Last night the sky was the most amazing deep purple. Shreds of clouds blew across a full moon. I drove home from Reno and realized how long it’s been since I’ve listened to God. But lately, the voice has been creeping in. Now and then.

I went to a two hour meditation at the Buddhist church in downtown Reno. A small group, but there’s power in meditating with others. I do like to be around people. Maybe people reinforcing my world view helped end my marriage, but I don’t really think so. I think that’s one interpretation that helps ease the pain of what’s true. And the truth is, I was unhappy. No bad people involved in this. Just people who are no longer on the same path.

And that’s something I take responsibility for. No one took my power away. I willingly gave it. I so badly wanted to be married, to have a family that I was willing to bury myself deep, deep down. And that had to twist things. Maybe the one issue of work became out of proportion, but there were other factors too. And I think it all came back to the need to be who I am, the need to listen to my own spirit.

Do we ever really know another person? I doubt I do when I didn’t even know myself. I’m not sure even people closest to me know me well. My husband still has the idea that I was miserable and lonely my year alone in China because that’s when I called him, usually at night, often after a dream. He doesn’t see the many more hours spent with Lulu or Quan or someone else, laughing, exploring the island. The hours I spent in my apartment reading or writing. No TV blaring in the background. The great contentment I also began to feel that year on my own, the discovery of my own power. It’s not his fault. I think most people, including myself, see what we choose to see and then define it as truth. It’s much easer to look at someone else and tell them what they need than to look at the murky, dark places of our own soul.

Pain makes way for peace. For today I’m happy. For today I have peace.