Crossroads Moments
I had a dream last night. It was disturbing and has made me consider what might have been. The dream was an alternate reality – a parallel reality – of a decision I made many many years ago.
But before I tell you my dream I need to go back through my life to make sense of it. If you’ve been reading my Blogs you’ll know some of my story already but for the benefit of continuity I’ll summarise the relevant parts again for you here.
In my twenties I was madly in love with a guy. It wasn’t an easy relationship. We were young, immature and unaware of all our wounds. We looped merrily into dramas and old patterns of behaviour. This played out on an almost daily basis with codependency, manipulation, moodiness, arguments and pointlessly hurting each other over the most trivial things. Yes it was incredibly fraught! I remember one spell when we didn’t speak to each other for three weeks!!! Three WEEKS! We were on the slippery slope towards self destruction by then. But still. Three weeks we lasted living together in a rooftop room in Varanasi- sharing the same bed, cohabiting and existing side by side, while physically, emotionally, mentally and spiritually rejecting each other. It was incredibly damaging. Eventually the flip-flop between the cold shoulder treatment and clingy-needy codependency (it got to the point where I couldn’t have a shower without him coming in to talk to me!!) got too much and I had to leave.
I found myself at a crossroads. Should I stay or should I go? Do I work on this or do I leave?
I called on my spirit guides and I was given a resounding and unequivocal ‘YES’ to leaving. It was incredibly painful. This was a soulmate I was leaving. Despite not being mature enough to make it work the lifetimes of grief and despair, of deep deep love and longing reared up and held me. Four years I resisted the call to leave. Four years I fought to hang on to the love.
Even after I left him it wasn’t any easier to move on. I pined for this lost love. I understood that love is a tap. You can’t just turn love off. This was a forever love whether I liked it or not! I thought of him daily – and dreamed of him often – for nearly a decade after we separated. It was a rip that never really healed in my heart. This is despite knowing I could never be with him, could never sustain a relationship that was so incredibly dysfunctional and downright toxic! Yet the longing remained long after the memories faded.
Another crossroads occurred about a year after this separation. I continued traveling, working to refresh my dwindling travel funds when I needed. But one day, in Pushkar India, I was walloped with a realisation: the world was my oyster. I had the luxury of going where ever I set my heart on. But my heart didn’t want to go anywhere! It was 1998 and I was done travelling. I had a crossroads in front of me, two choices that would shape the future: do I become a career traveller or do I go home?
I chose to go home, blowing the last of my savings on a trip down the east coast of Australia to visit old travel buddies. This was when I met my future husband and innocently exchanged email addresses. At the time I wasn’t interested in a romance: I was going home to reclaim my lost love! As you can imagine that didn’t end well! He had moved on – he had a new partner and although he was respectfully caring there was no connection there.
18 months home in New Zealand and I was on the move again to Melbourne, Australia. Nigel visited me there (another crossroads moment right there!), we fell in love and I moved to Tasmania two months later…within a year we were married and I was pregnant with our first of three babies a few months after that! Yes things move fast when you are guided and on your highest path and purpose!
Ok! So my dream. This dream was based on a completely different choice. What could have happened if I had continued travelling? What could have happened if I had travelled another 10 years then returned to New Zealand to reclaim my lost love?! Wow. As you can imagine it didn’t end well! By this time he had well and truly moved on – he had 3 kids and a wife and although he was respectfully caring there was no connection there.
So my dream ended with me facing reality: I had no home, no job, no partner or anything resembling stability. I was rudderless and in despair, looking back at my decades of travel and wondering what to do next!
That’s not to say that this reality would have played out if I had decided to be a career traveller but I imagine it could have been. I imagine my life as a career traveller would have been deeply fulfilling and profoundly meaningful. This life would have led to other alternate realities I can’t even imagine. But it wouldn’t have led to stability and the commitment of a marriage, to children and all the learning and growth associated with not being able to project or run away!
A crossroads moment is such a gift. A crossroads moment is an such incredibly potent opportunity in life. The choices we make ripple through the future. This is the Law of Attraction in action! There is no right way and wrong way. Both choices just lead to different future realities.
Tune in. If you follow your intuition and go where your passion lies you are on the right track. If you are guided by what lights you up from the inside you know you’re on the right track.
Art by Patricia Ariel
Article by: Debra Reeves
Professional Intuitive
Website: debrareeves.com