I wrote a short story for you. It’s fiction based on true events 😉

But before you read it, I want to let you know how grateful I am that you are here. I am honored that you read the stories and inspirations I write for you.

I love when you reach out, and I love when you write that you don’t have time to read and that you missed the past year’s worth of news and stories. I love that we are connected and that I get to create content to uplift you – whenever it might reach you.

If you kept up with my posts, you know I am in the middle of a major transition. In the past month, I turned 50, had a hysterectomy, and launched my first (and very vulnerable) memoir.

Two out of three of my sons are now in college, and due to the Pandemic that cancelled all of my concerts, I had to rethink my work.

Like many who had been my inspiration, I’ve kept a positive outlook, focused on gratitude for the many blessings in my life, and I’ve been looking at the challenges as new possibilities and opportunities for growth 🙂

But because I know that no matter how good we get at accepting big changes and letting go of the life we no longer can have, these transitions feel emotionally difficult to go through – I wrote this story.

The very process of writing it felt healing to me (like all creative and expressive arts do). I encourage you, after reading it, to write your own – pick your most difficult challenge and let your creativity release your worries, anxieties, sadness, and remind you of joy, peace and blessings.

By the way, my book (un)Broken is another example of how a creative process can bring healing. If you haven’t checked it out yet, please do – I’ve extended the offer for $5 off till the end of the month.

And now, the story:

A Voice, A Bridge and Love

I first heard the Voice in the middle of one night when I couldn’t sleep.

I tossed and turned with anxiety that had me sweating and shivering and fighting with thoughts that wouldn’t leave my mind. I prayed, breathed, and prayed some more.

When it finally spoke, or more accurately, when my tired brain finally gave up and shut down long enough for the Voice to come through, it sounded like a mother calling me to lay down on her lap and rest.

“Yes, I want to,” I answered, desperate for relief. In an instant the Voice triggered a vision (or a memory) in my head – of laying warm and safe (and small) in my own mother’s embrace. The calm came over me and I slept.

I heard it again a few days later. It showed up while I was singing my favorite song in an echoey gorgeous cathedral. “You aren’t listening!” it said.

The voice wasn’t mad. It was gentle, kind, and loving. “I want to,” I said back “Help me to hear you,” my song’s words confirmed what every bit of my being desired.

“Don’t be afraid,” the Voice said in a thousand different ways over the several years that followed.

I began to hear it in sermons and conversations with friends, in conference talks and retreats, in movies and songs. I’d see those same words on signs I’d passed while driving through the countryside, and in books I read.

I’d see them in my sons’ doodles and drawings. They’d form themselves on the pages of my journal when I prayed for guidance and direction.

“What do you want from me? What should I do?” I asked one day after I bumped into the same piece of furniture that had bruised me many times before and made me wince with pain and tear up with irritation.

“Just keep walking. And listen,” the Voice said.

But I needed something to DO about it! In an almost manic desire for answers, clear direction, simple commands, action, anything, I rearranged the furniture.

I replaced some, I cleared pathways and started paying more attention. I dug into the old boxes and let go of things that I no longer needed – stuff that weighed me down.

I cleaned the cobwebs – the silky ones you can get with a feather duster – and the invisible ones in which hurt, grief, regret, resentment and anger get stuck.

“How do you know you are following the right voice?” a friend asked when I told them I was moving away.

“Because when it speaks, I’m at peace,” I replied. And because I noticed how following it was helping me to remove a lot of stuff that was causing me the anxiety on that first night when I heard the Voice. I was already resting and sleeping better.

But I knew the path I was on wouldn’t always feel as exciting and rewarding. It wouldn’t always be about moving and replacing the furniture and going through old boxes. I knew the Voice would eventually call me to a much harder task.

One day, I found myself at a place where a rope bridge was strung over a deep canyon. “Don’t be afraid,” the Voice repeated. “Take your time, if you need to. But you are here – ready to step over into your new life.”

I set up a camp and took my time. I didn’t want to step over. I liked where I had been. I stayed up all night and in the constellations of the stars looked for the memories I didn’t want to be over.

I waited for the dawn to greet the faces of the people who had walked with me on this side – with whom I said goodbyes when they reached their own edge of the world, but who still felt close as long as I was staying in the same place.

I cried watching the sun disappear, taking another day I couldn’t have back.

I clenched the baby pictures of my children in my hands as if by holding onto them I could bring back the days of their little voices giggling and laughing and running around and crying when they fell down.

But the storm was coming and I knew it was time to move. I took a deep breath, stood up and walked over to the bridge. I shivered with fear so bad, it made the bridge swing. “I know you are with me. Hold me please,” I whispered.

Then I fixed my eyes on the edge in front of me and moved one foot in front of the other.

When I got to the other side, the Love, the peace,
the Voice were already there.

“It wasn’t so bad,” it said. “Yes it was! It was horrible, and painful, and devastating, and lonely, and I can’t believe I’m here,” I yelled out loud hysterically.

Then I sat on the ground and wept.

When I looked up, the bridge was gone. There was no way back, only forward.

Everything I had seemed to be on the other side.

But the truth was, everything I needed I had right where I was.

I got back on my feet and kept moving. “I love you,” the Voice and I said at the same time.

“Let’s go.”

Tatiana “Tajci” Cameron is an award-winning music artist, published author, inspirational speaker, and certified transformational and spiritual life coach.

She has many passions and is dedicated to helping others while also creating an enriched life for herself and her three sons. 

When Tajci is not on the road performing gigs, she volunteers with local organizations dear to her heart, spends time with loved ones (often involving music!), and collaborates with other artists to bring creative projects to life.

Tajci’s most recent projects include a meditation CD, an annual retreat & sea cruise in Croatia (that she organizes and hosts), and a multimedia CD/book (Un)Broken: Songs My Father Taught Me.

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