In the In-Between

I Don’t Have the Answers—and I Think That Matters

I have been sitting with some uncomfortable thoughts for quite a while.

They aren’t new, exactly. But over the past few years—and even more intensely over the past several months—they have become harder for me to ignore.

I find myself questioning things I once accepted more easily.

Life. Healing. Spirituality. Relationships. Purpose. Truth. The work I do. The things we are told we should want. The things we are told we should heal. And what any of it ultimately means.

Maybe this is simply where I am in life.

Maybe age gives us permission to question things we once felt obligated to understand.

Or maybe I have simply grown tired of hoping or pretending I have answers when I don’t.

I Don’t See Things the Way Everyone Else Seems To

For much of my life, I have felt as though I see things differently.

That isn’t meant to suggest that I see them better. In fact, there are times when I wish I could accept things as easily as other people seem to.

I tend to look underneath things.

I wonder why people behave the way they do. I consider their history, their wounds, their circumstances and what the world might look like through their eyes. Even when someone hurts me, part of me tries to understand what brought them to that place.

It can be a beautiful quality.

It can also be exhausting.

Because when you spend so much time attempting to understand everyone else’s perspective, there can be a quiet heartbreak in realizing that very few people make the same effort to understand yours.

And there is an odd loneliness in seeing many sides of something.

Sometimes I envy certainty.

I know I have contributed to some of this dynamic in my own relationships.

I know the parts of myself that learned early in life to keep the peace, avoid hurting people, make allowances, give another chance, and hold on longer than I probably should.

I understand where much of that comes from.

Awareness helps.

But awareness doesn’t magically undo a lifetime of being human.

Perhaps that realization is part of what has caused me to question the way we think and talk about healing.

When Did Healing Become Something Else We Have to Get Right?

The world of healing and wellness has grown tremendously.

There are practitioners, teachers, and approaches available today that many of us would never have encountered a generation ago. People are talking more openly about trauma, nervous system regulation, energy, boundaries, emotional health, spirituality, and the connection between our physical and emotional experiences.

I think there is tremendous value in that.

I have devoted years of my own life to learning different healing modalities, and I continue to learn. I wouldn’t do that if I didn’t believe these practices could offer something meaningful.

What I struggle with is something different.

Sometimes, surrounded by so many methods, explanations, and possibilities, I wonder whether healing has inadvertently become another thing we feel we have to get right.

There is always another pattern we might uncover.

Another wound we could explore.

Another practice we could try.

Another explanation for why we feel the way we feel.

Another layer to release, understand, integrate, or work through.

And perhaps some of those things will be exactly what someone needs.

But perhaps not all of them will be.

What resonates deeply with one person may not resonate at all with another. One person may find tremendous comfort in the idea of soul contracts or reincarnation. Another may find meaning through religion. Someone else may understand herself through psychology, science, nature, energy work, or a combination of many different things.

I don’t think one of us necessarily has to be right for the others to be wrong.

That is where I find myself increasingly resistant to certainty.

Not to the practices themselves.

Not to the people offering them.

To certainty.

Because I don’t know that there is one explanation for why we hurt, one path toward healing, or even one definition of what being “healed” means.

I also wonder whether there are times when we don’t need to work on ourselves at all.

Maybe sometimes we need to rest.

Maybe we need to laugh.

Maybe we need to sit outside.

Maybe we need to cry without analyzing the tears.

Maybe we need a cup of tea and someone who will listen.

Maybe we need energy work, therapy, prayer, medication, movement, creativity, or solitude.

Maybe we need several of those things.

And maybe what we need will change.

I want there to be room for that uncertainty in the work I offer.

I Cannot Heal You

I am an energy worker.

I am a Reiki Master Teacher. I work with the Ancient Black Pearl Technique, aromatherapy, herbs, intuitive practices, cards, and other holistic tools.

And I cannot heal you.

I don’t say that to diminish my work.

I say it because I respect it.

And because I respect you.

I can create an environment that feels safe and nurturing.

I can offer warmth, touch, quiet, aromatherapy, and energy work.

I can listen.

I can hold space for things you may not have anywhere else to put down.

I can bring what I have learned through years of study and experience into the room with you.

I can offer another perspective when you want one.

I can offer TLC.

And yes, I can work with energy.

