Exploring our lives and those of our family members is an activity many people engage in today, often as genealogical or military research. Some explore their lives through various energetic and healing modalities. Most people tend to stay on one path – that of collecting facts (names, dates, and places.) These are entered in a family tree or notes for a project or book. Usually only information which is easy to obtain, or on the surface, is explored. Changing paths or going deeper into our life and those of our family members is often avoided. The path is often seen as a dangerous, dark, painful detour in life, that many choose to avoid. 
Why is it most people do not go deeper in their research? Are they unaware of the infinite possibilities of understanding and healing available? Are they afraid to walk the other path, which will lead to greater understanding of themselves and their family members? Are they afraid to walk into the possibility of darkness emerging even when healing can occur?
Have you ever considered the true impact of researching the lives of your family members? Did you ever notice you may begin with one individual and move through the process or down the rabbit hole and end up in a place you never expected to be?
My family and military research has always started with the idea of researching one individual. It usually turns out that others will show up to guide the research and take me down the other path which contains the real story of what happened to them and the family. It is on that path the darkness often reveals itself and if I move through it, light and peace emerge at the end of the road. As I move through that darkness, the darkness long hidden in me often emerges and demands resolution. This has not been an easy process the last several years. I’ve gone through a lot of pain, tears, darkness, and loss of people in my life. I continue to come out of each dark period stronger, more confident, more understanding of the people in my life and myself. Healing takes place in ways it couldn’t otherwise.
I have had many clients who start a project focusing on one person – a father, brother, mother – who either died in World War II or returned home. They begin asking for the general service history of the individual. Maybe they have worked on their family history or they reached a point in their lives they want to know what really happened.
Through the course of research, I discuss findings with the client and ask questions. Often, the questions are more personal to help the client open up to a level of understanding of the individual in question, himself, the research, and how it affected the family, that otherwise may not occur. Through this process, he walks down a path of discovery and healing he never expected.
What happens when we follow the other path and the energy of a project? Who else shows up on our journey? Often it is someone we never expected and long deceased. Sometimes pain emerges from issues long put to rest, or so we think. Time has a way of healing, and also releasing the pain, exactly when we are ready to heal it.
Are you ready to walk the other path? Ask the more difficult questions? Move into the darkness so you can emerge again in the light? This fall I will be releasing new books and programs to help you do this. You may also experience the process by working with me on a client project. Contact me to find out what’s possible.
© 2017 World War II Research and Writing Center
god is with you never a path to dark or to narrow when we do right by our family