Breakups and Boundaries

change as a death

I was rarely the one who did the breaking up. I would hold on for dear life, forgetting myself, my self-respect, clinging, becoming someone I didn’t recognize or maybe recognized too well. Getting my own way, the object of my affections, which wasn’t reciprocated any more, was how I handled the end of relationships. I once destroyed an ex-boyfriend’s car, thinking somehow my rage would make him love me again. Needless to say, this didn’t work. This was in the days before cell phones and the internet, when you’d have to call someone on a land line or try to track them down in your car or on foot. If I were dating today, in that emotionally fraught shell of a young women which I lived in then, there would have been endless texts and messages for the “beloved” to roll their eyes and delete.

I behaved similarly with friends. I couldn’t accept that sometimes friends grow apart, or that people sometimes need to disengage for their own reasons. Part loyalty, part only child, I desperately wanted a sister or sisters, a forever kind of love. I was often disappointed by not being “the one.” My childhood best friend Amy, who went to a different school, grew to care more about her middle school friends than little old me. (Side note, we are now close like sisters). Life improved exponentially when I went to an arts focused high school. I made new friends and finally had a bona fide cool clique, just like I’d always wanted. But the pain of exclusion, that ache is always a memory, like an old injury which you only remember when it acts up if you move a certain way.

This morning I ended my relationship with a group (not the individuals in the group per se) which I had unwittingly become the leader of for over two years. I won’t go into the specifics but suffice it to say it was a support group, and it was a beautiful and messy and truthful and painful kind of place. We met at the same time every week, always on my zoom, with me as the “host,” and it was extremely rewarding for me. Until it stopped being so rewarding. I was changing, identifying differently, and I began to feel a little weird about it, like I was acting a role versus being real. I gave myself six months to make the decision, and when I announced it, the cards pretty much fell where I thought they would: a combination of compassion, anger, disappointment, and grief. Now I have the ubiquitous Taylor Swift song rolling through my brain about never getting back together, and I am living with my decision, and the boundary I set. I feel guilty, angry, relieved, sad, and yes, strong. I write about this because as I said to start I was rarely the one to do the breaking up. It didn’t come easily then even when it was the right thing to do, and it doesn’t now, but it is just a little easier as I've gotten older and feel more secure about how I hold the idea of truth. The group coming to an end was a death of sorts, and Death in the tarot means we are allowed, in fact we are required by this life to change, to accept change to enact change, to die a little and be reborn.

The Death Card

The Death card in the tarot is all about change. It is about recognizing and accepting what needs to change in order that the new can become welcome. We can see transitions in the Death card, both death and life. I think the sun is in fact rising not setting in the background. Though it is tempting as we approach Friday the 13th and Halloween to think of this card as spooky and sad, I like to bring in a little numerology and add 1 and 3 together to get 4, which is the number of stability and equilibrium. Death brings with it change, but change which strengthens and makes us more steady.

Photo by Tyler van der Hoeven on Unsplash

It is eclipse season, with eclipses on the 14th and 28th of this month. My Astrologer friend Natha says that change is inevitable but it can be either received open-heartedly or resisted. This will determine whether the month will be hard or not.

Photo by Jen Theodore on Unsplash

Tarot Circle is back on 10/22 at 9am pst. Let me know if you want a zoom invite.

As always,

Xo Hanna