Grace: what's in a name?

"That's because you *are* grace",  he said.

We were in a sprawling meadow, green grass on low curvy rolling hills stretching out to the horizon.
A bright sunny day, with a glowing pink mistiness to the air.
I leaned on the wooden fence's top railing; he was on the other side of the fence, staff in hand, wizard's hat on his head, long cloak flowing.

It was one of those old school fences, with simple design, like the kind we had in front of the house in Plainfield, NJ. The supporting vertical posts were roughly hewn logs, with two larger holes bored into them. The cross posts were also roughly hewn logs, each end of the posts place in the wholes of the support posts, two levels high, continuing on across the meadow, like an army of double-crossed H's.

We had been in conversation for awhile in my dream. I'm not sure about what, but it was meaningful, and my subconscious was consulting with this particular Spirit Guide about the true meaning of me, what am I here for anyway. Or at least that's what I think would have made sense. It's often hard to remember the specificity of dreams, even lucid ones, with epic life changing insights.

I*am* grace. Right, of course. Something clicked into place in my soul. I *am* grace. I am grace. Grace is what I am. For so many years, I carried with me the thought "But by the grace of god go i." So many really stupid mistakes made out of ignorance, lack of parental and adult guidance, lack of family and financial support. The eldest, the family scapegoat, exiled after my father's death by the circumstance of it, thrust into adulthood un-prepared, un-warned, un-guided, un-supported, and grieving. The synchronicites of random acts of kindness and generous blessings of acquaintances supported my faith in a Divine Source while my faith in the God of my Religion was crumbling at the seams.

If it wasn't for grace, I would have been pregnant at least twice accidently by random men I did not know well. If it wasn't for grace, I could have been in jail for check fraud or shoplifting.. If it wasn't for grace, I could have been an alcoholic. If it wasn't for grace, I could have been chronically homeless instead of the few bouts of short lived homelessness I experienced. If it wasn't for grace, I could have been dead now, another suicide statistic. If it wasn't for grace...

I've always naturally extended grace and patience to others. I know what it is to struggle, and so I have an extra measure for the struggle of others. I know what it is to internalize and be hard on oneself about those struggles, as if a capitalist, racist, sexist structure doesn't stack the odds against someone from the jump who doesn't abide in the privileged positions on that access. I understand how it is to have low self-esteem, to think so poorly of oneself that you accept poor treatment as the norm, and to think that all the challenges of your life are your fault, and so I encourage the power in someone, as it lies dormant, and forgive and allow and flex and bend when someone's ability to be reciprocal is diminished.

Before I understood cultural appropriation in the way I do today, I was attracted to the image of a kanji and had it tatto'd on my back, my first tattoo.. It is one of the precepts of Falun Gong Chi Gong, the Chi Gong practice that is illegal to practice in China, and yet many revolutionarily do so, en masse in parks. Their mind-body-spirit practice is an act of politcal resistance, it's quite impressive. I had been practice Lotus Crane form of Xi Gong, a different practice and lineage, and knew the deep benefits of being in touch with and intentionally 'exercising' one's energetic system. There was a group practicing Falun Gong in a park in my city, and I saw the banner they had displayed on the park fence, and one of the kanji's just jumped out at me and spoke to me, called to me on an aesthetic level and soul level. It is the kanji for the word 'ren' which roughly means patience in English, but more accurately means forbearance: or holding back a punishment or effect or point of accountability when it could be enacted. In other words: grace.

I had the dream meeting with my Spirit Guide several years before this meeting with the kanji. I had contemplated for all the time changing my name to Grace. But, what would my mother think, I wondered? The name she gave me is a lovely name: Stephanie. It comes from the Greek 'stephanos', meaning 'crowned one': crowned with a crown one earns through merit of their beneficient actions and conquering of challenges. It is a good name, but also a name that somehow never seems to fit 'who I am'. I could relate to it conceptually, and appreciated the beauty of it, but something never quite identified with it. My mother told me that when she was pregnant with me she had decided that if I was a blonde, my name would be Laura, and if I was a brunette, my name would be Stephanie. But then, when she first saw me, she just decided in the moment to call me Stephanie, despite my almost platinum peach fuzz on my head.

I started going by the name Grace about a year and half  after moving to Seattle, after telling my girlfriend at the time about my dream meeting, and my thoughts around the whole thing. She said 'oh my goodness, of course your name is Grace, I'm going to just start calling you that." I met a lot of women through her as I became more settled in Seattle, and everyone from then on called me Grace. It was a transitional time and transformational time in my life, as I transitioned out of the persona of Stephanie: loud-mouthed cleavage-showing drinks-too-much hot head Italian-Pollock from NJ who became a nomadic hippie and landed on the West Coast in a Honda CRX with her girlfriend. Grace moved me forward into a life where I took my raw skills of Sight, energetic sensitivity and interest in healing through trainings and education which gave me language and skills for my gift of grace and compassion and understanding for others as an empathic, highly sensitive person. With a Mars in Scorpio, I've had several re-births in my life, and this was a significant one, from Stephanie to Grace. From earned merit reward to unearned gift of generosity, compassion and love.

You can tell how long someone has known me by if they call me Stephanie or Grace. Some people made the switch with me, some came along eventually. Some just know me as Stephanie, and that is perfectly ok with me, I am still she. That *is* my name. Two of my sisters call me Grace, two of my  sisters call me Stephanie. I am both Aunt Grace and Aunt Stephanie. And sometimes when old friends and lovers call me Grace, it just seems odd and inappropriate. I don't mind if people stick with Stephanie if they knew me when.

When people meet me now, as Grace, many often comment on the name saying that they love that name and mention a beloved grandmother or aunt who had that name. I smile and nod and say that I do my best to live up to my name. And I do. But for the grace of God go I, and so I give this spiritual gift of Grace to you. At your service.