I have heard it said that what we are good at is not a strength if doing it does not strengthen us, if it drains or abhors us. At the same time, what gives us strength may come naturally—or rather, impulsively—to us, yet it is not necessarily what is easiest for us. It is simple, because there is no question about it, but it is not necessarily easy. Implied in how it comes to us is its undeniable necessity—or rather, urgency—and implied in it is what challenges us to evolve with it as it evolves through us.

In June of this year I had the opportunity to visit with and translate for several Guatemalan comadronas, as part of the International Study trip in collaboration with the Institute for the Study of Birth, Breath, and Death, Fundación Elisabeth Kübler-Ross México Centro, and Be Humanitarian. These were midwives whom no one taught, who were called to the work, who knew intuitively, since age five or seven, about what was going on in women before the women even knew it, who knew just how to tend to them, and who received babies for 60 or 70 years of their lives. I also had the honor of translating for an Ajq’ij, Mayan spiritual guide and community counselor, who was from birth identified, and then confirmed at age four as such—that he was born with the gift, guided by the Abuelos, the ancestors, to support the members of his community, help the dying, communicate with the dead, and heal others.

What struck me most being with such awe-inspiring beings was their unwavering matter-of-factness, their certainty and their confidence in what they knew to be true, something everyone in their community trusted and supported from the first moment it became evident. Since childhood their calling was recognized and respected, and they were encouraged to develop their gifts without intervention.

When asked by the international study students whether they were teaching others, or had apprentices, their unanimous response was a surprised “No, why would I?” “no one is interested,” and “it is not for me to intervene.” With their responses followed by more questioning—”aren’t you worried that the tradition will die with you?”—they unflinchingly responded,

“others will be born with the gift.”

Responding to the call is an expression I am not sure where or when I picked up, but it speaks to me of feeling impulsed in a whole-person way toward a particular life path that is not the path I was conditioned to expect to take, but which I was undoubtedly born to take. And each step has required the death of who I was and the death of whom I may have thought, or was told, I could be—in order to step into the unidentified and not confirmed gift I was born with. As it turns out, according to the Mayan calendar, I was born an Ajq’ij, and within that context, I now understand the signs—like the death of my twin in the womb, my clear communication with dead great-grandparents as soon as I could speak, and my near death experience at age four, just to name a few.

As I have responded to this call, this intuitive guidance, this divine impulse, this untamable instinct, my life has transformed from creative child to daughter, to sexually abused child to dreamer, to student to musician, to harassed bookstore clerk to abused wife to divorcee, to swimmer to runner, to cashier to cook to baker to restaurant manager, to assistant photographer to writer to art photographer to tai chi practitioner to art professor to tai chi instructor to art consultant, to jeweler, to hostage to abused girlfriend to psychologist to trauma specialist, to dreamworker to psychology professor to scholar, to psychic medium to death doula to happily partnered to death consultant, lecturer, educator, to president of Fundación Elisabeth Kübler-Ross México Centro.

I am all of them and none of them. And somehow, each phase, each step—each death and rebirth—has prepared and built me up for the next (much more than, and in spite of, any book I read or subject matter learned). And here, in this present moment, we all gather, reunite, become relevant in new ways, supporting something greater that is still in the process of becoming. And here we meet, and meet others whose paths have brought them right to this point in time and space, to this place and this condition, to this particular approach to living and grieving and dying and regenerating.

And I discover and find myself suddenly surrounded by people who are also being called by something, and responding to this calling that helps us recognize one another and brings us together. As we identify and confirm our gifts and the unique ways in which they manifest through us, we explore the fact that responding to the call is not about what we want but about what only we can do—that we didn’t even realize we could do—which is evidently why we are being called to do it, and, in the process, find out exactly what we are capable of.

Our truth is not in what we “want” but where what we thought impossible is absolutely possible, where the magic is for us. We stop believing everything and, only then, anything and everything becomes possible, on our terms.

When we say yes to the call and set out to do what is being asked of us to do, there is no stopping it—you know, taking the red pill, so to speak. Even when we cannot know where it is taking us, whether there is a ground below to sustain us, we cannot help ourselves; we take it step by step, and each step uncovers the next. We think we’re going this way only to discover this way is there to show is it is actually that way. We think we’re walking with someone only to discover this someone is only there to show us something about the very next step, to help us develop the qualities we will need in order to continue on our way, without them. Once we get used to that, we are able to trust more, surrender more deeply, and flow with what is guiding the way. It becomes evidently simple even when not always easy, effortless because we don’t need to waste time questioning it, and then, magic happens.

