The Pearl...Within - The Slow Holy Work of Becoming - Eposide 9

In The Pearl Within, Lulu reflects on the slow, holy work happening inside us all, even when we think nothing is changing. With story, spacious pauses, and a closing meditation, this episode invites you to soften, breathe, and rediscover the beauty already forming at your center.

Transcript

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Hello, my friends. Welcome to Light in the Garden, a soft place to land, to breathe, and to remember who you truly are. I'm Lulu, and this podcast is my offering. Here at Light in the Garden, we explore the quiet places where the human and the divine meet. This isn't a podcast of answers because goodness knows I am still very much a student of life, of living. Rather, it's a place of remembering. If you stay with me, you'll hear stories from the road, from the lake where I spend many hours, and from the long path of my own becoming. Each episode is a companion for your heart, something you can sink into, breathe with, and carry into your day. You'll find encouragement for the weary parts, clarity for the tangled places, and a gentle reminder of the divinity you already carry inside you. This is a space where we honor the mystery, where we live with one foot here and one foot in the unseen garden that keeps calling us home. This is light in the garden, and I'm so glad you are here. Yesterday I met a kindred soul, a musician who sang my song. Well, let me clarify not the content of his song, but the rawness, the self examination, the vulnerability that hovered in the air long after the last note faded. You know that feeling when something lands in your chest before your mind can catch up? Yeah, that is the thing of which I speak. It reminded me how rare it seems that we, we human beings, are willing to expose our underbelly. Or perhaps I'm only talking about myself. For many years I erected walls, not a gentle fence, not polite boundaries, but walls with sharp jagged edges, barriers designed not merely to protect, but to warn. Do not enter. I was as scared as a newborn kitten to allow in the light or the love, and like many of us my childhood carried missing pieces, particularly those soft and precious components young ones need in order to grow and to learn how to live and love and trust the world as they grow. So I learned how to hide. That little girl survived, though at what price? Years, decades really, spent in this self-protection mode, created an oyster shell exterior, masquerading as a self-possessed introvert. I wore that label proudly. Introvert. It sounded noble, spiritual even. But sometimes we choose language not to describe ourselves honestly, but to justify the distance we keep from people, from life. Yes, it was a perfect method for keeping others out, but it was also very effective at keeping out light and love and joy. Even with all the keep out signs that I cemented to my outer gray and craggy surface, something sacred was happening inside. Spirit was tending my soft interior. With every grain of sand, also known as life that irritated me and there were many. A pearl was being formed in that soft interior. I didn't notice it at first. Most of us don't. Growth is quiet like that, unflashy, slow, invisible from the outside. I found freedom not by leaving life and retreating deeper into that shell, but by leaving the version of myself that believed hiding was the same thing as safety. Ah there it was, the pearl. The freedom that came from laying down decades of playing hide and seek with my own soul, all the churches I attended, the retreats, the self-confrontation courses, the therapy, the prayer and meditation, the service I offered others like being a prayer chaplain, the journaling, the mentors and coaches, the twelve step meetings. None of it was wasted. Every single piece was gathered up by the Spirit of the Universe and used to polish that pearl. Right there in the center of a shell that had once seemed impossible to crack. Big sigh here the kind that drops from the shoulders, the kind that says Ah, this is what mercy feels like. Listening to that musician yesterday stirred something old in me. It reminded me of a poem I wrote years ago, before I had language for shells and pearls and nervous systems and survival strategies. Before I knew I was becoming something softer. Before I understood that survival and aliveness are not the same thing, I didn't know then what was forming inside me. I only knew I was trying to tell the truth. Let me read you a piece of it. I am the kind of woman who chooses to fly into the rip roaring flames and sparks of an all encompassing fire. I am the kind of woman who fears nothing except the generous folds of her body. I am the kind of woman who silently whispers to the fallen fledgling crow to get up and fly. I am the kind of woman who falls asleep each night nestled between the fur blankets of my dogs. I am the kind of woman who sings good morning to the Drake Elms and the cypress trees and the black bellied whistling ducks. I am the kind of woman who loves other women and their bright and drab scarves, their unadorned faces and their sparkling bangles. I am the kind of woman who hears the oaks calling me outside to play, climbing fearlessly into their heights. I am the kind of woman who grieves for the parents she never knew, the grandmothers who never knew her name. When I listen to her now, the woman who wrote that, I don't want to correct her. I don't want to toughen her up or fix her or tell her what she didn't yet know. I just want to smile and say Ah look at you. You