I said goodbye to my soul sister, my little Bichon, Clair, on June 2nd and I learned a lot through that experience.

Clair was sixteen and a half and had a great life as the reigning queen of the Universe. She’d done pretty well until a few months ago when she really began to slow down. She was diagnosed with a heart murmur about six years ago which ultimately resulted in heart failure.

Needless to say, it is a difficult thing to lose someone you love. My Grandmother (Gram) passed away a little over a year ago and being with Clair at the end of her life brought back memories of my last visits with her and an important lesson in acceptance.

The most important thing I had to do for Clair was accept where and how she was in the moment. Knowing that every day was different, some better than others, but no matter how they were, they just were. I realized with my Gram that I could spend the time that we were together wishing that things were different or that I could mine the jewels that were right in front of me in the moment. Like just being with her and sharing some time together. I learned to just meet her where she was because visiting for a little bit was all that mattered.

And the same was true for my time with Clair. Thankfully, I had some time to make peace with the inevitable. Not that it was easy by any means but I learned and am still learning so much from the experience. In the last few of weeks of her life I consciously found myself assuming the role of the observer – not just observing Clair but observing myself as her caretaker and observing my feelings about what was happening. The observer is neutral and detached – able to make decisions based on facts and not emotion. It is powerful and peaceful and from that place I knew, on June 2nd, it was time. She was not going to get better and I couldn’t, in good conscience, let her get any worse. She made a peaceful transition as she fell asleep on my lap.

I shared this with you to hopefully inspire you to just be with whatever is going on in your life at the moment and your feelings about it, whether it is big or small, profound or mundane, wanted or not wanted. Because if you spend your time wishing things were different you are not accomplishing anything. There are jewels to be mined in every experience – some of which may be deeper self-knowledge, self-acceptance, forgiveness and wisdom.

Ervin Seal writes;

“Undoubtedly each human life has its quota of suffering, but the only purpose and service of suffering is to awaken understanding. With each increase of understanding, the quota of suffering lessens.  The more detached one is from the human picture and the human way of judgment, the more identified one is with the divine picture and the more transcendent of human suffering.”

Thank you, Clair, for bringing me understanding.

Love and a Million Blessings

Kelly