How Deep Is Your Love?

I was told there’s nothing to see there.

Which is why I wanted to see it.

It’s 7:30 AM and right on schedule the ferry pulled away from the dock for the one hour ride to New Shoreham, a small island off the coast of Rhode Island. A booming summer tourist hotspot, the island is in full hibernation mode on this frigid December morning. Cold, isolated, and barren.

It’s exactly what I had hoped for.

I’m not sure when a ritual becomes a tradition, but for the past several years I select one day in late December to become somewhat invisible and inaccessible. A spiritual spa day of sorts, where I find myself in cold, isolated, and barren locations in coastal Massachusetts and Rhode Island wonderfully alone, embarking on long hikes in solitude where the only voice I hear is the one in my head. 

These days are important days. These are the days of reflection, release, realignment, and reconnection. This is a safe space for me to be honest with me about me. A kind and loving space where I allow myself to process and unpack the heaviness life sometimes throws upon your shoulders and your heart. In this space there is no agenda nor the pressure of needing to figure it all out and have solutions in place. It’s a space of open dialog and a space where I learn to better understand me.

This is something relatively new for me. For most of my life I really wasn’t a safe space for me. I was to blame for the presence of any life heaviness I was experiencing and I’d relentlessly blame myself for not knowing how to deal with it. Being hard on yourself is often a learned behavior and I learned that lesson well. When I learned that I didn’t have to perpetuate such habitual harshness I opened the door of kindness, respect, and self compassion which over time dramatically changed my relationship with me.

The old me, the harsh and bitter me, would never undertake an introspective journey such as the one I undertook this day. But the newer version of me, the kinder and more compassionate me, provides a foundational sense of emotional safety where going deeply within is no longer something I fear.

It’s become something I celebrate.

Of all the relationships we cultivate and nurture, the most impactful one of all will always be the one we have with ourselves.