were already listening to trees, already loving fiercely, already brave enough to grieve what you never had. You were still armored in places, still fighting the weather, still trying to be fearless while quietly negotiating with your own body. You didn't yet know you were allowed to rest because the pearl was already forming. I outgrew the frightened version of myself, the running child, the hyper vigilant teenager, the braced for impact adult. I'm not fighting them anymore. They had their season. They kept me alive. But none of them get the wheel now. I thank them quietly, reverently, and invite them to rest. The pearl of me steps forward instead. I was told often that I was an overthinker, too much, too intense, the woman who couldn't rest, the woman who tried to manage outcomes, who tried to answer every why, the woman who mistook survival for living, the woman who fought the wind. And so now I don't force myself to work beyond my limits. I allow myself to cry. I allow myself to leave a project unfinished when my old self would have cracked the whip. I allow myself mercy and grace. Letting the weather be what it will be without battling it. This has become holy work for me because I used to fight everything, including the weather. Including and especially God. I'd like to offer a longer breathing space now, an invitation to let this teaching land in your body, not just your mind. I call it laying down the armor. Take a slow breath in and let it fall out of you. Another in through the nose, out through the mouth. If it feels safe, let your shoulders drop just a fraction of an inch. Now imagine without effort that whatever you use to protect yourself is resting on your body right now. Armor, shell, old scaffolding. Nothing dramatic. Just notice its weight. Where does it sit? In the chest, the jaw? Behind the eyes? In the belly. You don't need to remove it. You don't need to argue with it. It was built for a reason. Silently inside yourself. Thank it for keeping you alive. Now see if you can loosen just one strap of your armor. Take a breath with me in. And with your exhale, let something unbuckle. Another breath in. And with this exhale, let the shell open the smallest crack. Light doesn't rush in. It never does. It arrives the way morning light does. Slow, patient, inevitable. Let the ribs widen. Let the tongue rest. Let the brow smooth. If an old part of you gets nervous, tell it gently. You can sit down now. I've got this. Picture yourself in a wide open space, a field, a garden, the edge of water, somewhere your body recognizes as safe. Notice the air, the temperature, the quality of light. Early morning, late afternoon, golden light, silver light, clouds soft. Feel the ground beneath your feet. Grass, sand, stone. Let your weight settle downward. You are held. Now imagine setting your armor on the ground. Not throwing it away, not destroying it, just resting it like a coach you don't need for this season. Notice what changes in your body when it leaves you. More space in the chest, more room for breath, and a surprising lightness in the spine. Stay there for three slow breaths. Inhale. Exhale. Inhale. Exhale. Inhale. Exhale. If it feels right, take one small step away from that armor. You are not abandoning anything. You are simply remembering that you can stand without bracing. Notice now how the air touches your skin. How your heart beats without armor The quiet courage of being uncovered. Look around that safe place again. What grows there? Trees Wildflowers Water Sun warmed stones. Hear the sounds that belong wind, birds, water moving and your own breath. So let this place witness you soft, alive, unfinished. Here there is nothing to defend against. Only weather, only seasons, only the slow unlearning of tightening up. Let your hands relax, let your jaw just float. Let the muscles around your eyeballs soften. And if part of you wonders how long this softness can last, answer simply long enough for this breath and this one. Now turn back toward the armor. Just notice it from here. How heavy it once was, how necessary. Offer it a small bow of gratitude. Then turn again toward the open space, toward the light, toward whatever feels like invitation, toward your own becoming. Feel the living pulse beneath your skin, the warmth, the steady quiet yes of being alive. This is not weakness, this is arrival. When you're ready, let the image soften, let the landscape fade gently. Bring your attention back to the room, the surface beneath you, the nearest sound, the simple miracle of breathing, and carry this with you. You are allowed to live without bracing. You are allowed to rest your vigilance. You are allowed to meet this day unarmored. Take one last slow breath in and let it go and step back into your life gently. Before we leave this space, let yourself name one small thing you are tending right now. A relationship, a healing, a hope, a piece of courage you didn't know you had. Give yourself permission to lay down your armor and meet this state gently and softly, polished like the pearl that lives within you already. Hold it gently. Ask yourself these questions. Am I ready to release this tight hold on myself? Am I willing to all the pearl? Am I willing to let all of the pearl within me shine? And as you return to your day, carry this with you. Even in the places you thought needed protection, light has been at work. Work quietly growing something that only you can grow. When you're ready, open your eyes and remember keep one foot in the world and one in the garden. Thank you for joining me today. I really do appreciate it.