Vachon Imagined

When a woman cannot honor her father, she can become trapped in the experience of him.

He was abusive.

He was absent.

He was disrespectful.

He was vengeful.

He was also loving.

Kind.

Giving.

Understanding.

He was all of these things, existing within the movement of time. But he is not only the moments that wounded her, and he is not only the moments that comforted her.

He was a human being.

And so was she.

When a woman honors her father, she honors the truth of her own experience.

She does not deny what happened through his hands.

She does not excuse harm.

She does not erase the pain.

She honors the reality that shaped her, and through honoring that reality, she honors herself.

This does not mean she must maintain a relationship with him.

Sometimes distance is the most loving choice.

Sometimes separation creates the space necessary for healing.

Space allows.

Attachment clings.

Attachment holds consciousness in the place where the wound occurred, asking the past to become something it can no longer be.

Healing comes when what happened is allowed to move.

When she can see that she and her father were more than the roles they played.

More than their wounds.

More than their gender.

More than their beliefs.

More than their actions.

They were both life experiencing itself through imperfect human forms.

When a woman honors her father, and when a man honors his mother and father, something changes.

There is honesty.

There is love.

There is reverence.

There is respect.

Not because everything was right.

Not because everything was forgiven.

But because the truth has finally been allowed to exist without being controlled by anger, denial, or fear.

Both must participate.

Both must be willing to see.

Because where there is inequality—where one person refuses to recognize the humanity of another—peace cannot fully live.

To honor is not to surrender.

To honor is to see clearly.

And what is truly seen can finally be released.

It can finally be loved.