I am my own guru...

I was in. All the way in. Not just committed to a cause, to a place, to a person. I was in because I was born there. Inside a web of deep love and familial bonds entangled with fear of doing the wrong thing. Saying the wrong thing. Being the wrong thing. The outside world, forbidden and frightening.

But I got out. It was all but inevitable. We weren’t a cult on some compound. Or secluded on a hillside ranch growing our own food. We were hiding in plain sight. The people who had a strict, outdated dress code and never went to movies. 

When I began to see the world for both its smallness and its immensity, there was no explaining the cult away. Trust me, I tried. I rushed back to headquarters time and again, struggling to make sense of it all. But then, the leader went to prison. And the straw finally broke the proverbial camel’s back. 

But was it just him? How did we get here? And why is it “over?” I spiraled down a pit of questioning. Knowing nothing, desperately trying to believe anything. And the cult marched on.

I now hold mystery, hope, and uncertainty. I breathe in air and share it with the world. Fearful of many things, and yet of nothing at all. I used to play the real or not real game, as if I needed a translator between real life and my mind. But now, I am my own guru. Not on a quest to seek what is, but on a journey to experience it. And I reserve the right to change my mind. 

Always.

~Shelly