Longing & belonging

I absolutely love this father and daughter team:
The Prayer sung by Adrian & Emma-Jean Galliard
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fgtvtS09W8M
 
There is obviously total trust and absolute love for them to be able to sing and BE so beautifully together. 
 
I could only dream of having such an incredible relationship with my parents. 
 
I have a close relationship with my dad, but never as close as I would have loved and which I dreamed of, for all of my life due to my mother divorcing my dad when I was only 2 years old.  I’m a lot closer today to my dad, but now he is old and stone deaf, so we can barely communicate.  He is being fitted with hearing aids soon, but will I even know how to communicate with him then… such closeness seems so foreign to me, and even a bit scary, because I never really knew it in the first place.  I hope it all works out and so that I can feel brave enough to have real conversations with him.  He’s 90 years old now.  Time and presence are so important… surely there is very little time left for us to get to know each other.  I must make the most of our remaining precious time together.   
 
I recently I said to my mentor, after she’d sent a short video of her and her family (including grandchildren) interacting so beautifully together on the lovely sunny balcony of their home, that I would have loved for her and her husband to adopt me, because I see their family as the perfect family that I’d always longed to be a part of.  She responded:
 
“You ARE adopted and part of our family.  “God places the lonely on families”!”
 
Her words are so meaningful to me and I am so grateful for them.  It reminded me of something she wrote on my Assignment when marking it many years ago. 
 
“Like with Frankl being thrust into terrible suffering, life never abandoned you but was near enough to take you through your hardships with all of its lessons, all of the skills of compassion you gained, to where you are now. And there is a beckoning, more liberating and growth-promoting journey ahead!”
 
I was reminded of how, all through my life, there was always someone or some animal there to walk with me for a time, to inspire, uplift, care about and love me.
 
My sister, my beloved Greek stepmother, my Anne and certain others of my family and Facebook friends, house helpers, neighbours, pets, horses and so many more.  I was never really alone or abandoned, no matter how lonely or abandoned I felt at any one time.  I even have family and friends in Heaven who I KNOW are with me and love me still.  I feel their presence and see the signs of their presence daily and feel so reassured and blessed by them all.

My mentor also wrote to me a while ago: 

"YOU CAN ALWAYS TRUST THE FACT THAT I WILL NEVER BE UPSET OR DISPLEASED WITH YOU - IMPOSSIBLE!  "Love covers a multitude of sins" - and go and read 1 Corinthians 13, my favorite.  Patience, forgiveness, understanding, whatever is necessary, ALWAYS lovingly accepts the beloved person when they err - don't we all??"

There have been so many “beloved’s” who turned against me when I erred, or when they met my inner-child, but never my mentor and a few other steadfast, longsuffering, faithful souls who could really SEE ME… I was never invisible to them no matter what... I learned to TRUST their friendship and love completely... something so very hard for me to do, but they showed me that I COULD.  

I have come to understand that TRUST is one of the most precious gifts one could ever give and receive... as with LOVE.

I once wrote: 

ABUSER ~ WHEN YOU TOOK AWAY MY TRUST!
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You sexually and verbally abused me, and beat me broken
You took away every possession I had
And sent away everyone I loved
You starved me
And took away my dignity
Humiliated me
And left me crying in the cold darkness of ‘your’ hate
Yet I was still able to endure it all and more
I was still able to rise up each time and continue on

But when you took away my trust in my fellow man
I became a lost and wondering soul
In the bitter cold world you had created for me to live in…

UTTERLY ALONE

FEELING REJECTED
UNACCEPTED
JUDGED
EXPOSED
INVISIBLE
AND SO SAD

~  Panayiota Ryall
(02 February 2008)

I have so much to be grateful for today, and I am.
 
Thank you for sharing with me.
 
~ Panayiota.