It’s what I have come to call el modo metralleta, as if in automatic fire mode. And we become someone we didn’t realize was there, what I have come to call la mujer volcán, because all we can do is bring forth, give forth, break out, burst from inspiration to creative manifestation and determined action. It is exciting, revitalizing, stimulating, inspiring, insightful, enlightening—and for the little human person with its charming limitations it can be testing, edge-pushing, and sometimes exasperating, and exhausting. Because, nobody told us this is what life could be like, and it does not fit any of the predesigned options we were to choose from as we were presented with the obnoxiously defining and altogether compromising question, “and what do you want to be when you grow up?”

Responding to the call can be mistaken as “exactly the opposite of what I want,” “off-track,” “unfulfilling,” “confusing,” “lacking focus,” or “unproductive,” “stagnant” or “not progressing”—irresponsible and reckless or altogether black-sheeply and marginal—if we measure it by those pre-conditioned parameters and pre-set roles. Responding to the call has no room for the stereotypes of friendship, romance, marriage, family, social life, vacation, free time, leisure, weekend, weekday, workday, education, learning, profit, product, result, and so on.

Instead, responding to the call reveals a fulfillment and satisfaction previously unknown, undefined, and unexpected, that if we don’t shift parameters will be dismissed or missed out on altogether.

When the little human person, with its necessary little ego structure, with its charming—and often neurotic and utterly insupportable—limitations is at her wits’ end, I may come up with little obsessive ways to keep myself on track, to comfort the sweet, innocent little me who needs reassurance.

We need to tend to our little ego personality to keep it aligned with the bigger picture and the bigger Self responding to the call.

So, this past week, after being thoroughly overwhelmed by non-stop mujer volcán en modo metralleta, yet with a little ego personality feeling utterly failed as a human, playing the “I am the only one who is willing to give their all to this,” “I don’t have a life,” “what am I doing all this for, anyway?” “I spend all day and night working and I have nothing to show for it,” and “no one cares about or understands the cause or the required dedication to it” tapes, I decided to follow myself for a day and really notice what I am doing and arrive at an appreciative “for what.”

Here is the list of tasks and roles of an average day—weekday or weekend, it’s all a blur—in the life of someone who’s said yes to a life’s calling. I offer this to you and to me and to all of us who are practicing the sacred act of surrendering to a mission beyond our little self, because everything we do is an invaluable contribution to our individual and collective evolution, for the wellbeing of all and for the highest good.

May you identify and confirm the gift you were born with, may you have the support you need to fulfill your life’s mission, and may you know the value of every minute of your day, and the life that is born with every breath you take. Thank you for being here.

This is in honor of you, of me, of all of us:

6:30am – I am Supervisor: wake up thinking about the volunteer death doula team and current needs of an accompaniment case. I am Body: miss cuddling up with husband because he is out of town, focus on the breath and try to sleep one more hour.

7:00am – I am Dreamworker: give up trying to sleep, shift position in bed, ask, “what was I dreaming?” and review dreams as they return to awareness.

7:30am – I am Nature: miss husband, get up, hug Bolena the family dog and do morning dog stretch ritual, water plants.

8:00am – I am Body: shower, get dressed, go downstairs. I am Homemaker: put dishes away and set up fresh candles on altars. I am Supervisor: send audio message to doula team in the process.

8:30am – I am Spirit: perform ritual and prayers to the dead.

9:00am – I am Body: stretch and make coffee, send message to somatic therapist because back is sore. I am Woman: send message to husband. I am Daughter: send daily morning message to mom.

9:30am – The official workday begins:

– I am Supervisor, Psychologist, Spiritual Director, Doula: read, listen, and respond to urgent whatsapp messages.

– I am Psychologist, Teacher: read and respond to urgent emails.

– I am Curriculum Developer: contemplate and articulate next steps in development of symbolic language listening skills for doula team.

– I am Workshop Leader, International Coordinator: coordinate plans for Perinatal Loss workshop in October in collaboration with Doula in Costa Rica.

– I am International Coordinator: review Death Doula Movement in Latin America (Ecuador, Colombia, Chile y México) meeting notes.

– I am Heart: send a few personal messages.

– I am Supervisor, Administrator, Copywriter: find and forward emails with Thoughtful Death online series info and bios of the last three months.

– I am Supervisor, Administrator, Video Editor: assist volunteer with video editing for Thoughtful Death recordings, Youtube uploading, texts.

– I am Administrator, Education Director: check all EKR email accounts (11 of them); respond to emails and channel requests.

– I am Supervisor, Administrator: delegate several tasks to EKR admin team.

– I am Registrar: register all new course inquiries (eight of them) on spreadsheet and add to Mailchimp contact list.

– I am Education Director: address EKR Global colloquium recording issues, send instructions, and request material to fix the issue.

