A Dialogue with my Emptiness.

An intimate chat with a younger version of me.

One day, I sat down and had a dialogue with my feelings.

These were feelings of emptiness and sadness - feelings I've known for a very long time.

It's like a sense that things will never be good enough. That whatever I do, I will never really be truly happy in my life.

So that day, I decided to get to know this feeling a bit better.

As I closed my eyes and searched inward, focusing on these feelings of emptiness, I realised that they were emanating from a younger version of myself.

This was a six year old version of me who had just lost his mum a year ago.

The boy was clearly visible in my mind's eye and he appeared with back facing towards me.

He seemed to notice my presence and turned around slowly, but he didn't lift his head to look at me. He appeared to focusing on something on the floor. On his young boyish face there was clear sadness in his eyes.

He said to me then in a rather quiet voice "I just lost my mother. I will never be happy again."

My heart tinged. And I told him, "I know, I was you once too."

He pondered on this for a while. Then he asked me, "Aren't you sad?"

I said, "Of course, I'm sad. But that was a long time ago for me now. But tell me, what does this sadness feel like for you right now? "

He said, pointing to his chest, "It feels like there is a hole in me now. It opened up just after mom died. It feels like it will never close. Just like how I will never be loved and held by her again."

I felt for him, remembering the sharp pain of grief. I told him "I'm so sorry you feel this way. I remember this feeling and I still feel it sometimes too. In fact, now I understand why it's still lingering around."

"Why?", he asked.

"Because I've left you here all on your own suffering by yourself, when I should have found you earlier", I said.

"Right, it's okay", the boy said.

"I'm really sorry", I answered.

He appeared to lighten a bit, then he wondered to me and asked, "It feels less painful now that you're here. Can I ask, how did we manage to stop missing mom?"

I answered honestly, "I don't know how we managed it exactly. We just somehow did. Of course, there were lots of ups and downs and tears and sadness as we grew up. But somehow, we turned out okay."

The boy sat quietly for a while then said, "In that case, are we happy now?"

I smiled and shared, "Yes, we are. I know it might be hard for you to believe this, but we have a wife now. She is a really wonderful person, you should come meet her. And we have two dogs too. We also spend our time helping people."

"Oh wow", he replied.

I continued, "Yes. Of course we still have our bad days, and some are really, really bad days at that. But most of the time, our life really does feel like it's worth living".

He nods and says "right, okay", quite unsure what to do next.

So I suggested to him,

"Well, I know we went through a painful time and that you really suffered. No child should ever be carrying the burden you had to carry."

I continued, "Still, I can see that you're stuck and frozen in that period of time, holding on to the despair that things will never get better". I can feel your pain even from here where I am now."

" Yes... ", he replied, softly.

"But things have changed now, and you can let go of this pain okay? And I really wanted to ask, would you want to come with me to enjoy our life together? I'll show you what my life is like and you can play with my dogs, how does that sound?", I asked with a smile.

He nodded and gave me his hand. And I felt his presence turn into light.

Then I felt him being drawn into the present moment with me.

And when I opened my eyes, a part of me that always felt a little broken became whole again.

May you heal,

Hernping