But I am not your healer.

Your healing belongs to you.

I think of myself much more as a vessel and a participant in an experience that belongs just as much to the person on my treatment table as it does to me.

Whatever happens within that space belongs to her.

Her experience.

Her interpretation.

Her healing.

Her knowing.

I don’t want authority over another person’s journey.

I don’t think it was ever mine to take.

Perhaps it begins somewhere much simpler:

Here you are.

Here I am.

What would feel supportive today?

And we begin there.

I Am Becoming More Comfortable With “I Don’t Know”

There are so many things we speak about with certainty that none of us can actually know with certainty.

Why are we here?

Is there a God?

What happens when we die?

Do we reincarnate?

Did we choose this particular life?

Did we choose our parents?

Are painful experiences lessons our souls agreed to learn?

Does everything happen for a reason?

I have heard beautiful explanations for all of these things.

I have probably repeated some of them myself over the years.

Today, my answer is much simpler.

I don’t know.

Maybe we choose our lives before we arrive here.

Maybe we don’t.

Maybe there is an intricate spiritual plan behind everything.

Maybe there isn’t.

Maybe some experiences teach us profound lessons.

And maybe some things are simply painful.

I don’t know why one person experiences tremendous suffering while another seems to move through life relatively untouched.

I don’t know why kind people sometimes experience terrible things.

I don’t know why people we love sometimes hurt us.

And I am no longer certain that every painful experience needs to be transformed into a spiritual lesson in order for us to survive it.

Sometimes life hurts.

Sometimes we make mistakes.

Sometimes other people make choices that change our lives.

Sometimes we grow.

Sometimes we don’t.

Sometimes we understand.

Sometimes we carry the question.

Perhaps being human is allowed to be that complicated.

What If There Is No Absolute Truth?

This may be one of the questions I struggle with most.

We have spent thousands of years trying to determine what is true.

And we still disagree.

We don’t agree on religion.

We don’t agree on God.

We don’t agree on morality.

We don’t agree on consciousness.

We don’t even agree on what constitutes a meaningful life.

Every one of us sees the world through a lens shaped by experience, family, culture, education, pain, love, loss, and countless other influences.

So I find it difficult to believe that my truth automatically makes yours wrong.

That doesn’t mean I believe nothing matters or that anything goes.

It means I am increasingly interested in humility.

In curiosity.

In being able to say:

“This is what I believe right now. Tell me how you see it.”

Perhaps connection doesn’t require agreement.

Perhaps it requires the willingness to remain curious about one another.

Then What Is the Point?

This is where my thoughts become harder.

I think about mortality more than I used to.

Not necessarily with fear.

With curiosity.

From the moment our lives begin, we become temporary beings.

We spend decades learning.

We develop skills.

We become knowledgeable about things.

We build careers and businesses.

We raise families.

We love people and animals.

We make homes.

We plant gardens.

We accumulate stories.

We become very good at certain things.

And eventually, we leave all of it behind.

Within a few generations, most of us will barely be remembered.

There are days when that thought makes so much of what we chase seem pointless and absurd.

Why spend decades becoming good at something if everything we have learned eventually disappears with us?

Why build something?

Why create?

Why become an expert?

Why work so hard to be seen?

Why spend so much of this very short life trying to prove our worth?

I don’t have an answer.

But lately I have been wondering whether I have been asking the wrong question.

Maybe Something Doesn’t Have to Last Forever to Matter

I love flowers.

I have never looked at a flower and thought its bloom was meaningless because it would eventually fade.

I have never looked at a sunset and decided it wasn’t beautiful because darkness would follow.

I have never believed loving an animal was pointless because I knew I would eventually have to say goodbye.

So why do I sometimes demand permanence before allowing my own life to feel meaningful?

Maybe meaning doesn’t require permanence.

Maybe an experience can matter simply because it mattered then.

Perhaps someone lies on my treatment table for an hour and nothing miraculous happens.

Maybe she doesn’t release decades of trauma.

Maybe she doesn’t discover her life’s purpose.

Maybe her energy isn’t permanently transformed.

Maybe she simply feels warm.

Safe.

Cared for.

Maybe her shoulders drop.

Maybe she closes her eyes.

Maybe she breathes more deeply.

Maybe someone listens without interrupting.