– I am Video Editor: download EKR Global Education video files for production.

– I am Multilingual Education Director: read and respond, in Portuguese, to several Brazilian EKR students.

12:00pm – I am Office Assistant: make more coffee.

– I am Copywriter, Public Relations Professional: write 3rd anniversary events press release in English.

– I am Graphic Designer: make three new social media designs in Spanish and in English for press kit.

– I am Supervisor: give instructions for future designs to Marketing team.

1:00pm – I am Kitchen Staff: make mango, strawberry, banana, chia, coconut milk smoothie with cacao nibs.

– I am Public Relations Professional: send press kit in English to seven individual contacts.

– I am Public Relations Coordinator: send press kit and template to EKR team for further dissemination.

– I am Graphic Designer: make three additional designs for the individual events for Admin press kit in English.

2:00pm – I am Nature: walk with Bolena the family dog before it starts raining.

3:00pm – I am Fate: Thunder, lightning, rain, and a big explosion out there blows the power plant in the neighborhood. I am Puerto Rican hurricane survivor: search for adapter and set up battery pack for computer and screen to keep working.

3:15pm – I am Head Doula: remotely support doula in vigil and consult medical doctor.

3:30pm – I am Puerto Rican hurricane survivor: set up candlelight office and check in with Admin team for alternate plans of where to go to connect to internet and keep working.

– I am Office Assistant: organize computer desktop until a decision is made.

– I am Public Relations Professional, Translator: work on Spanish version of press release offline.

4:30pm – I am Office Assistant: move the office to restaurant—remote office, ally, and sponsor—La Frontera, so that la comida is also taken care of. I am Puerto Rican hurricane survivor: don’t want to open the refrigerator and lose refrigeration of its contents; who knows how long before the power comes back—it could easily be 24 hours.

– I am Non-Profit President: run admin meeting to further event planning and promotion plan, develop curriculum plans for the fall, discuss details of the next workshops, finalize Reimagining Death Lab for Deanna Cochran’s CareDoula School, and make notes for continuing ed programs for our volunteer doula team.

6:30pm – I am Multitasker: eat and attend to individual work tasks.

– I am Public Relations Professional, Translator: finalize Spanish press kit.

– I am Consciousness: have a sudden insight about the bottom line issue of discomfort -> control response and the alternative, share with colleague in a very rich discussion.

– I am Death Care Activist: explain green burial for conservation, and share details of the project in San Miguel de Allende to the owner of the restaurant (and anyone else who eavesdrops).

– I am Colleague: agree to peer review colleague Cole Imperi’s grief book soon to be published.

– I am International Movement Coordinator: outline video requirements for promotion by spearheads of the Death Doula movement in Latin America.

– I am Social Media Manager: modify social media publicity posts from the Marketing team.

– I am Foodie: negotiate to stay at the restaurant as long as possible, and happy to leave a big tip – the restaurant closes at 8:00pm.

8:40pm – I am Satisfied Person: wrap up our work session, pack up office, and close the tab at the restaurant.

9:00pm – I am La que cierra el kiosco: light candles throughout the house with no electricity, make work to-do notes for tomorrow.

9:30pm – I am Dog Owner, Daughter: walk Bolena the family dog before closing up shop at home, evening message to mom.

10:00pm – I am Woman: talk with husband, share insights of the day.

10:30pm – I am Tired Person: it has been 16 straight hours of life; time for the nighttime ritual and getting to bed, tomorrow is another day.

And, all of that, for what? Someone told me yesterday, “you have to know what is the benefit to all of the people who work with you for this cause.”

What is the benefit with doing this work is the question, because we all do it for free. And, well, I’m really working hard to find ways of compensating the team because everybody works so hard.

It’s not that I don’t know what the benefit is; it’s just that I don’t know how it lands for each person. Because this work is so rich and so profound, that there are innumerable and invaluable benefits; I know that for sure. But how how it lands and how it germinates in each person, that I don’t know.

If I could say that there’s a benefit, it is that we are arduously working towards something huge. We are working to shift the culture, to generate a new humanity, a return to community from a compassionate heart. And the more that we work on this together, the more we can ensure that we are leaving a meaningful, valuable, loving legacy for future generations so that we can really break out of the suffering that we’ve generated with believing we are isolated and separated, that we lose and we grieve and we die in a vacuum, and all the myriad ways in which we’ve stopped being one with, in communion with. The more we work on this together, the more we can recognize and validate each other for the part that only we were born to play, identifying and confirming the gift we were born with to serve.

May it be so for you, for me, for all of us.

Cementerio de San Andrés, Guatemala, photo by Wenda Clinard, June 2022