Hey Soul Sister

 

How many of us know this song, Hey Soul Sister, by Train? Maybe even by heart, like I do?  I listened to it so many times in the past three years that I drove my kids crazy. I could listen to it today just as much as last year or the year before. Why is the song so catchy?

According to a 2009 Harris Poll, 71 percent of Americans believe we have a soul. For Catholic and Protestant Americans, that number is even higher, 85 percent. And yet, our soul is not something we talk about in everyday conversation. 

And along comes this song . . . it is a pop hit, that’s for sure, but I am drawn to it for more reasons than its upbeat tempo and captivating melody. I love it because it connects me to the idea that I am more than this body. 


Maybe there are people out there just like me and we belong together on a whole different level – on a deep level of connection that makes no sense, yet is undeniable all the same. On a soul level. 

Soul connections may be related by blood, but many of them are not. My co-authors in Pebbles in the Pond Wave 2 are soul connections for me. We were pulled together by a connection that did not come from this physical world. We are from the United States, Australia, Brazil, Canada, New Zealand, and Norway, and yet we are connected as if we lived in the same family all our lives.  

Another soul connection for me is a woman I met through a recent mail solicitation. Can you imagine? Most people would have thrown away the mailing, thinking with the left, logical side of their brains: this was junk mail. But something more intuitive was calling me to respond to the mailing. Despite never having met the woman who sent the mailing, I feel as though we have known each other our whole lives. How beautiful is that?!


And then there is my unborn child. One of the most important soul connections of my life is the one I have with my unborn baby girl, Mary. I don’t know how this works, but I do know that I feel her presence around me and I know that my work right now is because of her presence in my life (See blog I Love You More). She is a soul sister who has been willing to go the distance with me, from abortion to lessons of self-worth and self-love, to finding my life’s purpose and work. 

Our society makes so many judgments about the experience of abortion that keep us from knowing the truth of our life. Is it possible for us to step back and ask this question: What if our child knew we were going to do this and agreed to participate in this life lesson with us? What if our baby knew exactly what he or she was getting into? What if this experience has a component of love that surpasses our worldly grasp? 


Lorna Byrne, a mother, writer and angel expert, wrote about it in her book Angels in My Hair . Byrne writes that with abortion the “baby’s soul loves you and never for one moment holds it against you that you did not give birth to it. It already knew what would happen, and still it will pour its love onto you.” 

Many of us believe in the existence of a soul. I don’t think it’s too much of a stretch to assert that we are connected to others on this level. And when we do make that soul connection we can have a whole new way of looking at our abortion experience . . .and maybe there will be a shift and a healing that can bless us for the rest of our lives. 

Namaste.