The Falling
My mother is a fundamentalist Christian.
I am a psychic witch.
My path diverged from the Christian church back in my teenage years, but it didn’t cause any major problems until I began studying energy healing in my late twenties, and quickly figured out that I was a gifted psychic healer.
Now, I knew my mother was a Christian, but it never occurred to me that just doing simple Reiki-like energy work would be a problem for her. She had been suffering from pain for years, and energy healing was something that I was good at. So, I figured the only right thing to do would be to offer her a session–just to see if she could get any relief.
Bad decision!
To me, it’s just common sense: if you’ve been doing traditional medicine, and you are still suffering, try something else. But apparently, she was concerned that my healing talents might be coming from some nefarious spiritual alliance that I was unaware of.
I tried to explain that if she wanted, she could use angels or Jesus as her healing allies in the session, but that did not satisfy her. No matter what I said, her fear prevailed.
The Arrogance
From that point forward, I knew to tread lightly. Otherwise, if I said anything that was outside of her and her sister’s fundamentalist Christian purview, I would get ‘Christian-splained.’
As infinitely impossible and arrogant as the following seems to me, they both are certain they understand everything in the Bible exactly as God intended it, and that The Bible was written flawlessly, with no undue influence or error from understandings of the time, the historical settings in which the different books of The Bible were written, human error by the writers (let’s be honest, channelers!), errors in translations, etc.
For them, it is the infallible Word of God. Not sure how they reconcile that intellectually, considering that the English versions alone have over 50 major translations, each with slight variations in wording and interpretation, and the Catholics have their own version with extra books included. But regardless…
My mother and aunt are one-thousand-percent sure they know the “True meaning” of The Bible and everything in it because of their relationship with Jesus, who informs them—apparently not only for themselves, but for everyone else too. (Clearly they are not fans of the MYODB concept.🤭 But I digress.)
So of course, anyone who disagrees with their understanding is incorrect–even if they are religious scholars, even if they have gone back to the original Aramaic texts to check translations, even if they too have their own relationship with Jesus.
The Painful Silence
It didn’t take long for me to learn that there would be no discussion, no sharing, no alternative ideas or discourse, or I would get “Bible-thumped”.
(“Bible-Thumpers”: That’s what my dad used to call Christian zealots who preached and teached and had no other real facets to their lives. I’m thinking that meant getting smacked on the head with The Bible like in parochial school. Not sure, but that’s what it feels like when they start educating you on the “only Truth”.🙄 Anyway…)
So, in order to avoid that unpleasantry, I simply kept my mouth shut and let them have their assuredness, and lack of mystery or thoughtful questioning… at least most of the time.
Sometimes though, I would fail if I thought there might be an opportunity to share something from my world that was also in theirs if it might bridge the divide between us.
For example, when my grandmother died, I asked my mother if she could sense my grandmother’s energy during the memorial service. I thought she would like that.
Wrong again!
“That’s not how it works.” My mother made it very clear that I had no idea what I was talking about. My grandmother was in heaven. There is no lingering! (Apparently, Jesus takes you posthaste with no goodbyes or check-ins on your family first!) 🤣
The drivel
I laugh now, because it all seems so absurd to me. But at the time, it was deeply painful.
There was no bridge to cross and no conversation to be had. So eventually, I just stopped trying to connect with her in any deeper way.
When I’d call, she would talk about the weather, what she ate for breakfast, how many minutes she toasted her bread or cooked her steak, and how many swipes of butter she used.
The minutiae were astounding. Every conversation was beyond trivial, to the point that I avoided those phone calls like the plague. Sure, I would call every few weeks because it was the right thing to do to not completely ignore your mother. But our lives were so drastically different in every way that outside of the mundane, there just didn’t seem to be any relatable overlap.
The irony
Ironically, the one thing I thought we had in common was that we were both deeply spiritual people. But how that shows up in each of our lives is radically different. So any form of interesting discussion in that arena was just not on the table.
Unfortunately, that meant that I couldn’t share much of my passion, purpose or joy in my life because a lot of the interesting things I was doing were centered around my Healing & Alchemy work helping women with histories of Child Sexual Abuse and past relationship wounds. (And of course, CSA talk is never really a party-starter and they don’t really know how to deal with me around that topic either.) So, I mostly just stayed out of the way as much as possible. No need to add fuel to the fire.