Maybe for sixty minutes, nobody needs anything from her.

Maybe she simply gets to be.

And maybe that is enough.

Actually, I am beginning to believe it is more than enough.

Finding My Place in a Very Loud World

This brings me to another question I have struggled with increasingly:

How do I talk about the work I do?

There are so many gifted practitioners doing meaningful work in different ways. Some are comfortable being highly visible, speaking confidently about their methods, sharing their expertise often, and clearly telling people why they should work with them.

There is nothing wrong with that.

In fact, I admire people who can do it authentically.

It simply doesn’t feel natural to me.

Sometimes marketing feels like a competitive sport—everyone trying to be seen, heard, and chosen in an increasingly crowded space.

And I don’t want to compete.

I don’t want someone to choose me because I convinced her that my approach is better than someone else’s.

I don’t believe it is.

It is simply mine.

Another practitioner may offer exactly what someone needs at a particular moment in her life.

Someone else may connect with my way of working.

Both can be true.

There is room for both of us.

Perhaps that is because I don’t believe healing has one correct path in the first place.

What resonates deeply with one person may mean absolutely nothing to another.

Neither experience has to be wrong.

So How Do I Tell You What I Do?

This is the part I am still figuring out.

I own a business.

Of course, I want it to succeed.

I want clients.

I want people to know what I offer.

I want the work I have spent years learning and developing to be valued.

And yes, I need to earn money from that work.

Wanting to be compensated for something meaningful to me doesn’t make the meaning less genuine.

But I don’t want to turn myself into a product in order to do it.

I don’t want every conversation to become a sales opportunity.

I don’t want to continually position myself as the answer to someone else’s problem.

And I don’t want to participate in an endless cycle of trying to prove why you should choose me instead of someone else.

Maybe there is another way.

Maybe instead of trying to convince you, I can simply let you know me.

I can tell you what I believe.

I can tell you what I question.

I can show you how I work.

I can explain what happens in my treatment room.

I can share what I have learned and remain honest about what I don’t know.

I can tell you what matters to me and what you can expect when you enter my space.

And then I can trust you.

Trust you to recognize whether something here resonates with you.

Trust you to know whether I am someone you would feel comfortable sitting beside.

Trust you to choose another practitioner when that person feels more aligned with what you need.

That doesn’t have to be rejection.

It can simply be connection finding its appropriate place.

Perhaps marketing The Willow Connection doesn’t have to mean repeatedly asking people to pick me.

Perhaps it can mean allowing myself to be seen clearly enough that the people who recognize something of themselves here can find me.

That feels different.

Quieter, perhaps.

But much more like me.

Beside You, Not Ahead

Perhaps this is where all my questioning has brought me.

I don’t want followers.

I want connection.

I don’t want to stand at the front of someone else’s healing journey telling her which direction to go.

I would rather walk beside her for whatever portion of that journey our paths happen to share.

She brings her experiences, beliefs, questions, wisdom, wounds, humor, strength, and humanness.

I bring mine.

Neither of us enters the room empty.

Neither of us needs to stand above the other.

And somewhere in that meeting, something can happen.

Rest.

Comfort.

Release.

Recognition.

Insight.

Laughter.

Tears.

Stillness.

Connection.

Perhaps healing.

But I don’t need to decide what it was.

You do.

And perhaps that is what connection has meant all along.

In the In-Between

I still don’t know what the meaning of life is.

I don’t know whether I ever will.

Perhaps that is no longer the question I need answered.

We arrive.

We leave.

And there is this extraordinary, confusing, painful, beautiful stretch of time in between.

The in-between.

Maybe my work isn’t about explaining it.

Maybe it isn’t about fixing it.

Maybe it isn’t even about understanding all of it.

Maybe The Willow Connection is simply one small place within that enormous in-between where two human beings can meet without pretending to have all the answers.

A place to rest.

A place to question.

A place to reconnect.

A place to be cared for.

A place where you don’t have to become some better version of yourself before you are worthy of tenderness.

I don’t know exactly where all of these questions will take me.

For once, I don’t think I need to.

I want to keep exploring them.

And if some of these questions live inside you too, perhaps we can explore them together.

Not because I know the way.

Not because you need to follow me.

But because, for a little while, we can walk beside one another.

And perhaps that is enough.