You Don't Smell Like Smoke

“You’ve walked through the fire, but you don’t smell like smoke, how?” 

I remember the Sunday afternoon when I was asked this. We were at a local cafe with the new campus pastor when he posed this to me. The church I previously worked for, Generation, had just been taken on by Hillsong. 

The fire he was referring to was our years interning, leading and living with the senior pastors. 

In the moment I laughed and admitted that I didn’t really know, I just tried to keep a “sweet heart”. But what does that mean, and how was I able to not get bitter about things? 

The truth, I see now, is that I worked through a lot in the day-to-day moments of working for Generation (hello spin classes). I was intuitively doing somatic practices without realising it- I tuned in to what came instinctively and began moving my body in all sorts of ways that felt good. I now know it's somatic movement, but in 2020 it was my first experience with something so primal and deeply connective.

When the senior pastors moved overseas, I reflected on that past eight years; the leadership, the lessons I learnt, the skills I learnt, the ways I acted towards others and perpetuated a harmful system and I transmuted. 

I never wanted revenge, I knew Karma would do its thing and cycles would repeat unless addressed, I wanted growth for myself. To learn the lessons needed from that season and move forward as a more aligned version of myself.

So, how did I not smell like smoke? Because I turned and faced my own shadows. I transmuted and alchemised. It was never truly about others, but about freeing myself from the conditioning and ways I was living that weren’t aligned to my authentic self.

To actively forgive myself, as many times as needed, for the ways I had been and, where possible, reconcile. 

It has always been a journey of growth. Unlearning, relearning.

Releasing, becoming.