Silhouettes on the Wall

By Frances Mead-Messinger

Out of adversity grew a life of brilliance. The greatest wish of this exceptiona woman is to share her light with others

• Language: English
• Publisher: BookBaby
• Release date: Mar 15, 2015
• ISBN: 9781483550008

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1. The Big Bang: Give What You Want to Receive!

I AM SMALL and hungry. My cot is so hard it hurts. The room is crowded with cots, but I feel so lonely! It is quiet, dark, and smelly in here. Where is my mommy? Where is daddy? As I open my eyes, all of a sudden, a bright warm light comes through the window, and dark gray shadows appear on the wall behind the little girls sleeping across the aisle from me. A kind of spell comes over me as I stare at these shadows. I think to myself: Oh, these poor little girls. I need to help them.

Lying there in my little cot, astonished by those sad silhouettes, I had discovered that other children, too, were abandoned, alone, and in need of love. Somehow, deep down, I realized that caring for them was not optional for me, but a necessary part of living. With that thought—at five years old in this somber orphanage of little compassion—I instantly rose from my pity pot I’d been stuck in and turned my energy toward the others. It was the Big Bang for me! This is when my true life began.

I called over to a little girl who was crying. Softly, I said the words that set the tone for the rest of my life, Can I help you? The frightened girl stopped sobbing. She looked shyly at me. I could see she sensed that someone was there for her, even though that someone was as tiny as she was and had as little power in this place as herself. She knew she was no longer alone.

After that, I just kept asking other little girls at the orphanage the same question: Can I help you? I did whatever I could. I might have died in that orphanage from what I now know as failure to thrive syndrome—since I’d arrived there I’d been too traumatized to eat—but the energy I received from helping to sustain others helped to sustain me.

It is true that every condition one flees from will persist (as opposed to welcoming a condition that transforms). However, the age of five, when normally the social self has not emerged, is quite young to face all alone such powerful emotions as hurt, loss, loneliness, and fear. Coping with these emotions can allow us to meet our internal warriors and experience transformation within, but this typically occurs at a more advanced age.

The roots of altruism begin to form during infancy. For example, have you heard a baby begin to cry upon hearing another baby crying.? However, the movement toward reaching out to another, in order to offer assistance, typically begins developing in late childhood or early teens.

As I view it, my life did not begin at birth, February 26, 1933, but rather at this moment of incredible insight I gained in the orphanage when I was five. Helping other children in need allowed me to rise above my own desperate and dying condition. This early enlightenment has forever assisted me in facing my internal slings and arrows with a tender heart of compassion. I learned to give what I wished to receive.

2. Prior to the Awakening

MY EARLIEST MEMORIES are full of strife. When I was very young, I still lived with my mother and father in Arkansas. I remember that I slept on a cot in a kitchen niche by a small dim window and was constantly jolted awake by yelling matches between my parents in their bedroom.

I want to go dancing, my mother demanded. Let’s go!

No. Not tonight. My father’s voice got louder. Is that all you care about? We don’t have any money!

"Well, go get a real job then!" she shouted back. (My father was a saxophone player.)

On and on it went.

Hunger also remains a prevalent memory. I clearly recall my mother receiving $1.00 from her mother, my Grandmother Cleo, when I was about four. We discussed what to do with the precious dollar we’d been sent, following my mother’s plea to her.

So, Frances Ann, my mother said, what do you think we should buy with this money?

I don’t know, Mama, I need some milk…and a box of cereal will last us a long time, won’t it?

Yes it will, she said, and a loaf of bread will keep for a while too.

At the age of four, under the pressure of hunger, I had to learn to think and plan ahead. It was not simply a case of rushing to the market for food, but required choosing items that would last and help stave off hunger for as long as possible. What a gift these lessons in strategizing turned out to be! The choice to overcome adversity and learn from it became vital to me, physically and psychologically—and neuropsychologically, which happens to be the field I later specialized in. Additionally, I was able to change what could have become a negative pattern in the brain to a positive pattern.

Every thought we have releases chemicals in the brain. Therefore, when we have positive thoughts, such as grateful, happy, or hopeful ones, our brains release chemicals creating good feelings, along with a more efficient brain function.

Hunger was one form of adversity. Cruelty was another. I believe I was well behaved as a young child, yet my parents frequently and horrifically punished me for minor lapses by shutting me in a dark closet with the door closed. One time I ran down the street after some children on their way to school. I was hoping to tag along because I knew a lot of kids would be there and I wanted to be with them. But I was caught and returned to the closet! My parents told me I must stay there until they opened the door. I couldn’t tell you how long I was in that closet. I have no way of judging.. .it just felt long!

My most happy recollections from this time in the mid-1930s involve sleeping on the rumble seat of a two-door car, parked outside a bar as the upbeat sounds of Big Band music drifted out into the night. Inside, my father played the saxophone and my mother danced. Big Band music and jitterbug dancing boosted the spirits of many people during the hard times and eventual recovery from the Great Depression. This may be the reason music has such a huge effect on my mood. It makes me feel free! Curled up in the back seat with waves of music washing over me seemed like heaven. This glorious music freed me to see beyond my eyesight! I knew fun things were out there somewhere.

When I was about five, my mother decided to leave my father because employment for musicians other than Big Band players was hard to come by, and she thought she could do better. She also decided to place me in St. Josephs Orphanage, outside of Little Rock. I