Last week I was going through boxes of old photographs to find a “before” photo for the slide show at The Abundant Prana Conference™.  We’d been using “before” (raw food) and after photos of other people and decided to take it to another level and use some personal photos.  Ironically, the very first photo I pulled out “randomly” turned out to be the best (therefore the worst—LOL) photo to use.

Nevertheless, Virgo that I am and pregnant Virgo at that (nesting, nesting, nesting), I found several hours over a few day period to go through six huge boxes of old photos (the big plastic boxes you get at Target to store old clothes, etc. in) and make sure I found “the worst” and therefore the “best” photo for the slide show.

What ensued from those dusty hours walking down memory lane was unexpected.  As I sifted through many hundreds, maybe even thousands (I do like my photos), of photos from birth through 1999, I was surprised by the feelings I was having—and the epiphanies.

Could alcohol really have played that big of a part of my early twenties?  It seemed every party my two post-Brown roommates and I were throwing centered on shots of tequila and kegs.  Gross.

I’ve always been super social and loved people, and the parties seemed to be nonstop back then in 1987, but why the focus on alcohol and the documentation of the inevitable hangover? 

“This is so not me,” I kept thinking as I looked at the outfits I wore (Dear God!), the hair cut I had (LOL), the alcohol I was consuming on a regular basis (every weekend IS a regular basis), but most upsetting, was the people with which I was hanging out.

Upsetting, because I began to be filled with a deep feeling of betrayal. 

When I graduated from Brown one of my best friends from college and a mutual friend of ours who she’d grown up with moved in together in Everett, Mass. 

Yes, Everett. 

To us, Everett was Boston—but cheaper!  We had an apartment that cost $335 a month each, with three huge bedrooms, 2 bathrooms, and the kind of dining and living rooms that you could really throw a party in (an essential when you’re 21).

We were very close, or so I thought, and proclaimed that we’d be friends until Willard Scott announced our birthdays on the air (these were in the days when I not only drank tequila shots on the weekends but watched TV as well).

We got along famously—unheard of for three girls.  No jealousy, cattiness, competitiveness, or lack of integrity between us.  There were the occasional arguments/hurt feelings over two of us spending too much time with our boyfriends (the third roommate didn’t have a boyfriend), but we always talked about it and worked it out.

I was, though, it must be said, thrown off a bit by one of my roommates “ways about the world.”  She seemed to have no sense of karma—of the fact that everything you do will and does come back to you.  She stole from her employer (in “subtle” ways but nonetheless stealing—taking all of her dry cleaning on business trips and doing it there as an “expense,” taking friends who had nothing to do with her work out on her expense account for very expensive eating and drinking extravaganzas, and more ways that I don’t care to recount), slept with married men, stole ice cream from grocery stores, and bought computers—used them for 29 days—and returned them just before the 30 day return policy, many times over.

But I loved my friend fiercely and loyally, and chose not to judge. 

Fast forward:  15 years later.

We’d all stood up for each other in our marriages, and now mine was ending.  I was going through indescribable pain and grief, and my friends were there for me—that is, all but two.

One was the wife of a good guy friend of mine from Brown who my ex-husband and I used to do a lot with as a couple.  She dumped me like a hot potato when my “picture perfect marriage and life” wasn’t so “picture perfect” anymore.  But as I looked at the photos, I recalled that she had already “dumped us as a couple” (my ex-husband and me) when my ex-husband got fired from a reputable financial firm.  Her phone calls and invitations slowed and eventually stopped and when I called her on it she “didn’t know what I was talking about.”

The other friend who wasn’t there for me—and who, in fact, later refused to come to my wedding to Philippe, was—you guessed it—the roomie with a lack of regard for karma.

“How could SHE be judging me?”  I asked myself, again and again.

“How could someone who did all of those things that were so out of integrity judge me for following my heart and the truth and doing the best thing for my ex-husband and me?  How could she not get this/me?”

And in my darkest and most painful moments:  “Why did our friendship end?  What did I do wrong?”

This question and a deep feeling of betrayal and confusion plagued me, on and off, for years. 

Until today.  After stirring up all the memories—seeing them in those dusty photo albums from years past—my spirit came clean, and no surprise where it did so:  on my yoga mat this morning at 5:30am.

The betrayal is not about my (supposed) friend.  It’s about me.  My betrayal of myself—of who I know that I am.  I know that I walk my path with integrity and grace.  I know that I’m not perfect by any means but I do my best in each moment.  I know that I am filled with love and forgiveness.  I know that I follow my heart and my spirit—even if it’s not the “popular” thing to do at the time.  I know that I speak and live truth.  I know that I love to inspire and help others.  I know that I am love to my core.

When I asked myself again and again “What happened?  What went wrong?  What did I do wrong to lose our friendship?” I was walking down the wrong street.

When I went into judgment (“How could SHE judge ME?!”) I was walking down another street, but the wrong one nonetheless.

When I finally–after too many hours of pain and confusion–walked down the path of my spirit—of love—I felt relief and clarity.

Sometimes people step out.  Sometimes we have something—or a lot to do with it—sometimes we don’t.   Sometimes it’s pure projection.  Sometimes its just time the relationship ends—it’s served its purpose in this lifetime and its therefore just over.  There are a myriad of reasons that things and relationships change, and the important thing is to stay present and in reality—not in the past. 

So not in the “but before we…” or “but years ago she said…”, but instead in: “this moment is as it should be.”

Otherwise, we are paddling upstream. 

And how do we know we are?

It feels bad–sometimes really bad.

And nothing downstream feels bad.  It’s easy.  It flows beautifully and easily, and you feel joy.

I have officially–after years of ruminating—let those two friends who dumped me during one of the most challenging times in my life go.

But not with judgment, not with anger, not with resentment, and not with guilt or regret.  I have let them go with love and forgiveness.  Because that is the only real way we CAN let go. 

“There is no revenge so complete as forgiveness.”

Otherwise, the anger and the resentment act as magnets—bringing more of that to us, and our lives.

And most of all, I have forgiven myself.  For questioning my spirit, for questioning the perfect ways of the Universe, for questioning who I am.

Because that is why I really felt betrayed.