You as child
Greetings to you in the folds of where you are—long light and ladybugs for those of you in Summer, long nights and cuddled rest for those of you in Winter.
There’s a lot going on no matter where you may find yourself perched. And it can feel like a lot. Almost too much to bear. My daily practice is to not look away from what is present and stay in my heart. To remember why I’m here. To trust that we are all exactly where we’re supposed to be. That we are only given what we are ready for. That we are all in a moment when each choice, word, thought, action is both small and everything. And I choose love.
I offer you this month’s essay on a current of love. May it meet you where you are.
The wholeness of you includes you as child.
Not once were.
Not memory, cliché, or fantasy wish.
Now.
Do you know this to be true? Does it seem close or far away?
Anything of distance isn’t real.
Step back to see the frame, and the framing of the frame.
It’s flimsy. False. Held in place by separation.
Framing “you” as separate from all of you.
You are not of calendars.
You are sky.
Ocean of oceans.
Stardust seeds.
Wisdom of feathers and falling.
Childhood may be of memory, but you as child is always.
You as child is you as soul.
Your soul.
Open, true, longing for you—
to listen,
root your most ancient knowing
inside your heart
and be
free.
You are free.
You may have forgotten amidst the boxes, news, and patterns you thought were paths.
Yet, your soul is not once upon a time.
You are always, miraculous, continuous.
All of the world in all of you.
As child, as light, as song.
Attune to this, to you as child.
Release, breathe, melt.
Find that place inside—tender, defenseless, true.
Stay here.
Don’t turn away or grip too tight.
Let your heart open.
This is you.
I’m not speaking of ideas.
This isn’t of agreement or preference.
It’s not connecting with your “inner child.”
Not “if, then” logic to care for yourself first so you can then care for others.
You are more than this.
Children are more than this.
Ideas for what children need, what caregivers and community must provide, the essential actions to ensure all children thrive—these are important, yet…
when they exist as ideas, in spreadsheets and strategic plans, on whiteboards and policy statements, they aren’t whole or resonant as the essence of children.
We get so busy trying to fix things and argue with ideas, we forget who we are.
We forget to be reverence,
to attune to the frequency of children, to the wholeness of ourselves.
This is the work of love.
It aches to see and hold as true the mess, injustice, death, pain.
Yet the outer response pattern of fight, you’re wrong, be louder, do more, feel struggle is an inside pattern.
It’s what you’re doing to yourself—fight, you’re wrong, feel struggle—
it’s what you’re saying to your soul,
to you as child.
And this is what we’re doing to children. Not what “they’re” doing, not “them” over “there.”
What we, as caregivers, educators, family members, neighbors, have been doing to ourselves and each other for far too long.
Here, inside us lies the responsibility and the potential of liberation.
It’s simpler than we think it is.
It’s softer.
It’s of and from that place inside you—tender, defenseless, true.
It’s from here that we attune to the frequency of children.
You as child, as love.
From this inside place, you can see the whole without story or fear—
what’s dying, dissolving, burning, on its way, composting to something else.
And you can see why you’re here, what you’re creating with the soil,
you as soil, as star, as seed.
Always, magnificent, continuous.
You plant your feet, stretch your arms, open your skin, awake your eyes.
What you see is what you grow.
You let yourself see what you know.
What you know as child.
*
love+light, Melissa
Thank you for reading this essay of Noticing Matters. This is reader-supported work. If you appreciate what I have to share, consider becoming a paid subscriber, sharing this post with others, and/or gifting a subscription to a friend.
I love to take things that feel like “big ideas” or “impossible ways of being” and translate them into tangible, practical, everyday actions for people and contexts who resonate with the energy, but aren’t quite sure what to “do.”
Reach out if you’d like to chat about how we might work together: melissa@melissaabutler.com
Learn more about me and my work: www.melissaabutler.com
