the underworld

Before they do the Healing of the world they came here for.

If we are lucky we return to help those who are still trapped below.

Pass through the gate

Open the door!

The darkness is a door

Opening a flower

Rain opening the Earth

The kisses of humans opening the heart of the world

These are doors

Pass through the gate

Open the door

A scar drawn by razors

That Is a door

The scars that are doors are open, are open

Pass through the gate

Open the door

Scars drawn by chainsaws across forests

Those are doors

The poem of new life that comes every dawn

The soaring of sun

That is a door

The grave is a door

The gate to the underworld is a door

Pass through the gate

Open the door

Your grandmother , your grandfather

Your mother, your father,

That have died leaving a hole

In your life

Step through that hole

That is an opening

That hole is a threshold

That hole is a gate

Pass through the gate

Open the door!

Pass through the gate

Open the door!

Clarissa Pinkola Estes