A Sacred Story by Laura Staley
the opened shell after that prickling of the spiny outer shell was an escape and something I could relate to. The deliciously quiet public library filled with books became another sacred space along with my lively inner imaginative world. I talked to God regularly, developing a personal and intimate relationship with what I came to understand to be Love, Consciousness, and what I now call Inner Quiet Charlotte.
I grew up inside a chaotic world of cruelty, an “I hate you, don’t leave me” dynamic in which I was split into the “all bad” child, the scapegoat. Nothing I did, said, or achieved ever hit the ever-changing expectations of the significant adults in my life. Shaming criticisms about my hair, laugh, frown, posture, walk, joy, tears, and passions were constant. When I spoke about the roaring anger fires erupting, members of my family persisted in denials, rewrites, and an insistence that I was the crazy one, the crybaby, the worthless one.
Still, the dynamics of my family of origin persisted into my adulthood. To free myself from these chronically abusive experiences I attended numerous leadership trainings and read almost every self-help, spiritual enlightenment book I could find. This fed my hunger to live with greater inner peace and healthy behavior patterns and I immersed myself in healing modalities with a pit crew of gifted therapists and healers. I learned about the wisdom of Feng Shui and living with belongings I love. Unknowingly, I had filled our family home with hand-me-downs I loathed, living a hand-me-down life. Purging belongings became a passion as I dove into the transformational wisdom of essential Feng Shui.
Chronically terrified, I vacillated between dissociation and hyper-vigilance, becoming fiercely committed to being good, to earning my right to exist. As a very little girl, like Cinderella, I did most of the family chores. I swam on the swim team beginning at 4 years old with a suicide dive off the starting blocks. At 10 years old I earned the “Most Valuable Swimmer” on the team award. I excelled in school, earning excellent grades, then my high school diploma, a BA, an MA, and a Ph.D. Amidst all the human raging and bullying storms Nature was my respite. Sitting under trees breaking open horse chestnuts, touching the smooth reddish, brownish nut with that tan eye, the silky skin layer of the inside of
The unraveling of the marriage began years before it finally fell to pieces 4
