I have never cried myself through a piece of art before, but I guess there is a first time for everything. Creating this piece gave me a way to express what I am feeling so deeply lately. As I moved around the flowers and shed tear, I experienced a great softening of sorts.

These words and feelings feel big, but they are known through moments found, and moments not found, in decades of living. Like how I wish could have shared more genuine laughter and tears with my mom when she was still alive. All the same, I no longer feel anger and regret about the hard times. Instead, I feel deep love and compassion for both of us.

Similarly, I wish I had been more present to my boys when they were young. So often I was distracted and consumed by my own pain. But now I see that even I was just a human being doing the best she could with what she knew. Just like my mom was, and her mom was. My boys were also doing the best they could with what they know, and someday their children will too.

As my entire being feels into this “great softening,” I see that all the seemingly wayward moments that have led me to this place have somehow been perfect and necessary. I am me, and I am also all those around me. Even and especially those I can’t or don’t want to see myself in. All of it is somehow profoundly okay. It’s even beautiful. Like the passing nature of poppies, which find their most fertile soil in human remains. It is also as far reaching as buttercups and wildflower that grow everywhere, generation after generation, no matter whose head they are on. And it is as universal as star shaped tears. Through joy and sorrow, their seeds plant healing for whatever and whoever is to come.

Yes, we are all unique and beautiful souls, connected in and through our humanity. With laughter and tears, I melt in the great softness of it all.

Original: 16″ x 20″

Print: 9″ x 11″, $55; 12″ x 15″, $75, go to PetalAndSoulArt