Each bead, like each part of the self, holds its own energy. Each bead is unique in color, in exact size, in design. Each bead is a reflection of what has come before and holds the promise of what is yet to come.

As I pick them up, hold them gently in my hands, begin to place them side by side, I begin to see the story that they tell together.

This one pulls out the color of that one. Contrast can sometimes create powerful energy, and sometimes more consistency allows for a sense of calm.

Each one of us is made up of many parts, whether we label them or not. The stories of who we have been, of who we think we are, of who we are becoming, are similar in a way to the beads. They can feel similar to one another, they can feel separate, they can lead us to feel like we are struggling to find a way to hold it all together, to see how all of these pieces fit.

There are the beads, and then there is the thread.

The thread that holds them all together while still allowing each bead space to breathe, to contribute its own energy to the whole.

And it makes me wonder sometimes about the thread that holds all of my parts together….

“I’m searching for the thread that holds it all together,” I said recently to some friends. In the days that followed I realized that I am that thread. All the parts of me are held together by the essence of who I am, that which is beyond the labels.

I am mama. I am wife. I am daughter. I am yoga teacher. I am writer. I am coach. I am mala maker. I am friend. I am all of this and more. These are the beads of self and I am the thread.