That courtesy was not reciprocal, however.
The Offense
Despite that my mother knew we did not share the same beliefs, I received birthday and holiday cards with Bible verses and other Christian-based commentary in them for decades.
And while I can understand this is the lens through which she views the world, and I can appreciate that she took the time and care to at least send me cards on holidays, she clearly wasn’t thinking about what messages would be meaningful to me as the recipient. Instead, her efforts felt thoughtless and selfish as she celebrated her beliefs on my birthday.
At first, it was disheartening. But eventually, over the years, disappointment turned to frustration, as these and other interactions reinforced her lack of sensitivity or acceptance of my gifts and my chosen spiritual path.
Eventually, it became too much.
I felt disrespected and it became very difficult for me to appreciate her efforts. Yet, she wondered why we didn’t have a good relationship.
So, one day, I was sick of it, and I was angry at her complete disregard for my thoughts and feelings, and I told her the religious cards were driving a wedge between us, “So, please stop!”
This time I did not pansy around. I was direct and assertive.
She didn’t like it. She was clearly angry that I had set a boundary with her and enforced it. But apparently, that’s what it took for her to finally get the message and change.
The religious cards stopped, and I was grateful. That meant a lot to me and felt like a positive turning point in our relationship.
Still though, on phone calls, she would tell me she was praying for me and how Jesus had answered her prayers, how good God is. In our conversations she frequently continued to include references to her faith, devotions, praying, God, and Jesus. She made no attempts to be discreet—at all—despite our previous conversations and confrontations.
Again, it was disappointing that she constantly talked openly about her beliefs, but I did not feel like it was safe for me to do the same, as it would cause too much turmoil in her life. It just felt wrong to upset her, even if it was something important to me, so I tried to let it go.
Did I wish I could share my own thoughts, opinions and experiences? Of course! But I knew it would be contentious and wouldn’t be good for anyone. (Or, so I thought at the time.)
Then something unfathomable happened.
The Hidden
One day, out of the blue, for some reason, my mother suddenly decided to share with my partner (now my husband) that she has been seeing ghosts and having supernatural and ecstatic spiritual experiences all her life!
I could hardly process what was happening as she recanted her stories with wide eyes and pure glee, like a proud little child.
To make matters even more interesting, her stories and experiences were largely identical to my own.
I couldn’t believe it.
We have had nothing to talk about for decades!
I have watched her recoil in fear because she was afraid that I was working with the Devil, or some such nonsense. And yet she has similar psychic skills as I do, but she hid them.
There were no words to express how I felt in that moment.
The Revelation
I had been rebuked spiritually, and talked down to for years, decades even, only to find out that we have had nearly identical experiences—the only difference between them being her attribution of source. She believes she has a special “in” with Jesus that makes her experiences holy, but mine are not because I use different words—so my experiences are feared and distrusted.
I left the room to collect my thoughts and process the moment. I was incredulous. I just couldn’t believe what I was seeing and hearing.
It was absurd that I had been shunned for decades for the same gifts and experiences that she has had as well.
When I returned, she was still going on with her stories. She looked at me and launched into, “I know you don’t believe this, but …”
That was it! I couldn’t be silent any longer. It was time to discuss the elephant in the room.
In that moment, her soul opened the door and created an opportunity for us both to stop constantly living in damage control and avoidance. A difficult, but long overdue conversation unfolded. This time, however, I was able to communicate from a vulnerable and heartfelt place, instead of a wounded, unskilled place.
Was it painful? Yes, for both of us. Many tears were shed. But I learned a lot.
The Understanding
I learned she too had feelings around our disconnect. She too had to make choices to stay in any level of relationship with me, because my actions and vocation are out of alignment with her beliefs. She also felt like I was trying to change her beliefs, even though I was always the one on the receiving end of the religious education and judgment I received from her and her sister.
We both felt unaccepted.
But ironically, the answer had always been right under my nose, in plain sight.
