If Death is a Teacher [22 Days to 30]

August 5, 2015

A strong memory of my dad right now is when he would print out job descriptions from the internet and give them to me when I visited, even though I already had a job. There was a definite sweet about this.

At the time, a very small part of me felt like he was doing it because he thought I wasn’t succeeding in some way. I’d already had a good job, so why was he still giving me job descriptions? But the larger part of me knew it was out of love.

As the years go by, memories of him grow smaller and smaller. Having him around feels like it was practically 10 years ago now, even though it’s only been a little over 4.

I wish time didn’t do this.

But lately, an odd feeling comes over me when I remember my dad, and his passing. It might have something to do with all of the metaphysical work, but when I think about what happened to him, a small part of me no longer sees it as this horrible, awful, bad, bad thing.

Don’t get me wrong, it’s shitty. I’ll admit that for the rest of my life. No one should have to go through life without their father, and my stepmom sure as hell shouldn’t have to live her life without her soul mate.

But what I mean is I don’t see myself anymore as someone who lost her father. I’ve morphed into this person who’s now more connected with her dad on a spiritual level than she ever got the chance to be in real life, and I don’t want to be someone that people feel bad for (although I’m always tremendously grateful for well-wishes).

There is no good and bad in the spirit world, there just is. And what happened to my dad just was.

Thinking back on my twenties, I can’t help but see a huge rip in the middle of them. He died when I was 25, so that makes sense. But I’m learning every day now to see that as something that happened for whatever reason the universe wanted it to.

When I write it out, it sounds weird, so I hope I don’t come off as someone who is still not mourning his physical absence, because I always am. But I think in some way I’m coming to a more peaceful place about it. I have more love in my life now than I could’ve ever dreamed of, and as I transition on this journey towards self-love each day, I just don’t feel bad for myself anymore.

Mostly I’m starting to see it as something that altered the course in my life that I thought was already paved. I was on a path one way, and then I took a sharp detour onto another. For whatever reason, I was meant to live out the rest of my life without the physical part of my father. I was meant to connect with him for the rest of my life on a purely soulful and spiritual level.

And maybe that’s how he preferred it to be when he mapped out his life this time around. And maybe this is the way I mapped my own journey out. Do you ever think about that when hard times hit? Do you ever wonder what purpose your higher self had for all of this? It reminds me of an Eckhart Tolle quote:

Whatever the present moment contains, accept it as if you had chosen it. Always work with it, not against it. Make it your friend and ally, not your enemy. This will miraculously transform your whole life.

My twenties will always hold something special for my dad and I. He played a huge role in my life, and he’s a good reason why I am the way I am today. And the day he passed away can be written about for centuries, in terms of how it felt. (Centuries I tell ya. You don’t want to see me during a father-daughter dance at a wedding).

But that’s living, isn’t it? That’s the stuff of life. When you feel the separation of spirit from body in someone you love, it opens your eyes wider than you ever thought they could open. It opens up your other eye, the one that sees beyond the physical. It teaches you to live life a whole lot differently.

I’m starting to see hard times now as opportunities for spiritual growth. And if death is a teacher, I am a ready student.

Thanks for reading! This post is part of a 30 days to 30 series, read all about it here.