I participated in a profound call with my business mentor, Damian, on Wednesday this week. Our calls are wide ranging and can seem, at least to an outside observer, to not deal with business at all. This call was deep and profound. I began the call feeling guilty that I had not done work that he had recommended I start on. I said, “Damian, I actually was expecting a lecture or finger wagging talk from you that I need to do the work!” He chuckled as did I. I chuckled because in the past two years of working with him, he has never even come close to using or being in that kind of conversation with me, ever. But he did ask me or invited me to lean into that feeling of guilt. “What’s that about?” he said. “Can you recall anything from your past?” he followed with.

And, some memories came rushing back to me. I was three years old. I have these very clear emotional nightmares and visions that I experienced from that time. I vividly remember a car driving by our house in Chico, CA very slowly with a large woman driving and the car full of young kids my age, all of them yelling and screaming. And my first thought was “She’s coming to take me away- she’s stealing all the children from the neighborhood!” And I remember running back into the house out of breath and trembling in fear. Another time, I remember vivid painful stomach aches and a skeleton swinging me around me in circles and feeling completely out of control with no one to help me and fear rushing through me. Nightmares, obviously. I also remember the most powerful nightmare of all- being in the basement of the house (no basement existed in the house) and hanging on these large vent pipes in complete darkness, and yelling for my dad to come and help me.

What I have become aware of is that my father and mother had separated at that time; and my father was gone for a few months when these nightmares occurred. So feelings of abandonment were coursing through me at that time.

And those are the memories that came up, when Damian asked me that question. I shared them and Damian asked me to continue “leaning into those feelings and thoughts and see what comes up.” SO, a day later (yesterday), this is the profound discovery that exposed itself for the first time in my life. Ever since, I have correlated that experience of “abandonment” to making sure I dedicated myself to be loved more and more so I wouldn’t be abandoned, to gain approval, to do good so that other parent like figures would’nt abandon me (for me, that meant jobs and employers who became parent like figures in my life). All of that just so I wouldn’t experience being abandoned again (that was my story- not true in reality- my dad came back and Mom and Dad were together for another 17 years).

And, so, over my past forty odd years, I have worked in jobs and organizations or been involved with projects or people in such a way, so that when I did the work or took actions necessary to get approval and acknowledgement,and feel and experience again that I was loved and wanted. And, if I screwed up, or didn’t do the work, they or the person I was working for would lecture me or yell at me, insuring that they cared enough to want me around.

But, I avoided being a business entrepreneur. No security there or acknowledgement. On your own. Alone. Or so I thought. Ever since I took on writing my book, I have met more people, been given more acknowledgement than I ever could have imagined. It’s been immense!

Now my journey has taken me beyond just having a job with an employer. My revelation this week is to come to this place of entrepreneurship with a new vigor and peace of mind that I haven’t embraced wholeheartedly. It’s about being generous and kind with myself and discovering love as a creative generous and giving core. It’s just recognizing I’m in a brand new world and exploring new and amazing ways to move and touch people.

My mantra the night before my chemotherapy came suddenly out of the blue “Dive into uncertainty with courage and surround myself and everyone with love!”

So, this is who I am! I am a writer and a vibrant living human soul on this planet standing for people to discover and realize their own loving healing core. And, each and every person just has to find their own unique path to their precious core. And I am here to say “I can help with that!” You are each unique and special.

So, with lots of compassion and love, with a commitment for new discoveries, lean into your dark places we usually don’t want to go, and see if you can find a newer gentler space that can open more love and beauty and courage to take a new path in your life.

Go to my website at danieljunkins.com and sign up for a free gift and a link to my Amazon best selling book!

Be on the lookout for me on Facebook lives as well as more workshops and courses

Be well, be your own best friend, and be kind, especially to yourself!

With love Daniel

P.S. I end with a powerful and beautiful poem by Derek Walcott!

LOVE AFTER LOVE

The time will come

when, with elation,

you will greet yourself arriving

at your own door, in your own mirror,

and each will smile at the other’s welcome

and say, sit here. Eat.

You will love again the stranger who was your self.

Give wine. Give bread. Give back your heart

to itself, to the stranger who has loved you

all your life, whom you ignored

for another, who knows you by heart.

Take down the love letters from the bookshelf,

the photographs, the desperate notes,

peel your own image from the mirror.

Sit. Feast on your life.

-Derek Walcott