My mother was never going to accept my spiritual choices or my intuitive gifts because her beliefs cannot allow her to do so. There are no exceptions.
It doesn’t matter if I’m her daughter and she should know that I am not evil. It doesn’t matter that I am a logical, intelligent, kind and compassionate person. It doesn’t matter that I follow the teachings of Jesus in practice more closely than many people who share her religious affiliation.
Nothing matters except the words I use, and her need for absolute truth and a way to put things in a box that she can label and file—black and white—no thinking, no soul-searching, or no inquiry required.
In the simplest of terms:
My mother is a fundamentalist Christian.
I am a psychic witch.
She is fearfully and vehemently averse to witchcraft.
By her own admission, she has no idea what witchcraft is. She can’t define it and has no idea what it looks like or how to recognize it. Her only concept of witchcraft is the word itself, and the label “witch.” But the Bible says to stay away from witchcraft and sorcery, and that’s all she needs to know.
Nothing else matters… Not science. Not history. Not common sense. Not a desire to understand her daughter’s choices and what they mean in practical life and application.
She doesn’t want to know any of the history of Christianity or Christian holidays/schedules. She doesn’t want to know what my beliefs or practices look like.
She has no interest in knowing what is important to me spiritually, what I believe, what I do, or what being a witch means to me personally, because in her mind, it is too dangerous.
I have used the word witch in the past and that was all she needed to know. Full stop. In this, she was abundantly clear. Anything not in the Bible is not relevant to her life and not something she should be learning about on any level. If it’s not in the Bible, she doesn’t want to know.
In hindsight, that makes sense. Knowledge is power.
Don’t eat the fruit from the tree of knowledge or you will have to leave Eden, right? What’s the saying, “ignorance is bliss?”
The absurdity landed fully on me.
The Healing
In that moment, the profound irony of the situation hit me fully and I found relief.
Her intense fear, near total ignorance of the evolution of her own religion, and unwillingness to learn about any other practice or culture even a little bit—combined with the withholding of crucial information that could have been used to help bridge the chasm in our relationship and find some common acceptance and interest—was exactly what I needed to break free of any negative feelings about my spiritual gifts being shunned and feared.
In that moment, my feelings of guilt about not being a good daughter and not wanting to spend time on superficial weather-talk conversations washed away.
I had tried to bridge the gap multiple times in different ways. I had tried to find something meaningful to talk about. And all the while, she had information that could have changed our relationship years ago, but she hid it.
Equally importantly, I also came to understand that due to her beliefs, she will never be able to see my skills and talents as anything other than dangerous, even though many of our psychic abilities are practically identical in form and function.
You would think I would feel disappointed at this revelation. But ironically, I don’t. Quite conversely, I finally felt free!
I finally understood at a deep, heartfelt level that her feelings and fears have nothing to do with me or my abilities, and there is nothing else I could, or should, have done to try to bridge the gap between us.
We will never be able to fully engage in a relationship with meaningful dialog because it is not safe for her. She is a secretive person and rarely shares anything personal about herself. For her, weather-talk is good enough. That is what she is comfortable with.
I am a shadow-worker and alchemical healer. I need more for a deeply connected relationship. There must be some level of emotional intimacy and vulnerability. Without that, there isn’t much point in my opinion.
So yes, there will always be fundamental limits to our interaction. Yet somehow, knowing those limits and boundaries clearly—and that there will never in this life be an opportunity to share my work or some of my most profound thoughts or experiences—is remarkably freeing.
All hopeful expectation is relieved and now I can choose to participate without feeling hurt, rejected, unseen, or unknown. For her to truly know me would be impossible under the circumstances, and it’s not my fault.
On the bright side, we now have a new homeostasis, and with it, new possibilities for engagement without all the baggage (at least on my side).
Happily, I see a freer and happier future for us in our visits and time spent together. And that’s good news for both of us!
Follow-up: More has changed since I wrote this article a year and a half ago. I’ll share that in another post, but it’s another big aha that has shown up in my life twice in the last couple of months, and really blown my mind (in a good way!).
Hint: It’s about reciprocity and a fresh perspective that makes applying alchemical work on the physical plane, real-time, much easier.